Berlin-City of War

November 15-17, 2018

Berlin, Germany

Arriving in Berlin, we checked into our hotel, just across the street from the train station in central Berlin. Our German meal, from the Peter Pan hamburger shop next door, was a good old fashioned…...hamburger!

Friday the 16th we had planned to begin our tours of the city, but I opted to rest instead. To plan for Saturday I spent a couple of hours (literally) on the internet reviewing the museums of Berlin to see which I wanted to tour. There are an incredible number of museums in Berlin, encompassing the entire range of your imagination....from architecture to technology to...yes, dear reader...a museum dedicated to sausage. Wurst to be exact.

One of the most unusual though is really not technically a museum. It is a warehouse filled with luxury cars. Some are housed in glass cases by their owners. Others are just open to the public and are for sale. Want the ultimate souvenir? Bring a big checkbook!

I ultimately settled on the Museum of Technology, and we began with Frank taking me on a driving tour of Berlin. It was, as usual, an incredible day. What made it the most fascinating was not only Frank’s knowledge from his many visits, but the fact that Berlin was one of the areas he was assigned to surveil during the Cold War.

Frank and I had essentially the same training...Photo Interpretation as Air Intelligence Officers. I actually had more training because I was what Navy jargon called “a triple-headed monster.” In addition to the photo interpretation, I was also trained in Electronic Counter Measures and Radar Interpretation. I was sent to Jacksonville, Florida to VAP-62, a heavy photo squadron that had taken part in the Cuban Crisis. In my position as Squadron Air Intelligence Officer I never once used any of my training...but that’s a story for another day.

Frank, on the other hand, was sent to Germany where his billet involved close surveillance of German troop movements. Listening to his stories, a couple of which I will recount in this blog and in ones to come, made the city come alive in ways the average tourist would never experience.

I’m going to try to walk you through some of the photos. The city is so complex it would take way too much time to try to explain all of them, so I’ll hit some highlights. If any of them intrigue you you can look them up on the internet.

The unusual granite squares is actually the Jewish War Memorial. The picture with the squiggly sticking up into the sky is actually sculpture. The city is covered with them so I’ve included some representative shots.

The next series is the remnants of the Berlin wall that have been saved as a memorial, followed by Checkpoint Charlie and then the Brandenburg Gate, flanked by the ubiquitous Starbucks Coffee Shop.

We wanted to see Charlotte’s Palace so our route took us past too many governmental buildings and churches for me to try to describe them. The next monument is the Russian War Memorial. Curiously enough it’s on the wrong side of the East/West Germany line of demarcation. Heading for the Victory monument we passed on of the most famous sculptures...the screaming woman. (I mentioned the artist earlier.)

Because of the way the streets have been closed off, we could only see the back side of the Palace. The Plaza in front was being filled with kiosks in preparation for the Christmas markets...something we would see all throughout the rest of our trip.

Although our route was heading toward the Museum of Technology, but when the time came I still wasn’t feeling up to a lot of walking so I asked Frank to continue the driving tour. Am I glad I did. The next several hours were far more fascinating than walking the halls of any museum.

We decided to see if we could find the Luftwaffe Museum. On the way Frank tried to identify the building were (forgive me Frank for my faulty memory) the Nazi war criminal, Hess, as detained. Unfortunately it appeared to have been demolished. The GPS took us to the gate of the Luftwaffe training center instead of the museum, but the guard assured us the museum was “just around the corner on the other side.” His concept of geography led us on a merry chase through the suburbs, but we finally found it. Touring it meant walking from one end of the airfield to the other, looking at the superb collection of all kinds of aircraft. Again, it was more walking than I felt I could do, especially in the cold, so we drove along the fence line and took pictures of the aircraft through the fence, with Frank narrating descriptions of the various planes out of his knowledge from his job.

Leaving there we started heading back to the city, but about half a mile from the airport Frank saw a signpost of a city he recognized. He had not realized it was so close. He recognized it as the location of a Kasserne (Germany name for a military installation) that he had followed on a daily basis, monitoring troop movements and training maneuvers, so we headed that direction. What had one been a thriving base for an entire battalion was now just shells of old barracks and miscellaneous buildings. Stopping before the old entrance, the gate was posted with a large sign saying it was soon to become a planned community. An ambitious project considering all the decontamination from toxic waste and unexploded munitions they would have to clear. It would be equivalent to demilitarizing Camp Bullis.

My grandmother’s ranch was “purchased” during WWII to expand Camp Bullis and her home, a priceless example of early ranch architecture, was used as a target for artillery practice. When we enquired whether we would ever be able to reclaim the property, we were told it would take countless millions to clear it.

Leaving the kasserne we stopped in a little village bakery for lunch. We both got pulled pork sandwiches which were enormous! But delicious, naturally! It took every ounce of my will power not to buy the equally enormous chocolate eclairs in the display case, along with an unbelievable array of irresistible (almost) breads, cookies and other treats.

Heading back to the hotel we retraced our route from the morning chalking up one more (insert your own superlative) day of this (superlative) trip.

Photos: Berlin

Reflections: Pretty much the same as the previous reflections on war. Brandenburg Gate, the most visited monument in Berlin, is iconic for what it reveals about history. If you’re interested, as I was, Google it. Germany’s history in a nutshell.