This week marks 30 years since the berlin wall came down it signaled the end of a decades long cold war the bitterly divided east and west so what sort of legacy did the wall leave behind and did it bring about a new world order this is inside story. Hello and welcome to the program im Darren Jordan it was the single most important moment since the end of the 2nd world war on the night of november 9th 1909 the berlin wall came down it drew to a close one of europes darkest chapters since 1061. 00 the wall was a physical reminder of a divided east and west the soviet union on one side and nato on its western allies on the other hundreds of east germans climbed on top of the wall chipping away at the concrete with hammers on the other side their cousins came out in support in their thousands the east germans were shouting for freedom and democracy after decades of communist rule Television Cameras broadcast the jubilant scenes around the world well its a look at some of the events that led to the rise and the fall of the berlin wall when at the end of world war 2 germany was divided the u. S. U. K. And france controlled west germany and the soviet union the east the east German Government directive the wall in 1901 to stop an exodus of millions of people to the west in 1909 revolutions in european states inspired many east germans to demand greater freedom on of them by 9 that year days after half a 1000000 people protested in east berlin the berlin wall came down but that led to germanys formal reunification on the 3rd of october 1990. Well lets now get the thoughts of our guest joining us from. From berlin heading man hes managing director of social europe publishing and consulting thats a Public Policy and Business Consultancy in moscow victor levitch lead expert at the center for actual politics thats a think tank and in london elizabeth broad Senior Research fellow of the modern deterrence project at russi and author of god spies the stars these cold war Espionage Campaign inside the church a warm welcome to you all heading my let me start with you if i may there in berlin because you were there where it all happened 30 years ago what do you think the berlin wall came to symbolize for People Living on both sides and what was really reunification meant for the people of germany well the berlin wall was obviously the symbol of the divide in the country that i grew up in i mean i personally grew up in the southwest part of germany had a artificial knowledge of the war itself so nothing compared to what is now the killer was the case in berlin and it was universally greeted in 89. 00 when war came down and one year later when a country united that was a big come for celebration and its good to commemorate a 30 years on and what did it what did read if occasion mean then for the german people. Well it meant. It meant the end of 4 of the divided country it was also coming back to what you might want to call normalization of german politics and policy so obviously ever since the 2nd world war having a divided country was seen as an extraordinary circumstance so from the beginning on the policy objective was to reunify at some point and that was basically the end of the 1st chapter after the 2nd world war and the beginning of something new basically so it was a was a great time of of a of a new start for United Country lets bring in victor all of its there in moscow lets remind our viewers that the russian president Vladimir Putin at the time was a young k. G. B. Officer stationed in east germany in dresden i think it was he must have been deeply alarmed as he watched all these stalinist regimes in Eastern Central europe collapse around him. Well the decision to go for to give a green light for joining the union he cation of course came from moscow it was the sawyer story his time and failed go but sure of who had just cited the soviet union could no longer. Or did not want to manage the cold war with the west that it was not in its National Interest and there were a number of reasons for that from starting from the increasing economic difficulties soviet union in the early mid and late eightys to the unwillingness moscows unwillingness to support its Eastern European allies including his germany financially and in other terms and those so the fact that the soviet Political Leadership itself did not in your longer subscribe to a large extent to the marxist leninist ideology that stupid the core of the soviet state for almost 70 years and so all of that led to the decision to launch a socalled serious troika and to essentially give up control of the Eastern European allies of the soviet union now the k. G. B. That you mentioned a few minutes ago where the current russian president served at that time actually played an instrumental role in letting Eastern European allies and satellites states. The soviet bloc so at the time which can actually was quite supportive of those policies all right well come back to the issue of perestroika and glasnost. A little later in the program Elisabeth Brewer there in london let me bring you into the debate when the berlin wall came to represent the lack of freedoms i guess under communism but more significantly how do you think it came to symbolize the cold war and this ideological divide between east and west where it was clearly the most obvious symbol of the cold war and the division between those 2 parts they were fighting each other and i personally thats its my last thing them or of the of the cold war my grandparents took me to east berlin from sweden to see the wall and it left an enduring memory and now we also have to remember that on both sides of that german of the of the