Kennedy And The Berlin Wall

Author : Frederick Kempe
Publisher : Penguin
ISBN 13 : 1101515023
Total Pages : 826 pages
Book Rating : 4.20/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book Berlin 1961 written by Frederick Kempe and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2011-05-10 with total page 826 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In June 1961, Nikita Khrushchev called Berlin "the most dangerous place on earth." He knew what he was talking about. Much has been written about the Cuban Missile Crisis a year later, but the Berlin Crisis of 1961 was more decisive in shaping the Cold War-and more perilous. It was in that hot summer that the Berlin Wall was constructed, which would divide the world for another twenty-eight years. Then two months later, and for the first time in history, American and Soviet fighting men and tanks stood arrayed against each other, only yards apart. One mistake, one nervous soldier, one overzealous commander-and the tripwire would be sprung for a war that could go nuclear in a heartbeat. On one side was a young, untested U.S. president still reeling from the Bay of Pigs disaster and a humiliating summit meeting that left him grasping for ways to respond. It would add up to be one of the worst first-year foreign policy performances of any modern president. On the other side, a Soviet premier hemmed in by the Chinese, East Germans, and hardliners in his own government. With an all-important Party Congress approaching, he knew Berlin meant the difference not only for the Kremlin's hold on its empire-but for his own hold on the Kremlin. Neither man really understood the other, both tried cynically to manipulate events. And so, week by week, they crept closer to the brink. Based on a wealth of new documents and interviews, filled with fresh-sometimes startling-insights, written with immediacy and drama, Berlin 1961 is an extraordinary look at key events of the twentieth century, with powerful applications to these early years of the twenty-first. Includes photographs

Author : W. R. Smyser
Publisher : Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
ISBN 13 : 0742599787
Total Pages : 314 pages
Book Rating : 4.89/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book Kennedy and the Berlin Wall written by W. R. Smyser and published by Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. This book was released on 2009-09-16 with total page 314 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Berlin Wall Crisis dominated the presidency of John F. Kennedy from his inauguration in 1961 until his historic trip to the city in June 1963. W.R. Smyser's Kennedy and the Berlin Wall offers new insights into the Berlin events that riveted global attention, especially as Soviet and American tanks faced each other at point-blank range over "Checkpoint Charlie." Drawing on his experience as an American diplomat in Berlin at the time; personal interviews; memoirs; and Soviet, East German, and American documents, Smyser ties together the full story of what actually happened on the ground and in world capitals.

Author : Fabian Rueger
Publisher : Stanford University
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 276 pages
Book Rating : 4.49/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book Kennedy, Adenauer and the Making of the Berlin Wall, 1958-1961 written by Fabian Rueger and published by Stanford University. This book was released on 2011 with total page 276 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Kennedy, Adenauer and the Making of the Berlin Wall, 1958-1961 The Second Berlin Crisis, which began with Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev's threat to sign a separate peace treaty with East Germany in November 1958, has largely been interpreted by foreign policy historians as a conflict between the superpowers, in which the dependent allies - the Federal Republic of Germany and the GDR - had almost no influence on the course of events that led to the erection of the Berlin Wall. This interpretation served the political purposes of the governments involved for most of the Cold War. The Kennedy administration as leading government of the Western world could claim to have successfully managed a difficult crisis; the Adenauer administration and the Ulbricht regime could both point to Washington's and Moscow's responsibility for the division of Germany's capital; and Khrushchev, as leading statesman of the Warsaw pact, could finally deliver on some of his promises made to the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. However, recent findings suggest that Ulbricht, not Khrushchev, was the driving force behind the decision to close the East Berlin sector. In the course of the first two years of the Kennedy administration, severe problems arose in West German-American relations. It is time to ask how the West German government's interactions with the Kennedy administration influenced the course of the crisis. President Eisenhower had seemingly managed to avoid an escalation of the Berlin crisis from 1958 to late 1960. This came at the cost of increasing pressure for his successor to find a solution. Ten months into the Kennedy administration, Berlin was divided by a wall, and American and Soviet tanks faced each other at Checkpoint Charlie. This dissertation reexamines the interactions between the Western governments, in particular between West Germany and the United States during the Second Berlin Crisis, and shows how these affected the outcome of the crisis. The first chapter serves as an introduction to the historiography of the Berlin Crisis and German-American relations in the period, especially between the Kennedy and Adenauer governments, and defines the pertinent questions; the second chapter provides an outline of the first two years of the crisis and the Eisenhower administration's approach to Adenauer and Berlin, especially as to Western policy on Berlin when the Eisenhower administration handed over the reins; the third to fifth chapters trace the Kennedy administration's and Chancellor Adenauer's interactions during the crisis in 1961 with particular regard to the actual sealing off of West Berlin, and the last chapter finally serves as an overview of the immediate aftermath. I argue that four key assumptions about the Berlin Wall crisis in 1961 can no longer be upheld: 1. The claim that Kennedy had stood firm on Berlin and merely continued the Eisenhower posture on Berlin is wrong. Instead, the Kennedy administration attempted to find new approaches to Berlin and Germany in line with its general revision of US foreign policy. 2. The notion that the closing of the sector border came as a surprise is not supported by the documents. President Kennedy had been informed numerous times that a closing of the sector border could be expected within the year. 3. Adenauer's policy to prevent diplomatic recognition of the GDR contributed to an escalation of Washington's search for alternative policy options, rather than slowing them. The West German election campaign in 1961 further limited the chancellor's willingness to make changes to his foreign policy. The Kennedy administration eventually sought accommodation with Khrushchev without consulting Bonn. 4. Inherent conceptual mistakes in Kennedy's early foreign policy agenda exacerbated the crisis, rather than contributed to its eventual solution. An additional lack of trust between West Germany and the United States complicated and delayed the attempt to find a more coherent, unified Western approach. All four Western governments anticipated an end to the refugee flow through West Berlin as the first step in a crisis escalation, while developing no contingency plans for this step. The lack of any political intention to prevent the expected stop of the refugee flow became the casting mould for Ulbricht's plan to close the sector border, a plan Khrushchev eventually made his own. By leaving Ulbricht and Khrushchev with only one option, Western policies on Berlin and Germany unwillingly conspired to force East Germany to face its systemic flaws in the summer of 1961.

