This speech by President Ronald Reagan to the people ofWestBer n contains one of the most memorable nes spoken during his presidency. The Ber n Wall, referred to by the President, was built by Communists in August1961 to keep Germans from escaping Communist-dominated East Ber n into Democratic West Ber n. The twelve-foot concrete wall extended for a hundred miles, surrounding West Ber n, and included electrified fences and guard posts. The wall stood as a stark symbol of the decades-old Cold War between the United States and Soviet Union in which the two po tically opposed superpowers continually wrestled for dominance, stopping just short of actual warfare.
Chancellor Kohl, Governing Mayor Diepgen, ladies and gentlemen: Twenty-four years ago, President John F. Kennedy visited Ber n, speaking to the people of this city and the world at the City Hall. Well, since then two other presidents have come, each in his turn, to Ber n. And today I, myself, make my second visit to your city.
We come to Ber n, we American presidents, because it's our duty to speak, in this place, of freedom. But I must confess, we're drawn here by other things as well: by the fee ng of history in this city, more than500 years older than our own nation; by the beauty of the Grunewald and the Tiergarten; most of all, by your courage and determination. Perhaps the composer Pa ncke understood something about American presidents. You see, ke so many presidents before me, I come here today because wherever I go, whatever I do: Ich hab noch einen Koffer in Ber n.[I still have a suitcase in Ber n.]
Our gathering today is being broadcast throughout Western Europe and North America. I understand that it is being seen and heard as well in the East. To those stening throughout Eastern Europe, a special word: Although I cannot be with you, I address my remarks to you just as surely as to those standing here before me. For I join you, as I join your fellow countrymen in the West, in this firm, this unalterable be ef: Es gibt nur ein Ber n.[There is only one Ber n.]
Behind me stands a wall that encircles the free sectors of this city, part of a vast system of barriers that divides the entire continent of Europe. From the Baltic, south, those barriers cut across Germany in a gash of barbed wire, concrete, dog runs, and guard towers. Farther south, there may be no visible, no obvious wall. But there remain armed guards and checkpoints all the same--still a restriction on the right to travel, still an instrument to impose upon ordinary men and women the will of a tota tarian state. Yet it is here in Ber n where the wall emerges most clearly; here, cutting across your city, where the news photo and the television screen have imprinted this brutal division of a continent upon the mind of the world. Standing before the Brandenburg Gate, every man is a German, separated from his fellow men. Every man is a Ber ner, forced to look upon a scar.
President von Weizsacker has said,"The German question is open as long as the Brandenburg Gate is closed." Today I say: As long as the gate is closed, as long as this scar of a wall is permitted to stand, it is not the German question alone that remains open, but the question of freedom for all mankind. Yet I do not come here to lament. For I find in Ber n a message of hope, even in the shadow of this wall, a message of triumph.
In this season of spring in1945, the people of Ber n emerged from their air-raid shelters to find devastation. Thousands of miles away, the people of the United States reached out to help. And in1947 Secretary of State--as you've been told--George Marshall announced the creation of what wo d become known as the Marshall Plan. Speaking precisely40 years ago this month, he said:"Our po cy is directed not against any country or doctrine, but against hunger, poverty, desperation, and chaos."
In the Reichstag a few moments ago, I saw a display commemorating this40th anniversary of the Marshall Plan. I was struck by the sign on a burnt-out, gutted structure that was being rebuilt. I understand that Ber ners of my own generation can remember seeing signs ke it dotted throughout the western sectors of the city. The sign read simply:"The Marshall Plan is helping here to strengthen the free world." A strong, free world in the West, that dream became real. Japan rose from ruin to become an economic giant. Italy, France, Belgium--virtually every nation in Western Europe saw po tical and economic rebirth; the European Community was founded.
In West Germany and here in Ber n, there took place an economic miracle, the Wirtschaftswunder. Adenauer, Erhard, Reuter, and other leaders understood the practical importance of berty--that just as truth can flourish only when the journa st is given freedom of speech, so prosperity can come about only when the farmer and businessman enjoy economic freedom. The German leaders reduced tariffs, expanded free trade, lowered taxes. From1950 to1960 alone, the standard of ving in West Germany and Ber n doubled.