berlin wall and also of the border between the 2 germanys were enormous numbers of soldiers of a station nature so just so west german American British french and so forth on one side and east german and soviet soldiers on the other side it could easily have come to a major clash between the 2 sides in germany and it would have been the suspects for germany so i think were all grateful that the 9th of november happened so peacefully heading may of berlin lets bring you back into the conversation here because after the initial euphoria i mean reunification brought about some hard times especially for People Living in the old east germany for them it meant unemployment it also meant a sense perhaps of insecurity didnt it. Yes absolutely i mean obviously it was a massive task to integrate the whole population also especially in economic terms into what amounted to the western german. Economic system and actually be seeing these repercussions until today so quite interesting me a bit in contrast to previous decades ago i mean i remember i was on aljazeera as a present this friend in london 10 years ago when it was the 20th anniversary of the fall of the berlin wall this time around theres a lot of introspection of whether you know also looking at the downsides so what wasnt managed that well so that the 1st sort of 20 years was basically yes were unified you know that was the historic achievement and put it in all the rest of it but now there is a specially also you know against the backdrop of some of these populist parties doing well especially nice and eastern germany. We have to be honest and also have a look at what didnt work so well and how to address this so yes it was a member thought it still is a big task to a large extent but its obviously it was an unprecedented situation hasnt happened before all of it in moscow i mean with the collapse of the berlin wall and the reunification of germany Many Russians actually blame Mikhail Gorbachev you mentioned him earlier and glasnost and perestroika for the collapse of the Old Soviet Union but was he really to blame do you think. Well the. Hopes of the soviet leadership over that time i certainly did not materialize in the way that. They were looking for the soviet leadership under gorbachev and the staff around him were certainly hoping for to integrate the soviet union and what they mean or that into a more western style alliance of states and they were looking to for moscow to become a junior partner to the United States in the new world war there now of course throughout the 990. 00 s. 3 as russia became an independent states with the 14 other soviet ex soviet republics also because becoming 7 country is. Nato of course was moving eastward and finally taking the 3 Baltic States loose when your lot in the store nya as its members and of course russia also the russian leadership also saw that the United States and some of its european allies did not support the russian position on chechnya and on its own territorial sovereignty to vigorously they felt that washington the london and some other european capitals were not very supportive as they were also worried about. The bush george h. W. Bush administration abrogating union literally ever getting the stick new south the in 2003 and starting to build anti missile facilities around russias borders all over the all of that they can together with what moscow so as the un willingness. Of the United States and its allies to truly integrate russia more and more deeply into local institutions that certainly caused people both in russias leadership and among the populace to be disenchanted with gorbachev spahis years and the policies of your successors who are looking and hoping for that integration and thats when russias. Foreign policy changes in foreign its Foreign Policy and its Foreign Policy resurgence we started in the early 2000 Elizabeth Brewer it is interesting though to compare the cold war of then and the new cold war now with countries carrying out Cyber Attacks and trying to subvert other countries was it naive back then at the end of the cold war to think countries could coexist peacefully perhaps well absolutely lost even though all the condits of the day seemed to agree that that was a perfectly reasonable position to take now if you look at kids in the sandbox i mean they just never get along and its like that with countries too they can they can establish 9 rules and who are less adhere to them but its its naive and even foolish to think that they will all of a sudden all just agree and thats what has happened there hasnt been agreement on which country should be play the leading part in the world and so that the us a leading role which we have had now for for a number of years is being challenged not just by russia but by china as well not primarily from a military aggression but through other ways which you mentioned for example Cyber Attacks and this information pending mayor in berlin i mean lets not forget that the german chancellor Angela Merkel also came from the old east germany how did those events do you think shaped her politically because she may be an east german Success Story but your main is deeply unpopular in the east of the country doesnt she. Well it depends i mean i certainly know that beginning office trying to ship she was in the unpopular sphere she was more or less actually when she took over the helm from dan sure that there was you know there was no Glass Ceiling anymore there was no obstacle for somebody who grew up in the eastern part of germany to actually become chancellor and you know go go to the highest office so that was actually at the beginning quite the opposite that