Berlin Wall Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words

Berlin Wall - Research Paper Example After the Second World War, Joseph Stalin of the Soviet Union established an informal union of states which would be known later as the Eastern bloc, with Poland, Hungary, and Czechoslovakia as its allies (Wettig, 2008).   It was a grouping of nations which he planned to maintain together with the Soviet-controlled portion of Germany.   His plans were to compromise the power of the UK over its portion and when the US would later withdraw, he then wanted to push forward with his plants to create a united communist Germany (Wettig, 2008).   In order to funnel Soviet communist ideals to Germany, Marxism-Leninism became a standard part of the German school curriculum and this prompted many students, as well as scholars to defect to the West (Wettig, 2008).   East Germany was however under close monitoring by the German police as well as the Soviet secret police, also known as the SMERSH (Wettig, 2008).   This made defection difficult, but not impossible for thousands of East Ge rmans.     With disagreements regarding the introduction of new German currency, Stalin implemented the Berlin blockade which prevented the entry of food and other supplies from the Western occupied blocs (Pearson, 1988).   The Western bloc countries then airlifted some supplied into West Berlin.   The Soviets launched their public relations campaign against the Western bloc protesting the policy changes of the Western countries (Pearson, 1988).   As 300,000 Berliners protested against Stalin’s actions in stopping the airlifts.