Weirdest Attempts to Cross the Berlin Wall (1961-1989)
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- Опубліковано 13 січ 2025
- Following the conclusion of World War Two, Germany found itself divided into two newly established nations, commonly referred to as West Germany and East Germany. The capital city of Berlin was also divided in a similar geographical manner - the western portion of the city being administrated by the pro-democratic West Germany, while the eastern portion of the city was administrated by the USSR allied East Germany. The new border in Berlin initially proved no obstacle for the city's inhabitants, with thousands of civilians migrating from East Germany to West Germany, unsure of their future under the Soviet regime. In order to stop this mass exodus, the border was abruptly closed by the East German government and sealed off by haphazard barricades of cement blocks and barbed wire. The border was ultimately reinforced with a massive, impenetrable wall - complete with guard towers, gun emplacements, and mines. Many would-be escapees continued to attempt a crossing - with hundreds killed in the process or executed when caught. This is the story of the ingenious, risky, and outright bizarre methods of escape some East German inhabitants deployed to free themselves from oppression.
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Between 1961 and 1989, more than 100,000 citizens from East Germany tried to escape across the border. More than 600 of them were shot and killed by the Border guards. At the Berlin Wall alone, 5000 people attempted the crossing and 100 of them were either shot or died accidentally when they were caught by the authorities.
Their attempts to escape ranged from being quite ingenious to downright crazy.
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Credit:
Created by Daniel Turner (B.A. (Hons) in History, University College London)
Narrator:
Chris Kane
vocalforge.com/
This defenitly needs a second part.
On the December 5th 1961 the wall was broken by a whole train. The engeneer was Harry Deterling who crossed the border between Spandau and Oranienburg together with 25 people.
And you only told the story of only two of the three Bethke brothers. Ingo and Holger Bethke. But there was a third brother: Claus Bethke. In 1989 Ingo and Holger Bethke returned to the GDR in ultralight aircraft disguised as soviet airforce. They picked up thier brother Claus and his wife Marianne and landed in West-Berlin just in front of the Reichstag.
Maybe the most badass escape in the history of the Berlin Wall.
It's wild the lengths that people went to in order to reach freedom. Even worse to think how many didn't make it
thats mega badass
What is up with that family being a bunch of escape artist lol
Considering the degree of escalation between each brother's attempts, imagine what a 4th or 5th sibling might have have tried 😂
I'm just happy to see that someone else knew this.
“Democracy is not perfect but we have never had to put a wall up to keep our people in.”-John F, Kennedy.
and then trump said the thing about the wall
@@bumpermanthesecond615 What 'thing' would that be?
But we donerd a wall to keep people out, or do you leave doors and widows unlocked in your house?
@@bumpermanthesecond615 the trump wall is to keep people from coming in illegally, not trapping people in. Trump and biden give no fucks if you leave.
@@esmeraldagreen1992seems like you cant even understand the difference between berling wall and a basic home door
Other attempts did NOT include a giant slingshot, a motorized pogo stick, a super powerful trampoline, or 99 red [helium] balloons.
A big stick of dynamite may have been attempted.
They should just painted a tunnel and then cross it duhh
I heard in January 4th, 1971, an East German citizen named "Will E. Kayoty" tried to cross the Berlin Wall in an attempt to catch one of his Ostriches which had broken free from his farm and ran across the wall. Will apparently "used a homemade jetpack" to attempt to fly over the wall. He managed to get some lift and actually made it into the air. Unfortunately, he was immediately killed by East German guards while he was trying to fly over the wall. His body was shortly recovered with a few wooden signs and dynamite.
In the song, aren't the balloons coming from the west?
@davidpawson9047 My condolences to those who died trying to make it across, take the stick out of your a** and stop being so humorless all the time. It’s not like it was “too soon” for a joke.
During the construction of the Berlin Wall, an East German border guard named Conrad Schumann was hesitant to cross over the barbed wires while guarding. Some of the West Berliners saw him acting nervously, knowing he wanted to jump. They shouted for him to, “come over!”
After much deliberation, he jumped & dropped his PPSH SMG. During his time in West Germany, Schumann feared that the Stasi would try to assassinate him, but this never happened.
