I first visited the Berlin Wall as a student back in the mid sixties. It had not then long been constructed and was far from the smooth and forbidding concrete behemoth that it later became. I was taken there by a young West German – not much older than myself – bitterly angry at what he saw had been perpetrated on his city by an occupying power.
It was an untidy structure, built from elongated concrete blocks thrown together hurriedly by people who clearly had never so much laid a brick in their lives. It was not even particularly high and so ugly coils of barbed wire, now decayed and rusty, had been wound on top. The overall effect was crudity, roughness, hasty slipshod work by people who cared not for anything or anybody, but were enslaved to an idea.
I remember a sparrow flying out of the East and alighting for a moment on the top of that wire before flying off into the West – a poignant image that remains with me to this day. How come sparrows could cross freely when thinking people could not?
Of course, the Wall was enhanced soon after, but as the fabric of the structure was renewed, the political substance that kept it in place gradually crumbled. Twenty years ago it came tumbling down.
That it did so, largely amid tears of joy rather than of grief and sadness, can be attributed to the statesmanship of Mikhail Gorbachev, the last Soviet Premier. With the sense to recognise defeat he determined ‘not to lead to destruction what (he saw) had already perished.’ From this followed consecutive revolutions in central and eastern Europe and, later, the enlargement of the European Union.
Mikhail Gorbachev was writing this week in The Times newspaper - looking back on those events and forward into the future. His described a zeitgeist – a force practically irresistible. Glasnost and perestroika were a response to this – but the pressures kept building. A unity of popular purpose brought the revolution into being.
Could today a new unity of purpose be assembled to fight climate change, he asked? Likening climate change to a Wall he invited President Obama and other world leaders to ‘Tear it Down.’ ‘You cannot dodge the call of history,’ he implored.
Indeed. But just as the multi-faceted and multi-causal movement that culminated in the collapse of the Soviet Union and the return of democracy to countries that had not known it for decades, or in some cases ever at all, was a movement more profound than simply tearing down an iron curtain, so today’s problems go beyond climate change alone.
For instance suppose that at a metaphorical click of a switch we could solve the climate problem tomorrow. Let’s suppose that the scientists working on the ITER project – aimed at bringing us unlimited amounts of cheap and clean energy from nuclear fusion – make a sudden breakthrough and that never again need we worry about burning a single drop of fossil fuel.
Let us then suppose that the climate soon reverted to normal: glaciers growing again nicely, only occasional typhoons in the Philippines, East African droughts consigned to the history books.
No more climate change – but we should all still be in peril. In the next century the world will acquire another three billion people. Another three billion mouths to feed – all demanding their share of the planet’s resources. Already each year we consume the sustainable resources of three planets. Despite this, two thirds of folk are poor, malnourished, illiterate, diseased. We know the only way they will stop having large numbers of children is by raising their standard of living. This will take resources.
So the crisis is not just about climate change – it is far wider than climate change. It is a crisis of sustainability itself within which climate change is just one element.
But neither is sustainability the only threat we face. With the ending of the Cold War we exchanged one ideological struggle for another. Today we face a new battle for hearts and minds, a new conflict of fundamental ideas as to how mankind should behave towards one another. And if the struggle has not the same potential for disaster as Cold War armageddon, it nevertheless still has the potential to kill untold millions.
We have exchanged the Cold War for the ‘War on Terror’ – or rather more accurately – the Jihadist struggle. Since the Wall fell, cities all over the world have grieved over Jihadi outrages. New York, London, Madrid, Rawlpindi, Bali, Mumbai, Kabul – the list is a long one. Yet despite the world’s attentions, both military and civil, the activities of the Jihadis are undiminished, if anything they grow stronger all the time.
Not all are wedded to violence though there are plenty that are willing to kill no matter whom. Others just encourage the suicidal struggle, preaching the doctrine of a brutal medieval caliphate stretching from the eastern Himalayas to the Atlantic ocean – a clock-turned-back-world of fundamentalism in which human rights are extinguished, women deprived and oppressed, democracy extinguished.