was seen as look we got the same chances as people coming from from the west but let me make it quick remark on the on the what happened after the end of the. Cold war the conflict. In my view its been not superseded by at least complemented now by an economic conflict an economic conflict of systems that he can see now which is interconnected with the issue that he talked about about Cyber Attacks and given that how data and and and intellectual property and everything that is the foundation of modern capitalism so the conflict between states has been played out more and more in the economic area and i think you know we just shifted the seemed a bit but he conceded today that there is a big conflict of economic philosophies if you are so which comes with power which is a new game in town as far as im concerned i think to all of it i want to speak to you briefly about Vladimir Putin because how did those events back in 1909 shape him do you think in driving the reemergence of russia as a superpower as a superpower because many people say when the soviet union collapsed Vladimir Putin was embarrassed and you know he basically wanted to help get russia reemerge russia on the International Stage. Well i think what really shaped pushkins worldview at that time was the fact that it seemed to him that the soviet union gave up its. Predominant role in Eastern Europe and the. Regions allowed european states to move into the western cyr it allowed some former soviet republics to also move into the western cyr and the soviet union itself collapsed into 15 states as i said before and what did the what did moscow get for it from the west in his world view and in the view of millions of russians. The rush russia got nothing for it then became a much weaker state that washington and its allies no longer took seriously as they did when it was one of the 2 superpowers and so what. At that point understood or thought and thinks that in order for western powers and other world powers to. Take into account russias interests and the russias positions on various International Topics russia has to be strong russia has to be assertive and at times russia. Has to be proactive in. Stating its goals and promoting them on the International Stage and thats one of the reasons that the russians moscows Foreign Policy. Since the beginning of 2000 has become more assertive and more vigorous ok as far as your links with. With its western counterparts it is about peru i mean for a few years after the fall of the berlin wall america didnt have any major competitors let me ask you how has that changed and are we now seeing super powers like china mount serious challenges to u. S. Dominance yes we absolutely are and we have to remember how incredibly fragile in those early years after german reunification were when. Soviet soldiers and then subsequently russian soldiers were still station in the stone and i was a student there at the time eastern germany i should say and soviet so and so just were being gradually withdrawn but they were still there and in 1904 and we are very lucky that there was no incidents involving russia and the west during that period but we are seeing that increasing tension in the world and that has been said by others because its its essentially a way of weakening an effort to weaken western countries individually or collectively by sewing this cord by creating fear and essentially its a very effective way of. Increasing ones position in the world not just russia china north korea iran and these are all countries that would struggle i think to defeat nato militarily but by weakening western society domestically and their cohesion they are these countries are achieving more power than theyve had before letting me let me ask you how do you think europeans see germany today i mean germany is a country as we know has gone through huge amounts of up the bull and violence 2 world wars yet its emerged as a beacon of tolerance of multiculturalism and its the main economic and defense powerhouse of europe. Yes i think the war general present reputation has obviously changed dramatically since the 2nd world war and there was a conscious effort to rebuild this so there was no coincidence that the the postwar policy was the german National Interest is actually equal to the european interest and especially in in a world that was alluded to ready where conflict lines are becoming more parent again and i think everybody would agree that you know that idea that the we saw the end of history after the end of the cold war was was much more than was very premature so you know in the context of the emergence of all of these new conflict lines germany has a very Important Role in europe to play in order to make help make europe fit for that kind of trouble global circumstance especially against the backdrop of. Whether we see it or not victor all of it in moscow many experts say the fall of the berlin wall defined a new world order you mentioned it earlier but does russia today provide an effective counterbalance to the u. S. The way it did during the old cold war. Well russia at this point has no ideological alternative to the socalled liberal world order that the United States promotes around the world moscow may not be happy about the ideological backbone of that order not find that or there to be to be continuance with its Foreign Policy goals but at the same time russia has limited ideological each so at this point russias Foreign Policy is is focused on promoting russias National Interests both in the x. Soviet space in the socalled near abroad which russia views as its sphere of influence to outside the jinns such as africa where moscow is