Author : Greg Mitchell
Publisher : Crown
ISBN 13 : 1101903864
Total Pages : 400 pages
Book Rating : 4.65/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book The Tunnels written by Greg Mitchell and published by Crown. This book was released on 2016-10-18 with total page 400 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A thrilling Cold War narrative of superpower showdowns, media suppression, and two escape tunnels beneath the Berlin Wall. In the summer of 1962, the year after the rise of the Berlin Wall, a group of young West Germans risked prison, Stasi torture, and even death to liberate friends, lovers, and strangers in East Berlin by digging tunnels under the Wall. Then two U.S. television networks heard about the secret projects and raced to be first to document them from the inside. NBC and CBS funded two separate tunnels in return for the right to film the escapes, planning spectacular prime-time specials. President John F. Kennedy, however, was wary of anything that might spark a confrontation with the Soviets, having said, “A wall is better than a war,” and even confessing to Secretary of State Dean Rusk, “We don’t care about East Berlin.” JFK approved unprecedented maneuvers to quash both documentaries, testing the limits of a free press in an era of escalating nuclear tensions. As Greg Mitchell’s riveting narrative unfolds, we meet extraordinary characters: the legendary cyclist who became East Germany’s top target for arrest; the Stasi informer who betrays the “CBS tunnel”; the American student who aided the escapes; an engineer who would later help build the tunnel under the English channel; and the young East Berliner who fled with her baby, then married one of the tunnelers. The Tunnels captures the chilling reach of the Stasi secret police as U.S. networks prepared to “pay for play” but were willing to cave to official pressure, the White House was eager to suppress historic coverage, and ordinary people in dire circumstances became subversive. The Tunnels is breaking history, a propulsive read whose themes still reverberate.

Author : Honoré Marc Catudal
Publisher :
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 376 pages
Book Rating : 4.68/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book Kennedy and the Berlin Wall Crisis written by Honoré Marc Catudal and published by . This book was released on 1980 with total page 376 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Author : Honoré Marc Catudal
Publisher :
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 23 pages
Book Rating : 4.66/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book Kennedy and the Berlin Wall Crisis written by Honoré Marc Catudal and published by . This book was released on 1977 with total page 23 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Author : Norman Gelb
Publisher : Touchstone
ISBN 13 : 9780671657871
Total Pages : 356 pages
Book Rating : 4.79/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book The Berlin Wall written by Norman Gelb and published by Touchstone. This book was released on 1988 with total page 356 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Author : Michael O'Brien
Publisher : Macmillan
ISBN 13 : 9780312357450
Total Pages : 1016 pages
Book Rating : 4.51/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book John F. Kennedy written by Michael O'Brien and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 2006-05-16 with total page 1016 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: John F. Kennedy creates an absorbing, insightful and distinguished biography of one of America's most legendary Presidents. While current fashion in Kennedy scholarship is to deride the man's achievements, this book describes Kennedy's strengths, explains his shortcomings, and offers many new revelations. There are many specialized books on Kennedy's career, but no first-class modern biography--one that takes advantage of the huge volume of recent books and articles and new material released by the JFK library. Ten years in the making, this is a balanced and judicious profile that goes beyond the clash of interpretations and offers a fresh, nuanced perspective.

Author : Hans-Michael Koetzle
Publisher : Hirmer Verlag GmbH
ISBN 13 : 9783777420202
Total Pages : 0 pages
Book Rating : 4.04/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book Kennedy in Berlin, 50th Anniversary written by Hans-Michael Koetzle and published by Hirmer Verlag GmbH. This book was released on 2013 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Published to mark the 50th anniversary of John F. Kennedy's historic visit to Berlin in June 1963, Kennedy in Berlin captures the event in a series of hitherto unpublished photographs by Ulrich Mack. Technically superb, Mack's photographs feature both the great set pieces of the visit, and candid, unscripted and personal moments in stunning close-up.

Author : Frederick Kempe
Publisher : Penguin UK
ISBN 13 : 0241961742
Total Pages : 691 pages
Book Rating : 4.42/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book Berlin 1961 written by Frederick Kempe and published by Penguin UK. This book was released on 2012 with total page 691 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Based on a wealth of new documents and interviews, filled with fresh--sometimes startling--insights, written with immediacy and drama, "Berlin 1961" is a masterly look at key events of the 20th century, with powerful applications to these early years of the 21st.