Berlin 1958-1961

Berlin caused several political problems for Nikita Khrushchev. There was a noticeable difference between East Berlin and West Berlin. In East Berlin, clothes, shoes and meat were expensive and the standard of living was much lower than the West. Since the pay is the same for everyone, some people got fed up. Many highly skilled workers that were fed up fled to West Berlin.   As more and more highly skilled workers fled from the East to the West, this deprived the East of skills, labour therefore crippling the economy.
1st   May 1960, thirteen days before the summit ( A summit meeting in Paris to try and sort things out), an American U2 spy plane was shot down over the Soviet Union and the Pilot, Gary Powers, was captured. At first, the Americans tried to say it was a weather plan. They were forced to admit that it was a spy plane when the Russians had revealed that most of the plan was intact and that they captured Gary powers alive. When they met on 14th May for the Summit meeting, Khrushchev demanded that Eisenhower apologised but he refused so Khrushchev went home. When Khrushchev left, there was no test ban treaty. No discussions about the problem of Berlin, which lead to the Berlin wall and due to the failure of the Summit meeting, the US elected John F Kennedy. At this moment of time, the tension between the two superpowers was unbelievably high and the chances of a nuclear war occurring was extremely high.
In 1961, Khrushchev made his first move to solve the Berlin problem. He demanded that West Berlin demilitarise Berlin and allow it to become a free city. The West rejected Khrushchev’s demand and reminded the Soviet Union of their rights with regards to Berlin. Khrushchev responded by extending the deadline and agreed to meet with the West to discuss problems.

On 13th August, Khrushchev closed the border between East and West Berlin and began building the Berlin Wall. At first, the Russians regarded it as a propaganda success, but as time went on, it...