Checkpoint Charlie, the best-known Berlin Wall crossing point between East Berlin and West Berlin during the Cold War (1947–1991), was opened in November 1989 and removed on this day in 1990. However, it remained an official crossing for foreigners and diplomats until German reunification in October 1990.
The checkpoint came about after East German leader Walter Ulbricht agitated and manoeuvred to get the Soviet Union’s permission to construct the Berlin Wall in 1961 to stop emigration and defection westward through the Border system, preventing escape across the city sector border from East Berlin into West Berlin. Checkpoint Charlie became a symbol of the Cold War, representing the separation of East and West. Soviet and American tanks briefly faced each other at the location during the Berlin Crisis of 1961. On June 26, 1963, US President John F. Kennedy visited Checkpoint Charlie and looked from a platform onto the Berlin Wall and into East Berlin.
After the dissolution of the Eastern Bloc and the reunification of Germany, the building at Checkpoint Charlie became a tourist attraction. It is now located in the Allied Museum in the Dahlem neighbourhood of Berlin.
-Wikipedia
Photo Caption- US Army tanks face off against Soviet armour at Checkpoint Charlie, Berlin, October 1961 – US Army