Whereas, between 1945 and 1961, more than 2,500,000
people, or 15 percent of the total population of the German Democratic Republic
(referred to in this preamble as East Germany
), left the country
to pursue economic opportunity and enjoy the benefits of liberty and political
freedom in the Federal Republic of Germany (referred to in this preamble as
West Germany
) and other countries;
Whereas, at midnight on August 13, 1961, East Germany
sealed its border with West Berlin and began construction of a 100-mile barrier
that would later include bunkers, watchtowers, searchlights, minefields, barbed
wire, concrete walls, and armed guards, to prevent the emigration of the people
of East Germany to seek freedom and opportunity elsewhere;
Whereas, during the 28 years the Berlin Wall existed,
approximately 5,000 people successfully fled East Germany for West Germany and
West Berlin, more than 75,000 people were imprisoned for attempting to leave
East Germany, and an estimated 1,200 people were killed trying to
escape;
Whereas Presidents John F. Kennedy and Ronald Reagan
declared their vision of Berlin as a free city, in the heart of a free
Germany;
Whereas Chancellor Willi Brandt of West Germany and others
demonstrated great foresight in their pursuit of Ostpolitik
, a
policy of engagement that lowered tensions and ultimately helped undermine the
authoritarian rule of the wall-builders;
Whereas more than 22,000,000 Americans served in the Cold
War, supporting the efforts to bring military, economic, and diplomatic
pressure to bear in the defense of Germany and the West, and ultimately helping
more than 400,000,000 people gain their freedom from the bondage of communism
in the Soviet Bloc;
Whereas the Solidarity Movement in Poland demonstrated
that the will of a people united could not be silenced by winning a surprise
landslide victory in elections to the Contract Sejm in June 1989;
Whereas, on August 23, 1989, Hungary officially opened the
border between Hungary and Austria, resulting in 13,000 refugees from East
Germany fleeing into West Germany through Hungary;
Whereas, on September 4, 1989, after prayers for peace in
the Nikolai Church, crowds that would eventually number in the hundreds of
thousands gathered in Leipzig, East Germany, to repeatedly and peacefully
protest the authoritarian regime of East Germany and to demand basic
freedoms;
Whereas, in September 1989, thousands of people in East
Germany took refuge in the embassy of West Germany in Prague, Czechoslovakia,
in order to emigrate to West Germany and the West;
Whereas, on October 18, 1989, faced with widespread civil
unrest and a deteriorating political situation, East German leader Erich
Honecker, who had predicted that the Wall will stand in fifty or a
hundred years,
resigned;
Whereas, on November 4, 1989, more than 1,000,000 people
gathered in Alexanderplatz in East Berlin and 40 other cities and towns in East
Germany to demand free elections and basic civil rights, such as freedoms of
opinion, movement, press, and assembly;
Whereas, on November 9, 1989, East German politbureau
member Günter Schabowki announced that the government would allow every
citizen of the German Democratic Republic to leave the GDR through any of the
border crossings,
and East German leader Egon Krenz promised
free, general, democratic and secret elections
;
Whereas thousands of people in East Berlin immediately
flooded the border checkpoints at the Berlin Wall and demanded entry into West
Berlin, causing the overwhelmed border guards of East Germany to open the
checkpoints to allow people to cross into West Berlin;
Whereas, in the days following the fall of the Berlin
Wall, hundreds of thousands of people from East Germany freely crossed the
border into West Berlin and West Germany for the first time in more than 28
years;
Whereas the Chancellor of West Germany Helmut Kohl and
Foreign Minister Hans Dietrich Genscher managed the political situation and
foreign diplomacy with great tact and in close cooperation with Western allies,
leading to the peaceful reunification of Germany as a sovereign, democratic
state on October 3, 1990;
Whereas, on November 9, 2009, the people of Germany will
celebrate on both sides of the Brandenburg Gate the 20th anniversary of the
fall of the Berlin Wall with the Festival of Freedom
;
Whereas the fall of the Berlin Wall was one of the
milestones of the 20th century, brought about by the actions of many ordinary
and some extraordinary people; and
Whereas the fall of the Berlin Wall embodied the end of
the division of Europe, the opening of the Iron Curtain, and the triumph of
democracy over communism: Now, therefore, be it
That the Senate—
(1)recognizes the
20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall;
(2)celebrates 20
years of an undivided Europe, free from the oppression of authoritarianism,
with the people of the former communist countries and Western Europe;
(3)honors the
service and sacrifice of the people of Germany, the United States, and other
countries who served in the Cold War to bring freedom to Central and Eastern
Europe;
(4)expresses its
appreciation to the people of Germany for their commitment to preserving the
dignity and freedom of others in their leadership on international assistance,
peacekeeping, and security efforts, including in Afghanistan, Bosnia and
Herzegovina, Georgia, Kosovo, Lebanon, Sudan, and off the coast of the Horn of
Africa; and
(5)reaffirms the
friendship between the Government and people of the United States and the
Government and people of Germany.