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| Building the Wall Photo: Wikipedia |
Highly effective, the wall included weaponized guard
towers. Wide areas called “death strips” had anti-vehicle trenches, beds of
nails, and other devices that were supposedly installed to protect the innocent
German population from fascist elements that were colluding to prevent the building
of the socialist state called Deutsche Demokratische Republik (DDR), a state
ruled by force, fear, and coercion.
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| Iron Curtain border Photo: Wikipedia Commons |
The Berlin Wall was meant to keep people in, prisoners to
the Stasi police and to the Soviet communists. Stasi, an abbreviation of the
official name, Ministerium
für Staatsicherheit (Ministry for State Security), was the secret police
of the German Democratic Republic (East Germany) and one of the most hated and
feared institutions of the communist government.
As the communists went underground to reorganize in order
to emerge later in a more powerful form, the infamous Berlin Wall, a symbol of
communist oppression, started coming down on November 9, 1989.
The Iron Curtain, a term coined following the end of WWII,
during the dark period of communist oppression, was an actual barbed wire strip
of land which separated the free European nations of the west from the communist-enslaved
nations of the east, Poland, East Germany, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, USSR,
Yugoslavia, Bulgaria, Albania, and Romania.
On the western side of the Berlin Wall was Checkpoint Charlie manned by three
western nations. Many citizens of the communist –enslaved nations attempted to
flee across this wall and a few actually made it while others died trying. In
remembrance of the daring escapes of those who attempted the impossible and
lived to talk about it, a museum was organized in Berlin.
Checkpoint Charlie Museum holds many interesting
artifacts used by East Berliners and citizens from other communist countries in
their attempt to escape to freedom, such as a car bullet-proofed with concrete
and another retrofitted to hold passengers inside car seats. Another museum
display holds a small home-made airplane.
The infamous sign, “Halt hier, Zonengrenze,” (stop here,
border zone) is a reminder that border walls are effective to protect and preserve
a country’s sovereignty despite the weak arguments coming from Democrats who
refuse to fund the border wall that would protect our southern border from
criminal invasion and drug cartels.
In 1984 a Prague university engineering student from communist Czechoslovakia, was
one of those millions oppressed under communism who dreamed to escape to
freedom. Ivo Zdarsky was studying aerospace engineering and knew how to build
his own homemade airplane.
To an old hand glider, he attached three wheels and a
seat, a two-stroke engine salvaged from a car, and a home-made propeller. He
tested his plane one night in an eastward direction. Even though he flew low to
avoid detection by radar, when he landed, he was arrested by the
Czechoslovakian police that was waiting for him in the field. And, to make
matters worse, his plane was confiscated.
At the station, Zdarsky explained that his aircraft was a school project and pointed out that no one trying to escape to the west would be crazy enough to fly east towards the Soviet Union. Sure enough, the police believed him, let him go, but they kept his home-made aircraft.
Zdarsky, unable to find more parts to build another plane and desperate for time, returned to the police station and offered them a cash bribe for his plane. As was often the case, officials were bribed all the time for the right price under communism. Allegedly, the police never thought a college student would pose any danger to the national security of a communist nation, so they agreed.
On August 4, 1984, at 3 a.m., Zdarsky flew his plane into the night and landed one hour later at Vienna’s International Airport. Curiously, nobody saw Zdarsky land his “flying lawnmower.” He parked his “3-wheeled craft with a basket-like seat outside an Austrian Airlines hangar used for DC-9 jets and sat there until airport employees spotted him.”
Ivo spoke fluent English and asked to emigrate to the United States or Australia. The 24-year old was granted political asylum after several hours of questioning. He was then taken to the Vienna refugee center in Traiskirchen near the airport.
Zdarsky eventually immigrated to the United States and formed his own company, building airplane propellers.
At the station, Zdarsky explained that his aircraft was a school project and pointed out that no one trying to escape to the west would be crazy enough to fly east towards the Soviet Union. Sure enough, the police believed him, let him go, but they kept his home-made aircraft.
Zdarsky, unable to find more parts to build another plane and desperate for time, returned to the police station and offered them a cash bribe for his plane. As was often the case, officials were bribed all the time for the right price under communism. Allegedly, the police never thought a college student would pose any danger to the national security of a communist nation, so they agreed.
On August 4, 1984, at 3 a.m., Zdarsky flew his plane into the night and landed one hour later at Vienna’s International Airport. Curiously, nobody saw Zdarsky land his “flying lawnmower.” He parked his “3-wheeled craft with a basket-like seat outside an Austrian Airlines hangar used for DC-9 jets and sat there until airport employees spotted him.”
Ivo spoke fluent English and asked to emigrate to the United States or Australia. The 24-year old was granted political asylum after several hours of questioning. He was then taken to the Vienna refugee center in Traiskirchen near the airport.
Zdarsky eventually immigrated to the United States and formed his own company, building airplane propellers.
Love the escape story! Don't know the name but there is a great movie about a family that rscaped in a hot air balloon.
ReplyDeleteMy brother was in the US army when the wall went up and was sent to Germany. My mother was frantic.