The Berlin Wall was part of history very well documented. I rode a train through East Germany to visit West Berlin in 1987 when it was still divided.
In 1974 West Germany began to seek new normal relations with East Germany with Ostpolitik. It began to work. West Berlin was like an island of freedom in East Germany.
Earlier the Soviets had blockaded the west from reaching it by rail and road. The Berlin airlift kept supplies reaching Western sectors of the city. Then the wall was built in the city to prevent Germans from escaping. It required the Nixon administration and Henry Kissinger working with
Willie Brandt and Helmut Schmidt to get the trash flowing freely to communist dumps in a sign of trust and progress.