After the fall of the Berlin Wall Schumann said, "Only since 9 November 1989 [the date of the fall] have I felt truly free." Even so, he continued to feel more at home in Bavaria than in his birthplace, citing old frictions with his former colleagues, and was even hesitant to visit his parents and siblings in Saxony. When he returned to East Germany after the reunification to visit his relatives, he was rejected by them. They saw him as a traitor who abandoned his family.
On 20 June 1998, suffering from depression, he committed suicide, hanging himself in his orchard near the town of Kipfenberg in Upper Bavaria. His body was found by his wife a few hours later.
😪
“Torn down that wall like the Koola Aid man! Oh yeah!” Mikhail Gorbachev
real internet champs know where is is from.
You two need yoga
@@The617Vietyou need a shower!
And you both need to learn how to handle REAL power!
@@katyusha408 did somebody say, REAL POWER??
The fact that these people weren’t soldiers, but students, circus actors, and family members is fucking insane. It’s so fascinating to see how human ingenuity is ramped up ten-fold whenever there’s a desperate need for freedom. You see it in clever prison escapes all the time. It’s amazing!
well I think one guy was a military officer; he drove the APC through the wall after all.
A freedom to be filmed in a gym and being "exposed" as a predator?
At that time, all men had to do basic military service (approx. 2 years in the West and 3 in the East). Only West Berlin was exempt from this, but only if you studied there. And one case even involved a soldier.
@@PROVOCATEURSKlmao what
@davidpawson9047 and Peter Fechter who died and the world look to him
That walk animation was so cartoonish, it’s amazing 😂
3:00
Bro skeddadled
cartoon sneaking ahh walk
Bro was floating over the ground😆
There was an escape attempt that was done by a couple who had a very low ride car. They made sure that they was low as the borders guards road barriers were and drove as fast as they could through and made it through it without even a scratch.
Then there was a guy that made his own scuba equipment and made it across that eventually became something of a novelty aquatic toy as a result.
The car was a rental and three people escaped that day, an Austrian electrician working in East Berlin, his East German fiancee (who hadn't been allowed to leave the DDR) and his future mother-in-law (whom they had put in the trunk). The funniest part about this: The same escape was replicated a few days later by another couple, using the same rental car.
The low car one im sure everyone knows about considering that i believe it was on the history channel at some point. I think the car was a Austin Healy Sprite?
@@ThePaperKhan Yeah I think it is in Austin Healy saw it on episode of mysteries at the museum on The travel channel which I wish they still did that that was a good show. It made me motivated to do stuff around my town.
I’m pretty sure you can see a replica of the car at checkpoint Charlie in Berlin. Went there some years ago and saw it.
@@MsBlackdeath13 Yeah I heard about it on the show mysteries at the museum and I guess that's what they used as their item I can't remember it was that or the The gate that they had at that entrance where it happened.
My greatgrand father was a carpenter, and he was allowed to cross the border to retun funiture to his customers in west berlin. He used this oppurtunity to smuggle all his funiture and family across the border.
As someone who lives in Germany (Saxony) I'm shocked when People say that we live in a dictatorship and that they want the wall back
People don't wanna learn from the past
Born in 1981.. I have a vague memory of small chunks of concrete in little presentation boxes being sold at Walmart as "peice of Berlin wall" as suoviners. This was when Walmart was just a department store. No groceries no "Super store". This was in middle Alabama of all places.
Interesting. Do you suspect they were genuine or fake..
I have a genuine piece of the Berlin Wall in my room that was given to me after my grandfather on my dads side passed away
I was born Nov 8 1979 and can remeber the day the WALL FELL!
