Imposing alien doctrine

The collapse of the Berlin Wall was not a victory of the democratic west, it was the failure of communism in practice.

By Rafal Szymanski

Twenty years ago, the Berlin Wall fell, which caused November 9 to become a symbolic day for the German people. Live coverage from Germany showed magnificent concerts, a ceremonial domino toppling, mass rallies, impassioned speeches, and, undoubtedly, fireworks! It was a celebration based on feelings: of accomplishment, remembrance, and victory.

I watched the news coverage of this anniversary. The German chancellor Angela Merkel ended her speech by mentioning the many casualties that came as a result of this wall. It is a nice gesture to remember: those that died trying to escape or fighting to tear it down.

Merkel herself held back tears while uttering these words and I found myself lost. Although it is important to remember all victims of war and the after-effects of them, no mention was made to the purpose of the wall, or the circumstances that surround it. I found it grotesque to actively abstain from even mentioning the reasons for this crisis.

We are misinformed because we are not given an objective account to what led to the Wall’s demise. We are led by our emotions to feel for the 136 documented victims of the Berlin Wall. Yet no mention was made to remember why Germany was divided in the first place.

At the time the wall was erected, Germany was a nation whose history had revealed it as a constant war-monger due to having waged two World Wars. World War I acted in allowing Germany to specialize in becoming the most effective war machine in the world at the time In World War II, the country had a hand in the death of 110 million people – including the carefully planned and executed extermination of 6 million. At the Potsdam Conference in 1945, Roosevelt and Stalin arranged for the division of Germany following the war. While West Germnay enjoyed liberation and democracy, the East found themselves under the rule of Russia’s Soviet Empire.

Winston Churchill himself said that history is written by the victors. Even though the creation of the wall was not an Allied decision, it was a decision made by one of the victors. Those that lived under the repression of communism understand the harsh cruelty of these words and the reality that follows them. Churchill’s statement benefits those living in the western post-war world while sentencing those behind the Iron Curtain to decades of sanctioned slavery.

The Berlin Wall is seen by the western world as oppressive and unfair. It was not something that was built to benefit Germany, but to prevent it from devising a “three-peat”. The division of Germany was a result of world fear. Fear of Germany once again revolting against peace and starting yet another World War. Germany waged both World Wars in the past. Europe would not take another war. In a way, the world did not have a choice, Germany, a misbehaving member in the European family, had to be punished. Its division was its punishment.

The anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall was undoubtedly covered by the media. The day was filled with countless references to the US President Ronald Reagan demanding Gorbachev to “tear down that wall.” Coming from Europe, it almost made me laugh at how much emphasis was put on Reagan all throughout the day.

By the time of Reagan’s speech, given in June 1987, the political climate in Europe was much different than our media portrays. The “Red Scare” that frightened the western world was weakening. Communism no longer wielded the same power and influence it once did. Gorbachev had no other choice but to cede and allow for the wall to collapse. It collapsed like the very system it represented did. The reason for this was the slow but constant degeneration of the communist ideology and power in Europe, not the rest of the world. Obviously, pressures from democratic countries did strain and weaken the crumbling pillars of Communist Russia and it would be unethical to say that they had no part in it, but they were not the main factor.

It is disturbing to neglect two major factors: the local nationalistic movements, and the papacy. Pope John Paul II was a catalyst for the collapse of communism. Without his support, there would not have been a successful Solidarnosc movement in Poland. In the Kremlin, and the media, Gorbachev himself stated the extent of the Pope’s influence in the fall of Communism.

The Pope’s visit in 1979 gave the people this support. Without Poland as an example to the world (that Communism can be defeated) it is hard to say if other Soviet satellite countries would do the same. It was the unending uprisings, revolts, upheavals in Communist occupied countries that proved to be too much for an unwelcomed foreign doctrine. That is what Communism was, an alien doctrine imposed upon mass populations by force.

The collapse of the Berlin Wall was not a victory of the democratic west, it was the failure of communism in practice.

Rafal Szymanski is a Staff Writer for the Baron.