NATO is fighting this threat in Afghanistan. That is where the conflict was yesterday – but already it has spread to the mountain valleys of nuclear-armed Pakistan and threatens to undermine and destabilise that country with consequences that do not bear thinking of.
Yet incredibly as we celebrate in Berlin the defeat of one kind of totalitarianism, Europe is already debating whether we should end our commitment to Afghanistan. Debating whether we should withdraw out support, our finance, our forces and leave the majority population there to their fate and the Jihadist movement to exult.
This Afghan conflict is unlike those of previous generations. It is a global threat we are fighting, not specifically an Afghan one. This fight can erupt violently at any moment in any territory of the world. The evil of the terrorist knows no bounds – either as to place, or as to victim or as to method.
It is as much a threat to peace-loving and tolerant Islam as to any other religion or belief. It is a terrible diversion from the wider struggle towards sustainability. So it would be ironic if, at the moment when world leaders are commemorating the passing of a dark chapter of oppression, they should choose to turn away from the Jihadist threat. The price of liberty is eternal vigilance and Europe must be vigilant.
Tags: Afganistan, Berlin Wall, Climate Change, Europe, ITER project, Jihadis, Mikhail Gorbachev, NATO, Sustainability, terrorism
#1 by Tim Seretis on November 10th, 2009 - 3:12 pm
THE BERLIN WALL
People were celebrating, politicians giving praises, and all were happy. Sadly the disrespect towards one person that was the main reason the Berlin Wall came tumbling down, President Ronald Reagan, was the loudest of all. If not for President Reagan to state “TEAR DOWN THIS WALL” things would be a little different today. Germany might still be divided, and the European Union would not be swallowing up nations soverign rights, as it is doing now.
It was also a slap in the face for our nation, the U.S.A. The European Union is slowly and quietly changing history as there is little or no mention in various history books about the United State’s role in World War II, and how if not for the U.S, the landscape of Europe would now be different.
If the Europeans are so arrogant why then do we bother in giving them aid and support?
#2 by Jean-Baptiste Perrin on November 10th, 2009 - 4:38 pm
Dear Tim, you have clearly never read a European History book. Depending of the class group, WWII (and WWI) is covered or not in details. The role of the USA is always lengthily explained.
#3 by Mathieu A on November 11th, 2009 - 12:42 pm
Tim — as an American (and, incidentally, fellow Pennsylvanian) who has lived extensively in Germany and the Benelux, I am surprised by your comments.
As Jean-Baptiste points out, the American contributions to the wars are clearly and solidly documented in textbooks, perhaps even disproportionately. Receiving even more attention is the (possibly more important) post-war reconstruction support that was given.
Putting history books aside, a whole generation of Europeans has sung the praises of American support for WWII to their children and grandchildren. My grandmother hid American paratroopers as part of the Belgian resistance effort, and was officially commended by the US government for her contribution. She was thrilled to see her daughter marry an American. This is but one of a million anecdotes that any European family can dig out.
Reagan was only one of a large number of contributing factors. Though he may have been the last president to call for the wall to fall, he certainly was not the first. Yes, his “Star Wars” gambit was one of the straws that broke the camel’s back, but the Soviet system was already collapsing under its own weight. It was Gorbachev’s insight that avoided a brutal last-gasp power. The Chinese reacted quite differently in 1989 to popular demands for democracy.
Since we’re on the topic of politicized textbooks and WWII … I recall vividly my first visit to Berlin. It was 1996, and I was a high school exchange student. The dust of reunification was far from settled as the city was a still jungle of construction cranes. As part of our sightseeing, we went to the Soviet memorial for the unknown soldier (which still stands, btw). This was the first time that I had ever really reflected on the price paid in Soviet blood for the defeat of Nazism. Almost 24 million Soviets, more civilian than military, gave their lives during the war – over 14% of the entire Soviet population. It is well-known that keeping Hitler fighting on two fronts contributed substantially to his defeat.
And yet, this statistic was glossed over in my American high school history classes. The Cold War had made it politically difficult to do anything but grudgingly acknowledge that the USSR had been one of the Allies.