Greetings from Germany. It's very exciting how they mix real history and myths together. From the beginning, the so-called border troops had orders to stop any border breakthrough by all means, which also included the use of firearms. The only thing they weren't officially allowed to do was shoot at minors, but this still happened often. It is also absolute nonsense that one out of six GDR citizens worked for the StaSi, because not everyone actually provided information as an IM (unofficial employee). The three brothers who escape in the last story are really exciting, but they had very good mountaineering equipment, but what is even more exciting is that the third was helped to escape with the help of an ultralight aircraft. Incidentally, most of them did not flee to Berlin but to the direct inner-German border or via other Eastern Bloc countries. The collapse of the GDR had little to do with the Polish Solidarity protests, but rather with the fact that the leading communists had run the country and the infrastructure so badly and that people could only buy the bare necessities with their money. Back then, people hardly demonstrated for the freedom to travel; it was about being able to buy cars, furniture or technology in the store, for example, without having to wait months or years for it. In this context, unfortunately, a lot of things are generally misrepresented abroad.
"Capitalism builds walls to keep people from coming in. Communism builds walls to keep people from running away."
Yup. Communism needs free/poor labour to stay around.
@@TheMegatuz That´s capitalism. Capitalists need more people to exploit, poor countries to extract resources while giving no social benefits to their own people.
@@TheMegatuz😂😂😂 so does Capitalism
Capitalist wealth inequality just has a better PR team
@@mikeljackson9192 In the communist countries people who are talking against the government and the system often disappear! I've lived under this regime for 9 years! If you're coming from a poor family with no connections on highest levels even if you're the best in some sport you won't be representing your country before the world! The one who's going to do it does not have any skills but their family know military generals or colonels from the army which means anything is possible. Under communist regime the most important thing you need to remember is: "Ask what you can give to your country, not what the country can give to you!" and you stick by it. Meaning, you're working 9-12 hours per day for $50 a month. That was then. The purpose is to keep you and your family struggling so you can only work, sleep, work, sleep, work, sleep until the rest of your days. That's what communism needs - working class, minimum payment, no questions! Oh, did I forget to mention you don't have the right to watch or discuss the inventions created in Capitalism countries. The media and newspapers will only show you what the communist countries have invented and nobody will give you any info about the development of countries that are not under communist regime cause for the communists it was always a challenge! German citizens tried to escape the Eastern block for a very good reason!
@@PROVOCATEURSK In the communist countries people who are talking against the government and the system often disappear! I've lived under this regime for 9 years! If you're coming from a poor family with no connections on highest levels even if you're the best in some sport you won't be representing your country before the world! The one who's going to do it does not have any skills but their family know military generals or colonels from the army which means anything is possible. Under communist regime the most important thing you need to remember is: "Ask what you can give to your country, not what the country can give to you!" and you stick by it.
There was another famous attempt that went well in 1964. There was a doctor who managed to smuggle 9 people to West Germany with his BMW Isetta bubble car, he almost got found out by border guard's dog. There's a video of it on BMW's official channel titled The Small Escape
Isnt the fucking Isseta crazy small
@drivingdude7000 small but already modified to hide many people.
Bro straight up drove his car through the Berlin Wall. Respect.
Legend
Lets all take a moment to say thanks for amazing content delivered in amazing tone
Wasn't just in Berlin either. Saw a few attempts along the Grenz in Fulda back in the day.
Two other grate escape stories: In 1979 two families escaped via a hot air balloon. In 1971 a doctor swam about 40km through the Baltic Sea. His provisions for the trip consisted of chocolate, pain killers and methamphetamine.
I love your videos and i have been watching your videos for years
You were my childhood! Keep up the great videos!
I’d love to see Count Dankula do a video on the craziest escapes from East Berlin.
4:50 the guy's arm is flashing
portable epilepsy device /j
@@s_e-LBR people cant escape if they are having seizures
@@placeholder22atm imagine trying to escape but an east german guard just gives you an instant seizure 💀
Didn't even mention all the escape attempts featuring the Detlev-Rohwedder-Haus, the most notable being Heinz Holzapfel and his family in 1965.
Especially because at the time it was the House of Ministries.
My dad was an officer in the US Army, he actually flew in and out of West Berlin a few times.
half of americans are rooting for putin today, how far we've fallen
Shoot me out of the cannon, Otto!
-A circus performer in a cannon
Do you guys know how hard it us to skimmy along a rope let alone a steel one?
It takes incredible strengh and is a hated obstacle in every basic Training of any army
Imagine people being so happy in your regime you have to build walls to protect them to run away.
