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The inner German border originated from the Second World War Allies' plans to divide a defeated Germany into occupation zones. [7] The boundaries between these zones were drawn along the territorial boundaries of 19th-century German states and provinces that had largely disappeared with the unification of Germany in 1871. [ 8 ]
The development of the inner German border took place in a number of stages between 1945 and the mid-1980s. After its establishment in 1945 as the dividing line between the Western and Soviet occupation zones of Germany, in 1949 the inner German border became the frontier between the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG, West Germany) and the German Democratic Republic (GDR, East Germany).
Before 1952, the inner German border could be crossed at almost any point along its length. The fortification of the border resulted in the severing of 32 railway lines, three autobahns, 31 main roads, eight primary roads, about 60 secondary roads and thousands of lanes and cart tracks. [11] The number of crossing points was reduced to three ...
Hundreds of thousands of East Germans found an escape route across the border of East Germany's erstwhile ally, Hungary.The inner German border's integrity relied ultimately on other Warsaw Pact states fortifying their own borders and being willing to shoot escapees, including East Germans, around fifty of whom were shot on the borders of Polish People's Republic, Czechoslovak Socialist ...
The inner German border was a complex system of interlocking fortifications and security zones 1,381 kilometres (858 mi) long and several kilometres deep, running from the Baltic Sea to Czechoslovakia. The outer fences and walls were the most familiar and visible aspect of the system for Western visitors to the border zone, but they were merely ...
Grenzaufklärungszug (Border Reconnaissance) soldier taking photographs across the border. The East German side of the border was guarded initially by the Border Troops (Pogranichnyie Voiska) of the Soviet NKVD (later the KGB). In 1946, the Soviets established a locally recruited paramilitary force, the German Border Police (Deutsche ...
There were some of the most heavily militarised areas in the world, particularly the so-called "inner German border" – commonly known as die Grenze in German – between East and West Germany. Elsewhere along the border between West and East, the defence works resembled those on the intra-German border.
Germany shares its more than 3,700-km-long (2,300 miles) land border with Denmark, the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, France, Switzerland, Austria, the Czech Republic and Poland.