Killing of Peter Fechter - Background

Background

After World War II, Germany was governed jointly by an Allied Control Council consisting of the victorious Allied nations — The United Kingdom, the United States, the Soviet Union and France. Governmental decisions had to be unanimously approved by all four Allies. Germany was divided into Allied Occupation Zones to be administered directly by the military of each Allied state. The German capital, Berlin, was itself specially divided into four zones, one for each Ally, due to its importance.

As the Cold War escalated, the Potsdam Agreement on managing Germany disintegrated, and the Allied Control Council became ineffective. The country was de facto divided into West Germany and East Germany, corresponding to the areas occupied by the western Allies and the Soviet Union, respectively. Berlin, which lay entirely within the territory of the new East, was divided into West Berlin and East Berlin. From 1945, East Germany's civilian local governments were dominated by social democrats, but in 1949, the Soviets formed a government under the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED) led by Walter Ulbricht. Despite tensions, open borders were more or less maintained within Berlin itself for some time. But the increasing flight of many refugees from East Berlin to the West prompted the Communist government to build the Berlin Wall, beginning in 1961. Though officially billed by the government as an "Anti-Fascist Protection Wall," ostensibly to keep lingering elements of the former Nazi regime harbored by the West out of East Berlin, the wall, in contrast to usual border fortifications, was primarily designed to prevent East German citizens from escaping into West Berlin and seeking political asylum.