Imagine going to a foreing country, killind their native population, demanding unlawfull taxes, killing the best anticommunist fighters, then nuking civilians.
Desperation causes people to do crazy things.
Was life in East Germany extremely severe? Or was it strict but compared to other regimes not oppressive?
My mother escaped just after WW2. In the early 70s she went to the East to visit the mother of a soldier who was killed in the war. She was told by the authorities that, if asked what life was like in the west, she was to say, “just like everywhere else”. Sure enough she was asked that question and she gave the “party” answer. Upon hearing this, the mother in the East said, “that’s not true, just look at the way you’re dressed and you can come and go as you please”. My mother said that it was heart wrenching
@michaelphelan423 It must have been similar to North Korea? Given I read the Khmer Rouge though were on another level of extremism in thier ideology ...
It was just like any other communist regime. Oppressive and authoritarian to the bone, with secret police constantly spying on people, and people getting jailed in gulag-like prisons if not executed out of mere suspicions of being dissidents.
You can vote your way into communism, but you'll have to fight your way out of it.
Of course it was authoritarian and oppressive, just like any communist government. People jailed or "terminated" on a whim for mere suspicions of "dissidents", secret police monitoring citizens 24/7, people starving and freezing to death, the whole jist.
@@zhuangsaur227 DDR was a dictatorship and peoples got in prison for the smallest Things, they have lot of poor peoples, No freedom and No individualism. Not surprising they want to the free West.
There are many more interesting escapes over the border. From sown airbaloons to wind surfing. There is an entire museum dedicated to it in Berlin
I’ve patrolled the wall, from the West. We weren’t allowed to directly assist an escape, but we could create “a distraction”.
The day that dammmm wall fell felt like we had won.
It was a victory of people more over the victory of democracy over communism.
@@kuriankeralaIndia What is good about democracy? People can vote for commies, mafia, nazis and genocidal maniac worshippers.
Also the aveage voter is pretty dumb.
please do a video on these
(this is a copy and paste list for a few channels)
units and tactics/evaluation of loadouts of troops (from different jobs (and other branches)
like the 82 snd 101 airborne units
or infantry tank units, (or when tanks were assigned a infantry unit like i think earlier war Russia then all tanks were formed into there own units wich meant the infantry no longer knew the true strength of there own tanks but alowed tank units to fight more efficiently)
the tank doctrine of countries
evaluation of tank veiw ports
evaluation of tanks/armored vehicles of different countries
evaluation of aircraft types of different countries,
different between navil and army/air force fighters
logistics units of the axes and allied powers in ww2
ww1 estern front tactics
Russian Civil war tactics and strategies
navil ship cross sections (all the rooms and how it all works)
evaluation of types of ships
or evaluation of navil warfare (or just dedectsded videos on ww1 and ww2 navil doctrine as theres stuff out there on other times of history)
air craft carrier strike group formations exsamples (from different countries)
ancient persan ships,
ancient veneti ships (gauls that fought ceaser)
ships used by genoa and the vernesain republic
the vernesain republic government
all sailing ships, (i know theres many on yt but some contradict each other and i think theres more left out)
ancient macenean greek and trojan troops
2b9 vasilyok morter
tactics used so far in the Ukraine war,
better for squads to be 2 teams of 5 or 3 teams of 3,
and probably the easiest, better to keep troops well feed or starved like an animal
how dose age effect comsnders eg napoleon got older so took less risks,
ancient urban warfare
ww2 tactics in Asia, tactics in the Chinese age of warlords, (and Chinese civil war)
tactics in the ruso jap war
cold war navil tactics,
Korean war tactics,
strange tactics or unque battles from the American war of independence and America civil
how were 17th centry sailing ships build
types of bombs lunched by drones
comands given on sailing ships (like ease the sheets and get ready to chine, or slack n beases, basically things you hear movie capitns say)
why did the nazis never return (or a video on best occupations)
why did the Japanese empire fall, dont just say "America" like things like how there army and navy argued alot
alot more on the Polynesians and māori, but please learn pronounceations if you do this
And what’s crazy is there were simple tunnels running through the border the entire time. Remember they had a sewer system which ran throughout Germany and ran through the borders/wall
This sewage system was also barricaded, especially after it had been successfully used as an escape route.
