On the Right

Berlin, Mar. 21—We are all vaguely familiar with the arrangements, but having just today laid eyes on them for the first time, I think you would want to be reminded. First there is shoulder-high mortar and concrete. Then there is a stretch of earth, about ten yards wide. It is advertised that there are land mines buried here and there, though we are for obvious reasons not given a guide as to their exact location. After that there are tank-stoppers, which look like a knot of barbed wire, made of concrete, and magnified one hundred times. Then there is another stretch of earth, about five yards wide, where dogs run, Alsatians trained to bark and bite. Then there is a concertina of barbed wire, some of it rusty in appearance, some looking as if made of stainless steel. Either way, enough to serve its purpose. And, finally, the Wall.

Yes, ladies and gentlemen, the most impenetrable wall in modern history. Itistobe distinguished from other fortifications in that it is very nearly unique, having no analogue save in prison walls. It is intended not to keep people from coming in to disturb the security and serenity of the Wall’s custodians. Its function is to keep people who are inside the Wall’s boundaries from going out. Thus 17 million East Germans are prevented from doing the kind of thing they were doing before the Wall was created: leaving a totalitarian society and heading to West Berlin. There they would arrive with a suitcase of old clothes and baby pictures, and nothing else. But freedom. The month before the Wall went up on August 13, 1961, 25,000 Germans fled Communist Germany.

About the Author

William F. Buckley Jr.

William F. Buckley Jr. founded National Review magazine in 1955.

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Berlin, Mar. 21—We are all vaguely familiar with the arrangements, but having just today laid eyes on them for the first time, I think you would want to be reminded. First there is shoulder-high mortar and concrete. Then there is a stretch of earth, about ten yards wide. It is advertised that there are land mines buried here and there, though we are for obvious reasons not given a guide as to their exact location. After that there are tank-stoppers, which look like a knot of barbed wire, made of concrete, and magnified one hundred times. Then there is another stretch of earth, about five yards wide, where dogs run, Alsatians trained to bark and bite. Then there is a concertina of barbed wire, some of it rusty in appearance, some looking as if made of stainless steel. Either way, enough to serve its purpose. And, finally, the Wall.

Yes, ladies and gentlemen, the most impenetrable wall in modern history. Itistobe distinguished from other fortifications in that it is very nearly unique, having no analogue save in prison walls. It is intended not to keep people from coming in to disturb the security and serenity of the Wall’s custodians. Its function is to keep people who are inside the Wall’s boundaries from going out. Thus 17 million East Germans are prevented from doing the kind of thing they were doing before the Wall was created: leaving a totalitarian society and heading to West Berlin. There they would arrive with a suitcase of old clothes and baby pictures, and nothing else. But freedom. The month before the Wall went up on August 13, 1961, 25,000 Germans fled Communist Germany.