Thesis
Introduction/Background
Impact
Importance
Timeline
Process Paper
Influence
(Babylon Tours)
Picture of the Berlin Wall Memorial.
The fall of the Berlin Wall influenced the country of Germany and the continent of Europe. In 1995, due to the demise of the Soviet Union and unraveling of Yugoslavia, the 1995 massacre of more than eight thousand Bosnian Muslims occurred which prompted the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) air strikes. The fall of the wall also made it possible for the EU to gain popularity. Between 2004 and 2007, 15 years after the Berlin Wall fell, the EU jumped from fifteen countries to twenty-seven, including the Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania and the Central European nations such as the Czech Republic and Hungary (McBride). The fall of the Berlin Wall also made Germany realize the historical magnitude of the event. In 1998, after years of design and construction, the Berlin Wall Memorial was inaugurated in honor of the victims trying to cross the wall years before. In that same year, the Berlin Wall Association was founded for a planned documentation center at the site. Then, on November 9, 1999, the Documentation Center opened in the Reconciliation Parish on the tenth anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. Finally, the Chapel of Reconciliation was dedicated along the memorial in the year 2000 (“The Berlin Wall Memorial”).