West Berlin
West Berlin was the name given to the western part of
Berlin between
1949 and
1990. It consisted of the American, British, and French occupation sectors established in
1945. It was in many ways integrated with, although legally not a part of,
West Germany. The
Soviet sector became
East Berlin, which
East Germany claimed as its capital; however, the Western Allies did not recognize this claim, as they asserted that the whole city was legally under four-power occupation. The building of the
Berlin Wall in 1961 sealed the border to West Berlin, which since the end of the
Second World War had been surrounded by
communist East Berlin and East Germany.
Officially, West Berlin was called "Berlin (West)" by the West Germany government, and, for most of the period of its existence, "Westberlin" by the East German government; the latter began to use "Berlin (West)" in the period just before reunification. East Berlin was officially called
Berlin, Hauptstadt der DDR ("Berlin, Capital of the GDR"), or simply "Berlin," by East Germany.
The
Potsdam Agreement established the legal framework for the occupation of Germany in the wake of
World War II. According to the agreement, Germany would be formally under the
sovereignty of the four major wartime allies until a German government acceptable to them all could be reconstituted. Germany would be divided into four sectors, each administered by one of the allies. Berlin, though surrounded by the Soviet sector, would be similarly divided, with the western allies occupying an
enclave consisting of the western parts of the city. According to the agreement, the occupation of Berlin would only end as a result of a four-power agreement. (This clause did
not apply to Germany as a whole.) The western allies were guaranteed an air corridor to their sectors of Berlin, and the Soviets also informally allowed road and rail access between West Berlin and the western parts of Germany.
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Occupied Berlin |
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Boroughs of West Berlin |
At first, this arrangement was officially a temporary administrative expedient, and all parties declared that Germany and Berlin would soon be reunited. However, as the relations between the western allies and the Soviet Union soured and the
cold war began, the joint administration of Germany and Berlin broke down. Soon Soviet-occupied Berlin and western-occupied Berlin had entirely separate city administrations. In 1948, the Soviets tried to force the issue and expel the western allies from Berlin by imposing a land blockade on the western sectors. The west responded by using its guaranteed air corridors to resupply the city in what became known as the
Berlin Airlift. In May 1949, the Soviets lifted their blockade, and the future of West Berlin as a separate jurisdiction was ensured. By the end of that year, two new states had been created out of occupied Germany - the
Federal Republic of Germany (
West Germany) in the West and the
German Democratic Republic (
East Germany) in the East - with West Berlin an enclave surrounded by, but not part of, the latter.
According to the legal theory followed by the western allies, the occupation of most of Germany ended in 1949 with the declaration of the Federal Republic of Germany and the German Democratic Republic. However, because the occupation of Berlin could only be ended by a four-party agreement, Berlin remained occupied territory under the formal sovereignty of the allies. (The Soviets unilaterally declared the occupation of East Berlin at an end along with the rest of East Germany, but this move was not recognized by the western allies.)
In many ways, West Berlin functioned as a
de facto part of
West Germany, and was portrayed on maps as being a part of that state. Inhabitants of West Berlin were West German citizens, and there was freedom of movement (to the extent allowed by geography) between West Berlin and West Germany.
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In 1969 Berlin Brigade troops of the U.S. Army roar through morning rush hour traffic in a Zehlendorf residential district, a routine reminder that West Berlin was still legally occupied by the World War II victors. |
But the western allies remained the ultimate political authorities there. West Berlin was run by an elected Mayor and city government at
Rathaus Schöneberg, but this government formally derived its authority from the occupying forces, not its electoral mandate. West Berlin was not considered to be a
Bundesland, nor part of one, and the
Grundgesetz (constitution of the Federal Republic) had no application there.
This meant that West Berliners were not eligible to vote in federal elections; instead, they were indirectly represented in the
Bundestag by 20 non-voting delegates chosen by the West Berlin House of Representatives. Similarly, the West Berlin Senate sent non-voting delegates to the
Bundesrat. However as citizens of the Federal Republic, West Berliners could still be elected from party lists to the proportional seats in the
Bundestag; West Berlin Mayor
Willy Brandt became
Chancellor through this method in 1969.
The ambiguous status of West Berlin also meant that men there were exempt from the Federal Republic's compulsory military service; this exemption made the city a popular home for West German youths, which resulted in a flourishing
counterculture that became one of the defining features of the city.
Other anomalies included "provisional ID cards" without the German coat of arms, a ban on
Lufthansa flights to the city, and a West Berlin postal administration, separate from West Germany's, which issued its own
postage stamps until 1990.
While West Berlin was a formally separate jurisdiction from East Berlin after 1949, there was for more than a decade freedom of movement between the two, and in many ways Berlin still functioned as a single city. The
U-Bahn and
S-Bahn public transit networks, rebuilt after the war, spanned all occupation sectors. Many people lived in one half of the city and had family members, friends, and jobs in the other.
As the Cold War continued, many East Germans began leaving East Germany for the West. East Germany closed the borders between East and West Germany in 1952, but did not seal off West Berlin; because there was freedom of movement between West Berlin and West Germany, Easterners could use the city as a transit point to the West. It was in large part to stop this drain that the East German government built the
Berlin Wall, thus physically closing off West Berlin from East Germany, on
August 13,
1961. It was still possible to travel from West Berlin to West Germany by air and by specific rail and
autobahn transit routes set aside for that purpose, but inhabitants of the two Berlins were now physically and legally separated from each other.
On
June 26,
1963, U.S. President
John F. Kennedy visited West Berlin and gave a public speech known for its famous phrase "
Ich bin ein Berliner."
The
Four Power Agreement on Berlin (September 1971) and the
Transit Agreement (May 1972), helped to ease the tensions over West Berlin and at a practical level made it easier for West Berliners to travel to East Germany and simplified the bureaucracy for Germans travelling along the autobahn transit routes.
At the
Brandenburg Gate in
1987, President
Ronald Reagan provided a challenge to the then-Soviet premier: "General Secretary
Gorbachev, if you seek peace, if you seek prosperity for the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, if you seek liberalization: Come here to this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, open this gate! Mr. Gorbachev,
tear down this wall."
On
November 9,
1989 the wall was opened, and the two cities were once again physically - though still not legally - united. The so-called
Two Plus Four Treaty, signed by the two German states and the four wartime allies, paved the way for
German reunification and an end to the western occupation of West Berlin. On
October 3,
1990 West Berlin and East Berlin were united as the city of Berlin, which then acceded to the Federal Republic as a
Bundesland, along with the rest of East Germany. West Berlin and East Berlin thus both formally ceased to exist.
West Berlin comprised the following
boroughs:
In the American Sector:
*
Neukölln*
Kreuzberg*
Schöneberg*
Steglitz*
Tempelhof*
ZehlendorfIn the British Sector:
*
Charlottenburg*
Tiergarten*
Wilmersdorf*
SpandauIn the French Sector:
*
Reinickendorf*
Wedding*
Berlin*
Berlin Blockade*
Berlin 1969 - In the forgotten midpoint of the Cold War*
Berlin Wall*
Berlin Exclaves*
Bonn*
East Berlin*
East Germany*
Germany*
Ghost stations*
History of Germany since 1945*
RAF Gatow*
History of the Western Allies in Berlin*
Judgment in Berlin*
1986 Berlin discotheque bombing*
Spandau Prison*
Stunde Null*
West Germany*
Berlin Brigade*
United States Army Berlin