Where four decades ago there was rubble, today in West Ber n there is the greatest industrial output of any city in Germany--busy office blocks, fine homes and apartments, proud avenues, and the spreading lawns of parkland. Where a city's c ture seemed to have been destroyed, today there are two great universities, orchestras and an opera, countless theaters, and museums. Where there was want, today there's abundance--food, clothing, automobiles--the wonderf goods of the Ku'damm. From devastation, from utter ruin, you Ber ners have, in freedom, rebuilt a city that once again ranks as one of the greatest on earth. The Soviets may have had other plans. But my friends, there were a few things the Soviets didn't count on--Ber ner Herz, Ber ner Humor, ja, und Ber ner Schnauze.[Ber ner heart, Ber ner humor, yes, and a Ber ner Schnauze.]
In the1950s, Khrushchev predicted:"We will bury you." But in the West today, we see a free world that has achieved a level of prosperity and well-being unprecedented in all human history. In the Communist world, we see failure, technological backwardness, dec ning standards of health, even want of the most basic kind--too ttle food. Even today, the Soviet Union still cannot feed itself. After these four decades, then, there stands before the entire world one great and inescapable conclusion: Freedom leads to prosperity. Freedom replaces the ancient hatreds among the nations with comity and peace. Freedom is the victor.
And now the Soviets themselves may, in a mited way, be coming to understand the importance of freedom. We hear much from Moscow about a new po cy of reform and openness. Some po tical prisoners have been released. Certain foreign news broadcasts are no longer being jammed. Some economic enterprises have been permitted to operate with greater freedom from state control.
Are these the beginnings of profound changes in the Soviet state? Or are they token gestures, intended to raise false hopes in the West, or to strengthen the Soviet system without changing it? We welcome change and openness; for we be eve that freedom and security go together, that the advance of human berty can only strengthen the cause of world peace. There is one sign the Soviets can make that wo d be unmistakable, that wo d advance dramatically the cause of freedom and peace.
General Secretary Gorbachev, if you seek peace, if you seek prosperity for the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, if you seek bera zation: Come here to this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, open this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!
I understand the fear of war and the pain of division that aff ct this continent-- and I pledge to you my country's efforts to help overcome these burdens. To be sure, we in the West must resist Soviet expansion. So we must maintain defenses of unassailable strength. Yet we seek peace; so we must strive to reduce arms on both sides.
Beginning10 years ago, the Soviets challenged the Western al ance with a grave new threat, hundreds of new and more deadly SS-20 nuclear missiles, capable of striking every capital in Europe. The Western al ance responded by committing itself to a counter-deployment unless the Soviets agreed to negotiate a better solution; namely, the e mination of such weapons on both sides. For many months, the Soviets refused to bargain in earnestness. As the al ance, in turn, prepared to go forward with its counter-deployment, there were diffic t days--days of protests ke those during my1982 visit to this city--and the Soviets later walked away from the table.
But through it all, the al ance held firm. And I invite those who protested then-- I invite those who protest today--to mark this fact: Because we remained strong, the Soviets came back to the table. And because we remained strong, today we have within reach the possibi ty, not merely of miting the growth of arms, but of e minating, for the first time, an entire class of nuclear weapons from the face of the earth.
As I speak, NATO ministers are meeting in Iceland to review the progress of our proposals for e minating these weapons. At the talks in Geneva, we have also proposed deep cuts in strategic offensive weapons. And the Western al es have kewise made far-reaching proposals to reduce the danger of conventional war and to place a total ban on chemical weapons.
While we pursue these arms reductions, I pledge to you that we will maintain the capacity to deter Soviet aggression at any level at which it might occur. And in cooperation with many of our al es, the United States is pursuing the Strategic Defense Initiative--research to base deterrence not on the threat of offensive reta ation, but on defenses that tr y defend; on systems, in short, that will not pop ations, but shield them. By these means we seek to increase the safety of Europe and all the world. But we must remember a crucial fact: East and West do not mistrust each other because we are armed; we are armed because we mistrust each other. And our differences are not about weapons but about berty. When President Kennedy spoke at the City Hall those24 years ago, freedom was encircled, Ber n was under siege. And today, despite all the pressures upon this city, Ber n stands secure in its berty. And freedom itself is transforming the globe.
In the Phi ppines, in South and Central America, democracy has been given a rebirth. Throughout the Pacific, free markets are working miracle after miracle of economic growth. In the industria zed nations, a technological revolution is taking place--a revolution marked by rapid, dramatic advances in computers and telecommunications.
