"Die Mauer ist gefallen!"

Like many other people in the West I looked at events in Tiananmen Square in June 1989 and thought that the communist regimes across the world were as entrenched as they ever were. I certainly not expect to see the communist states of Eastern Europe tumble by the end of the year - as if their foundations were built on sand

Having said that the first signs were already there: Poland had already made a stride towards freedom with the legalisation of Solidarity. The party sweeping gains made in the country’s first free elections in decades, sadly just after the start of the start of Tiananmen massacre. Following the defection of communist satellite parties Solidarity was able to establish the country’s first non- Communist government since WWII.



Hungary was next. The stage was set in 1988 with the removal of the Janos Kadar who had ruled the country since 1956, it was fitting that Kadar, who died in July 1989, lived just long enough to see his murdered predecessor Imre Nagy reinterred.
But I digress. By October 1989 the Hungarian Communist Party had dissolved itself. Hungary’s borders were already open.

For us in the West the iconic moment was the day, twenty years ago, when the Berlin Wall came tumbling down, first metaphorically and then literally.

I saw the Berlin Wall just once, in August 1980. Apart from the amusing graffiti (such as “Warning! Practice area for East German Pole Vault team” or something like that - it is nearly 30 years ago!), I though then, noting the memorials to those murdered trying to escape, that I would never see it fall. It looked ugly, brutal and immutable and tragically permanent.
It did not matter that thousands of East Germans had already take advantage of Hungary’s open border; the opening of the Wall was the iconic moment that marked the spirit of the age

The day it fell

This timeline is based on one in the Independent.

1000hrs 9 November Central Committee members the Interior Ministry, officials and State Security officers attend meetings to draw up new travel regulations to try to stem the tide of citizens fleeing to the West.

Noon, Agreement reached: all restrictions on permanently leaving the country are lifted, and the ban on anyone under pensionable age making temporary trips will be dropped.

1800hrs Günter Schabowski, acting spokesman for the Central Committee, gives a press conference to announce the new regulations. It is broadcast live on television.

Schabowski: "... therefore, ah, we have decided on a new regulation today that makes it possible for every citizen of the GDR, ah, to exit via border crossing points of the, ah, GDR...

Krzysztof Janowski (Voice of America): "From when does that apply?"

Schabowski: "Well, comrades, I was informed today ..." (puts on spectacles, reads out press release on visa procedure).

Reporter: "When does that take effect?"

Schabowski (searching through papers): "That takes, to my knowledge, that is... immediately. Without delay."

Later Schabowski admitted that he had made a mistake. The authorities intended all East Germans to apply for travel visas to the west from the next day...

But the genie is out of the bottle

1905hrs The Associated Press flashes the headline: "GDR OPENS BORDER". West Germany's nightly news programme Tageschau carries highlights of Schabowski's press conference. Its correspondent reports: "They are supposed to start letting people through the wall overnight."

The show has a big East German audience...

2015hrs East Berliners start to congregate at three of the city's border crossing points: Heinrich-Heine-Strasse, Bornholmer Strasse, and Invalidenstrasse. At Bornholmer, they are told to return the next day, but are in no mood to listen. The officer in charge, Lt-Col Harald Jäger, tries to bring the ever-growing numbers under control. He seizes a megaphone and tells them:

"Comrade Schabowski has announced new travel legislation, but you need official permission to make use of it. You can get that permission from the people's police [Volkspolizei] but not from us. "

The crowd answers: "He said immediately – and without delay!"

Everyone heads towards the nearest People's Police office but comes back 10 minutes later.

2047hrs Oblivious to the crowds and to the shock generated by Schabowski's error, the Central Committee winds up proceedings for the day.

2130hrs Crowds build at crossing points. At Bornholmer Strasse nearly a thousand people press to be let through, chanting "Wir wollen rüber!" ("We want to go over!") Armed border guards look on. "If we shoot then they will hang us from the lampposts," says one. Lt-Col Jäger calls Stasi headquarters for orders. He is told: "Jäger, I cannot give you any decision, I am not getting any instructions from my superiors either." Jäger calls for an additional 60 armed guards.

2150hrs At Bornholmer Strasse crossing point, Lt-Col. Jäger decides to single out the noisiest East Germans and let them through. He tells his men to give their passports a special stamp which means they have been permanently expelled. One by one, they are allowed into West Berlin through an electrically operated steel gate.

2228hrs East German television's late-night show Aktuelle Kamera, tries to clarify the official line:

"At the request of many citizens, we inform you again about the new travel resolution issued by the Council of Ministers. First: private trips can be applied for without having to give reasons for the trip or proof of family relationships. In other words: applications have to be made for travel!"

Needless to say this is far too little, far too late!

2230hrs At the East German Central Committee building, a panicked Krenz tells two colleagues: "What am I supposed to do? I can't shut the borders now!"

2242hrs On West German television, Joachim Friedrichs, presenter of ARD's news show Tagesthemen, opens the programme: "Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. One should be cautious with superlatives; they tend to wear out fast. But this evening it is permissible to risk one: this ninth of November is a historic day: the GDR has announced that its borders are open to everyone as of now; the gates in the Wall are wide open."

It is his words that change the numbers going to the border from a stream to a torrent.

2300hrs Barbara Henniger, a cartoonist from a town just outside East Berlin, rushes with her family to Bornholmer Strasse. "The streets were crowded with people cheering, crying, and practically dancing. We were delirious. The border police first tried to channel the crowd through a small gate, but it was impossible and they had to open the main gate. And then, everybody just danced into the West."

2330hrs At Bornholmer Strasse, a crowd of 20,000 East Berliners chant "Tor Auf!" ("Open the Gate!"), and shove towards the crossing point. A wire fence gives way. Lt-Col Jäger shouts to his guards: "Open the barriers !" He says later: "All I was thinking about now was how to avoid bloodshed. There were so many people and they didn't have the space to move. If a panic developed, people would have been crushed."

2350hrs The Stasi orders the opening of all crossing points in the Wall including Checkpoint Charlie, Invalidenstrasse and Heinrich-Heine-Strasse. Everywhere there are scenes of frantic jubilation. Decades of confinement in communist East Germany are ending.

Postscript, Friday 10 November 1989 0000hrs Waiter Torsten Ryl is one of the many piling through. As he speaks to a reporter, a middle-aged West Berliner interrupts, gives him 20 marks, and says: "Why don't you get yourself a beer first?"



On 10 November, Bulgaria’s senile dictator Todor Zhivkov was deposed but it was not until 1990 that the Communists finally lost power.

On 16 November the Velvet Revolution started in Czechoslovakia. The Revolution continued to the end of December but the communist government was deposed. Happily Alexander Dubcek, who presided over the Prague Spring in 1968 lived long enough to become the speaker of the first post communist parliament. He died in 1992, Czechoslovakia died the following year following the “Velvet Divorce”.

Ion Iliescu, a wryneck

It was not until December that Romania fell. Although here had been unrest in the final years of the brutal regime of Nazi Nicolai Ceausescu (e.g. in Brasov in 1987), he held on longer than other leaders.. He was executed on 25 December but sadly this was not the end of Romania’s troubles. In 1991 there was more violence as the former communist, now leader of the Romanian National Salvation Front and wryneck (to use a German expression) Ion Ilisecu used miners to put down opposition demonstrations. Sadly this was the most violent of the revolutions in Eastern Europe. The break-up of Yugoslavia aside.

Even Albania got in on the act: Ramiz Alia, who, having intention of ending the same way as his Romanian counterpart, had already introduced cautious reforms. He was finally ousted in 1992.