I’m not sure what kind of “aid and support” you propose withdrawing? If you mean economic and political support, it is demonstrably a symbiotic relationship. The EU gives plenty of support to the US; even if not always in exactly the form that some US commentators would like to see. A whole wikipedia could be devoted to both formal and informal “aid and support” to/from both sides of the Atlantic.
Finally, yes, the EU is changing the balance of sovereignty. And yes, personally, I would strongly prefer more posts to be directly elected rather than appointed. But the growth of the US federal government in the past 10 years, let alone the past 50, is breathtaking in scope. EU states will still retain comparatively more sovereignty, whereas US states now find themselves beholden to a federal behemoth and stuck paying the bills.
Arrogance, though easy to wear, is not flattering for anyone.
#4 by Clarify on November 12th, 2009 - 4:32 pm
@Tim Seretis
You clearly got only access to the abuses of the Evil Empire. And are consciously or unconsciously oblivious to the abuses and plentiful arrogance perpetrated on the other side of the equation. While nobody could ever deny the obvious advantages and gratitude due to transatlantic link, there are plentiful of unreported reasons why it is not all flowers and candles…….
#5 by Kazimierz on November 13th, 2009 - 3:22 am
There is a saying “one’s man terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter”.
It is worthy to remember this.
I read at noon September 11, 2001 “… attack on key symbols of the U.S. financial and military might”. By evening that day control of western “free media” has been restored and such information never repeated.
#6 by Jean-Baptiste Perrin on November 13th, 2009 - 10:06 am
@Kazimierz I don’t know what you are alludign to. But media did repeat that message not only in the evening but in the days and weeks to follow. And it is still a narrative which is perfectly valid and in use. And why shouldn’t it be? It is after all what happened.
#7 by Kazimierz on November 13th, 2009 - 3:19 pm
@Iean-Baptiste Perrin,
Well, I live in USA and read only English language media, which means overwhelmingly American and British media. So, maybe, I should have said “American media” instead of “western media”. This would have been more correct.
#8 by Anna on November 14th, 2009 - 10:05 am
I visited West Berlin and East Berlin in 1979. I saw the vast difference between the two. The bright lights in West Berlin to the dingy dim lights of East Berlin one might say.
Many people rejoiced when the Berlin Wall came down. I did not because I knew what would happen. I suppose I sat with a stern face as I looked at the happenings on the television. While Berlin was divided, Germany could never rise again. From that moment, I knew one way or another, it would.”
Each Country has been made defenceless-has to rely on each other-this quite deliberately but sadly-this will not prevent unrest or wars. The UK’s own politicians have cut down their own regiments etc to ‘fit in’ with the EU’s would be army’s. So many, many lies have been told to the people’s of all nations for none have dared to tell them the truth. Not one politician dared to let the people have a say on the Treaty of Lisbon and for that reason alone, the EU will disintegrate as other forced “Unions” have before them.
#9 by al on November 16th, 2009 - 10:44 am
For the same reason we give other rogue states (e.g. Red China) support, because the USA has foolishly indebted itself to them, and through greed has eviscerated its own manufacturing base. These moves have gone against the free market, which is why the Soziale Marktwirtschaft is currently so ascendant.
@Mathieu: Your entire post reads like EU propaganda, filtered through the extremely left-leaning US media. (This same media is beginning to wake up to the EU’s reality, though; even the New York Times wrote a piece critical of Germany and the EU recently.)
@ the author: The price of liberty is never liberty itself. It’s specious that the EU has liberty or is becoming more warlike to defend liberty — the Union has shown itself to be utterly expansionist, and the country that leads the Union (Germany) has reverted to an historic pattern of behaviour, especially towards Russia, which should have alarmed the whole world far more than it did. Never mind the ascendant far right around the continent (especially in Italy). Funny how nobody wants the US to be world police anymore, but wants the undemocratic EU to suddenly assume the role, isn’t it?
#10 by Wojciech on November 17th, 2009 - 12:45 pm
It was a mistake, to let the Germans unify. New kind of German nationalism is being restored in Germany, as well as alliance with Russia against Central Europe.
As a Pole, I would feel safer with additional power occupying Germany and Germany divided.
Nothing good about that celebrations, also communism fell earlier then the Berlin wall.