You should do who are the Cossack
Cline was a bold man squirreled his way over the wall😥! Fell and broke both arms but made it to the other side👏!
I still have a piece of the Berlin Wall; a gift from someone who went through when people began to demolish it.
Nice video but I expected from you to talk about first person passed the wall a East German soldier and it was one of the symbol photographs of Berlin Wall
My grand grandma escaped, and she is still alive today
i respect your videos and you i learning history from you very easy
you should make a video about the secret stasi prison, Hohenschönhausen
2:54 the dude from west Germany: is that body for me?
For the record, October 3rd 1990 was not when it was demolished. It’s when East Germany legally and officially reunited with West Germany to become Germany. The wall was demolished slowly between June and November of 1990. And the so called Fall of the Berlin Wall is a much more fascinating story than represented here.
Reminder that the biggest escape was from West to East in 1988 - ref LA Times
‘West Berlin police Friday chased nearly 200 squatters from a disputed parcel of land near the Berlin Wall after a monthlong struggle that pitted environmentalists against city developers.
When the removal order came, the squatters found an unusual escape route--over the Berlin Wall into the city’s Communist side’
@simplehistory I love your Channel been following since 013. Hope one day you will cover Biafran war which had a death toll of 2-4 million women and children. Hope you cover that some day
4:56 is this what that author based a night divided on?
*What a great stories and words.*
Armored car guy they let his mom live..she probably had to disown him
Always a shock how low people will go to save their own skins
Thank God for David Hasselhoff and his keyboard scarf. The wall may still be standing today if weren't for him.
Zeus or Thor?
@@PROVOCATEURSK both
There used to be a little museum at Checkpoint Charlie. It had several examples of escape methods, including a hang glider and a car with the fuel tank drained and hatch cut into so a person could hide there. Sad that people have to live in such places where escape is the only viable option. I remember walking along the western side of the Berlin wall eyeing the East German guards with machine guns aimed down at their own country.
Maybe a very specific topic, but can you make a video about Christman Genepa Tinga? I guess people would really like to hear about his history!
I am German, and I am glad I was able to see the moment the Berlin Wall finally fell.
People still try to defend comunism
People still try to defend capitalism.
@@b62boom1 you saw the video. Cant you handle the truth?
@b62boom1 Most prosperous countries are the most purely capitalistic. Singapore, Switzerland, Taiwan and Ireland leading in economic freedom, followed by less purely capitalistic countries (yet capitalistic enough): New Zealand, Estonia and Luxembourg.
You will never hear about someone from any of these countries desperate to flee to Cuba or Venezuela or Iran or North Korea or Russia.
@@dadanifit Unless your country is named "Vietnam"
Wait Is Vietnam still a communist Country?
These people never lived in a communist country.
I feel like I need to point out the soil was not clay it was more of sandy type of soil,due to the ice age and the glaciers that flared the land. Additionally Berlin was built on a swamp that also where it got its Slavic name from. Due to this the subway system in Berlin was also not as deep because to was harder to go any deeper.
What about the BMW from that old comercial?
My family just took a vacation in the Hungarian People's Republic during the summer of 1970 and never returned to the GDR. From there we made it to West Germany.
When i heard the story of the Bethke brothers.
Damn they really humiliated Mielke & Honecker...
Hubert Hohlbein i know his tunnelling work as well. He helped his own mother escape...
There's a massive chunk of the wall at the Dayton Air Force museum.
I’m so glad i saw this video early
As a German/Polish American, the Demolition of the Berlin Wall is always a fascinating part of its history to me since it started in the year I was born. So I never witnessed or even heard what it was like with the Berlin Wall, but it fascinates me nonetheless.
Berlin Wall suspended train service from 1961-1989
Believe it or not: Eleven months before the wall fell, there was an episode of David Seville and The Chipmunks, where they performed at the wall and destroyed it.
