Читать книгу Where in the World is the Berlin Wall? - Группа авторов - Страница 11

At the start of the summer holidays in 1961, the amount of people fleeing the GDR soared. Many people disguised their escape as a holiday. This was a reaction to the foreign policy as well as the dramatic economic climate and the drastic supply problems that continually escalated.¹⁶

As part of a propaganda offensive, the GDR government depicted the refugee movement as a specific method of alienation from the West. In order to prevent further escapes, the GDR set up “human trafficking committees”. Alleged “human traffickers” were sentenced to harsh sentences in staged trials. By doing this, the government wanted to distract attention from the truth that people were leaving the GDR of their own free will. So-called border workers were also targeted. These were people who lived in East Berlin but worked in West Berlin.¹⁷ They were inspected more frequently at the border and some had their passports and ID taken from them so that they were no longer able to go to work in the West. Their number had risen to 56,000 due to the economic disparity between West and East Berlin before the Wall was built.¹⁸

Border workers were paid partly in West German currency and the GDR government used this as propaganda to cause jealousy and resentment amongst the people towards the border workers and also as a means to justify the harsh state treatment towards them. Any wages paid in West German currency were subject to a compulsory exchange. Many services could be exchanged in the GDR for West German cash. In early August, the border workers were forced to give up their jobs in the West and register as job-seekers in the GDR.

GDR propaganda aimed to denounce West Berlin as a dangerous trouble spot in the East-West conflict. The GDR’s campaign accused the FRG government of intensive war preparations, aiming to conquer the GDR and parts of Poland.

The increasing measures taken against refugees and border workers, as well as the fierce propaganda campaigns in the GDR, increased suspicions in the West that it would not just be individuals who were victimised by the GDR government. A televised speech by Khrushchev on 7^th August 1961 caused many of those watching to fear that a Wall may be built along the Berlin border. People assumed, however, that the measures would be enforced along the “ring around Berlin”. Nobody thought that the city would be cordoned off. That was a massive error of judgement, as would soon be proved.