History of Berlin for a unified Germany. Loshitzky depicts the role of the Berlin Wall as a symbol of the Cold War, détente, and the collapse of the Communist regimes in Eastern Europe. She divides the history of the Wall into six major stages: the erection of the Wall (1961); the period of the "geography of fear" from the Cold War; the period of détente; the short period of glasnost and perestroika; the fall of the Wall (1989); and after the Wall. On August 13, 1961 the Communist East German government started to build a wall, physically separating West Berlin from East Berlin
Embassy of the United States, Berlin gabled building was leased to the U.S. by the East Germans. The building no longer retains any of its original interior features. The exterior retains much of its original stone facade. With the fall of the Berlin wall and the unification of Berlin in 1989–1990, the U.S. State Department found itself with two main office facilities in one city: a Chancery in the former East Berlin, Mitte district (U.S. Mission to East Germany), and the Clay building in the Zehlendorf district of the former West Berlin (U.S. Mission Berlin). In accordance with the reality of a unified Berlin that was