In 1949, Germania a fost impartita in doua natiuni independente. Acolo era Germania de vest, care era aliata cu democratic si. germania de est care era aliata cu USSR. Cea noua vama in Berlin era relativ Usor sa scapi peste, si de cand August 1961,
700 de oameni au plecat din ussr. Prima cale, zidul Berlin era construit cu arme puternice si soldati agresivi. Soldatii de vama erau armati, desi ei nu erau permitted sa impuste in focuri.
Intre 1961 si 1989, 100,000 de oameni din germania de est au incercat sa scape peste zidul German.
In 1963, Wolfgang Engels era un 20 de ani mecanic de masini si sofer in armata germaniei de est. Intro zi, cand armata sa era la bombardat, el a furat un BTR 152 armat cu fier si arme, si a condus intre strazile Berlinului. Pe drum,el a incercat sa opreasca niste oameni sa vorbeasca despre communism, dar ei au ras la el si el sa suparat. Cand sa apropiat de zidul din Berlin, el a spart zidul cel mare. Cand el a iesit din vehiculul militar armat, el a fost impuscat de catre soldatii din germania de est.
Did you know that from 0:41 to 1:00 they were just playing at construction site?
But still a great video.
imagine someone escaped the last day and then they wake up to no wall
Worse still, imagine that they were killed trying to escape on the last day it was patrolled by officers ordered to kill.
The good ol' Trabi at 7:00. 🙂
Imagine having to build a wall just to keep people from leaving.
we don't have to imagine, unfortunately.
3:15 she wasnt no mother in the first place if she was like this
What about the guys with the bulldozer?
When I saw this video title I knew for A FACT that someone was going to make a tunnel under the wall, and I was right!
Fun fact, the first woman chancelor of Germany was there in West Berlin when East officially gave the green light to go to the west side.
Hedwig and the angry inch 😂
Wow what history
Okay, why are the Soviet guards wearing uniforms of the German Wehrmacht
"A East German people wanted to escape East Germany so they will be reunited with their family"
-A wise man
tightrope guy pulled a sam fisher 💀
2:50 fast speed skinwalker skinwalker
My Grandma escaped through the Wall with the Passport of a Belgian Woman that looked very similar to her which had been smuggled in by my Grandpa when he visited her
No lie that tight rope & zip wire escape were crazy af. But I’m not surprised in the first story the mom had disowned her son. A lot of people will do anything to save their own a$$.
Hey simple history, can we have one day a video on the organization of the Maginot Line ?
Good idea, we need more videos from this channel about the battle of France
nice video
There is a good size chunk of the wall where I live in missouri. It's pretty neat that the shipped a chunk that's like 8foot wide by 10 foot tall all the way over here
There’s a particularly well known block at my university, with really nice graffiti on it
I love the sks animations
calling the GDR a independent nation is a very far stretch to be honest.
I was a American solder in Germany in the 80s . Got to live in and around some of this history.
Don t forget the famous i be looking for freedom from David Hasselhoff his voice alone bring the WALL to FALL XD
They have a museum in Berlin full of relics from escape attempts. My personal favorite is the hot air balloon. 🧐
No mines in Berlin. Only at the East West German border.
“Gorbachev, Take down this wall!”
~Ronald Reagan
Tate
This is exactly what is happening on the US southern border but instead of meeting people who have traveled for months with kindness and help we do our best to ship them back to the awful situations they are trying to escape.
lol
I like how important figure drawn much more in detail than the last time.
thankfully Engels is still alive today. Sadly they are getting old at 81 years old.
At least his escape succedded and now hes got a family.
Can you do about Malaysia Vs Indonesia confrontation in 1963 history
You forgot to mention the escape by balloon and surf board.
I've seen several pieces of the Berlin Wall.
Is there a reason a world war 2 SS soldier is wirering in 0:50 when this is about the DDR?
East German officer uniforms actually looked like that, without all the SS stuff of course.
NBC sponsoring a tunnel….why am I only half-surprised?
What about the hot air balloon attempt?
there was also the armoured school bus, the glider...
Make a video about the Underground Railroad.
1700 x 365. From 1945 until 1961. So 9.3 million people? That’s alotta of people
What are those figures?