THE FALL OF THE WALL

My children could not understand why I was SO HAPPY when the Berlin Wall fell. I did not know how to explain that an entire country had been a prison.

So I told them that I had been on the other side of The Wall. I went on a tour of East Berlin from West Berlin. The entire city of East Berlin looked totally empty, with almost no cars on the streets. The guide said that it was a holiday.

Even the museum was empty. We were quickly shown the bust of Nefertiti, and then were told to go immediately to the bus. But I saw the fabled gates of Babylon, and could not resist a quick side trip to see them more closely. When the guide found me, she was trembling with fear. As if losing me would cost her life.

On the way back to West Berlin, we had plenty of time to see The Wall as our bus was searched for people trying to escape into the West. The Wall looked like prison walls, with barbed wire on top, guard towers, guards with machine guns. A large mirror was bought out to search under the bus.

Since then, I have visited several US prisons. NONE of them had anywhere near the number of machine guns per yard as did The Berlin Wall.

If you use just intimidation to govern, then eventually you have to imprison all of your people to keep them from escaping into freedom. Or else all that can escape, do escape. Leaving you to govern the ones who have figuratively crawled into bed and pulled up the covers.

Now, twenty five years later, the old Soviets are trying intimidation one more time.

If I were them, I would worry that their aging nuclear weapons might blow up in their faces.