The most famous border crossing was known as Checkpoint Charlie. On border grounds, at least 140 people died either by gunshot, by fatal accident while trying to escape, or suicide.
To prevent attempts to scale the wall or escape by digging underneath, the wall was reinforced with barbed wire, spikes, metal gratings, bunkers and vehicles made into obstacles.Ī wide-open area of dirt and sand, a buffer zone between the two walls, became known as “no man’s land” or the “death strip,” where guards in watch towers could shoot anyone trying to escape. The wall between East and West Berlin was nearly 12 feet high and approximately 27 miles long, with 302 guard towers and 55,000 anti-personnel explosive devices (landmines). The Berlin Wall began as a border of barbed wire fencing and evolved into a fortified concrete barrier with armed East German border guards.Įast Germany militarized the entire border with the West, laying more than one million land mines and deploying around 3,000 attack dogs. It became a symbol of East/West relations during the Cold War. Here’s some background information about the Berlin Wall, which enclosed West Berlin from 1961 to 1989, in an attempt to prevent East Germans from fleeing to the West.
