Los Angeles Times

Commentary: What the dismantling of the Berlin Wall can teach us as Trump tries to build his wall

VENICE, Italy - In 1962, two men from East Berlin attempted a daring escape to the West. Peter Fechter and Helmut Kulbeik were young - all of 18. On Aug. 17, the pair slipped away from their construction jobs during their lunch break and made their way to the border, hiding in an old factory near the Checkpoint Charlie crossing of the Berlin Wall, which had been erected only the year before.

Around 2 p.m., they slipped out an open window into the barbed wire-filled no man's land alongside the wall. They then made a run for it. Kulbeik managed to scramble over the wall, then still a crude barrier not much taller than a man.

Fechter did not.

An East German guard shot him before he could make the climb. His body fell to the East, but was visible in the West, from the windows of buildings close to the wall. He cried for help, but no

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