Word: throughness
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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When the great breach finally came, it started undramatically. At a press conference last Thursday, Schabowski announced almost offhandedly that starting at midnight, East Germans would be free to leave at any point along the country's borders, including the crossing points through the Wall in Berlin, without special permission...
On the stroke of midnight, East Berliners began coming through, some waving their blue ID cards in the air. West Berliners embraced them, offered them champagne and even handed them deutsche mark notes to finance a celebration (the East German mark, a nonconvertible currency, is almost worthless outside the country...
Later in the day, two young workers from an East Berlin electronics factory who drove through Checkpoint Charlie in a battered blue 1967 Skoda provided a hint that Krenz may in fact have scored a masterstroke by relieving some of the pressure to emigrate. Uwe Grebasch, 28, the driver, said...
"Developments are now unforeseeable," said West German Chancellor Helmut Kohl, who interrupted a six-day official visit to Poland to fly to West Berlin for a celebration. "I have no doubt that unity will eventually be achieved. The wheel of history is turning faster now." At the square in front...
Running through the joy in West Germany, however, was a not-so-subtle undertone of anxiety. Suppose the crumbling of the Wall increases rather than reduces the flood of permanent refugees? West Germany's resources are being strained in absorbing, so far this year, the 225,000 immigrants from East...