In Europe, only one nation and those it controls refuse to join the community of freedom. Yet in this age of redoubled economic growth, of information and innovation, the Soviet Union faces a choice: It must make fundamental changes, or it will become obsolete.
Today thus represents a moment of hope. We in the West stand ready to cooperate with the East to promote true openness, to break down barriers that separate people, to create a safe, freer world. And surely there is no better place than Ber n, the meeting place of East and West, to make a start. Free people of Ber n: Today, as in the past, the United States stands for the strict observance and f l implementation of all parts of the Four Power Agreement of1971. Let us use this occasion, the750th anniversary of this city, to usher in a new era, to seek a still f ler, richer fe for the Ber n of the future. Together, let us maintain and develop the ties between the Federal Repub c and the Western sectors of Ber n, which is permitted by the1971 agreement.
And I invite Mr. Gorbachev: Let us work to bring the Eastern and Western parts of the city closer together, so that all the inhabitants of all Ber n can enjoy the benefits that come with fe in one of the great cities of the world.
To open Ber n still further to all Europe, East and West, let us expand the vital air access to this city, finding ways of making commercial air service to Ber n more convenient, more comfortable, and more economical. We look to the day when West Ber n can become one of the chief aviation hubs in all central Europe.
With our French and British partners, the United States is prepared to help bring international meetings to Ber n. It wo d be only fitting for Ber n to serve as the site of United Nations meetings, or world conferences on human rights and arms control or other issues that call for international cooperation.
There is no better way to estab sh hope for the future than to en ghten young minds, and we wo d be honored to sponsor summer youth exchanges, c tural events, and other programs for young Ber ners from the East. Our French and British friends, I'm certain, will do the same. And it's my hope that an authority can be found in East Ber n to sponsor visits from young people of the Western sectors.
One final proposal, one close to my heart: Sport represents a source of enjoyment and ennoblement, and you may have noted that the Repub c of Korea--South Korea--has offered to permit certain events of the1988 Olympics to take place in the North. International sports competitions of all kinds co d take place in both parts of this city. And what better way to demonstrate to the world the openness of this city than to offer in some future year to hold the Olympic games here in Ber n, East and West? In these four decades, as I have said, you Ber ners have built a great city. You've done so in spite of threats--the Soviet attempts to impose the East-mark, the blockade. Today the city thrives in spite of the challenges imp cit in the very presence of this wall. What keeps you here? Certainly there's a great deal to be said for your fortitude, for your defiant courage. But I be eve there's something deeper, something that involves Ber n's whole look and feel and way of fe--not mere sentiment. No one co d ve long in Ber n without being completely disabused of illusions. Something instead, that has seen the diffic ties of fe in Ber n but chose to accept them, that continues to build this good and proud city in contrast to a surrounding tota tarian presence that refuses to release human energies or aspirations. Something that speaks with a powerf voice of affirmation, that says yes to this city, yes to the future, yes to freedom. In a word, I wo d submit that what keeps you in Ber n is love--love both profound and abiding.
Perhaps this gets to the root of the matter, to the most fundamental distinction of all between East and West. The tota tarian world produces backwardness because it does such violence to the spirit, thwarting the human imp se to create, to enjoy, to worship. The tota tarian world finds even symbols of love and of worship an affront. Years ago, before the East Germans began rebuilding their churches, they erected a sec ar structure: the television tower at Alexander Platz. Virtually ever since, the authorities have been working to correct what they view as the tower's one major flaw, treating the glass sphere at the top with paints and chemicals of every kind. Yet even today when the sun strikes that sphere--that sphere that towers over all Ber n--the ght makes the sign of the cross. There in Ber n, ke the city itself, symbols of love, symbols of worship, cannot be suppressed.
As I looked out a moment ago from the Reichstag, that embodiment of German unity, I noticed words crudely spray-painted upon the wall, perhaps by a young Ber ner:"This wall will fall. Be efs become rea ty." Yes, across Europe, this wall will fall. For it cannot withstand faith; it cannot withstand truth. The wall cannot withstand freedom.
And I wo d ke, before I close, to say one word. I have read, and I have been questioned since I've been here about certain demonstrations against my coming. And I wo d ke to say just one thing, and to those who demonstrate so. I wonder if they have ever asked themselves that if they sho d have the kind of government they apparently seek, no one wo d ever be able to do what they're doing again.
Thank you and God bless you all.
President Ronald Reagan- June12,1987
