15 Best Berlin Cold War Sites To Visit

Berlin Wall – East Side Gallery

While the Berlin Wall was still standing, its two sides were very different. While sections of the western side were covered in graffiti and street art, the eastern side was spotless: if you approached the Wall in East Berlin, you were likely to be shot.

So the East Side Gallery is something of a turning of the tables. This 1.3km section of the Wall is the longest preserved, and it’s a permanent memorial, with works by 118 different artists.

It includes some of the most iconic art of the late 20^th century. One of the best-known pieces is Birgit Kinder’s Trabant smashing through the Wall. Although as many people who have driven a Trabant will tell you, you would have been fortunate to reach the Wall in a Trabi in the first place, never mind drive through it.

The other most recognizable mural is Dmitri Vrubel’s My God Help Me Survive This Deadly Love, a painting of a (rather passionate) fraternal socialist kiss between GDR leader Erich Honecker and Soviet dictator Leonid Brezhnev.

The Gallery is open air, free to visit, and one of the best things to do in Berlin.  An ideal introduction to the Cold War for kids.

Getting there: S-Bahn S3, S5, S7 or S9 – or tram M10 – to Warschauer Strasse

Berlin Wall Memorial, Bernauer Strasse

The Berlin Wall Memorial is the only section of the Wall kept entirely intact. There are numerous sections of Wall around the city, but these are sections of one side of the Wall. This is the place to go to see it as it would have looked from a nearby apartment block, complete with both sections of Wall, the ‘Death Strip’ between them and a guard’s watchtower.

The Wall was built along this busy street on the border of the Mitte and Wedding districts, very close to some houses on the Eastern side of the city. In some of the most dramatic scenes in the Wall’s history, residents tied bedsheets together and abseiled down the outside of the apartment houses to safety on the Western side of the Wall.

The West Berlin fire brigade also helped with jumping mats, but some suffered serious injuries. It’s also where Ida Siekmann, who landed on the pavement after jumping  from her fourth floor apartment, tragically became the first person to die trying to escape across the Berlin Wall on August 22^nd 1961. The East German authorities cleared the buildings and bricked them up soon afterwards.

The Memorial site also includes a monument, a Chapel of Reconciliation, an exhibition and a viewing tower across the street from the intact section of Wall. It’s very much worth the climb for the view over the Wall with the city skyline beyond.

Getting there: S1 or S2 to Nordbahnhof, then a 3-minute walk along Gartenstrasse to the Memorial

Brandenburg Gate

The Brandenburg Gate (Brandenburger Tor) is the most famous of all Berlin landmarks. The late 18^th-century gate was one of the grandest monuments in the Prussian capital, commissioned by Friedrich Wilhelm II to boost the city’s prestige vis-à-vis more established European capitals including Paris and London.

However, in the 20^th century it took on a significance the Prussians could never have foreseen. It happened to be located next to one of the dividing lines of the Allied occupation sectors of Berlin after World War II. Unter den Linden, Pariser Platz and the Gate were part of the Soviet sector, while the Tiergarten to the west was under the control of the British.

After 13^th August 1961, the East German authorities built the ‘antifascist protection’ Berlin Wall along the demarcation line behind the Gate, therefore dividing the city in half for what would be 28 years. The landmark Gate became a gathering and rallying point for protesters in West Berlin, and as much as the Wall itself, a symbol of the Cold War and division of Europe. In 1987, US President Ronald Reagan famously urged Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev to ‘tear down this Wall’.

On 9^th November 1989 this finally happened, and the section next to the Brandenburg Gate was the scene of one of the biggest celebrations of the fall of the Berlin Wall. At first, traffic was allowed to pass through the Gate, but it has now been pedestrianized for the last 20 years.

The Gate is sometimes lit in the colours of flags of other nations in gestures of support from Germany. Most recently, it was lit blue and yellow following the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

Karl-Marx-Allee and Frankfurter Tor

In the aftermath of World War II, the Soviet way of life was exported west into central Europe. As well as one-party states, totalitarianism, repression, torture and loss of freedom, Central Europe got Stalin-era Socialist Realist architecture foisted upon it. And one of the best examples of this is Karl-Marx-Allee – formerly Stalinallee – in the Friedrichshain district.

The Stalinallee was a showpiece for the fledgling East German state. It’s a wide boulevard lined with near-identical luxury apartments on either side, used to house workers and their families. The facades were decorated with tiled motifs on the theme of Berlin – many of these later fell off, forcing authorities to build sheltered walkways for pedestrians.

It was also one of the main shopping streets in East Berlin. At one end, the two domed towers of the Frankfurter Tor (Frankfurt Gate) symbolized an entrance into the city. At the far end, over two kilometres away, Strausberger Platz is a typical Communist-era square with tower blocks.

While the street was still being built, it was the scene of one of the main demonstrations of the East German Uprising in June 1953. The gathering, at Strausberger Platz, was in protest against an edict ordering increased work quotas without an accompanying increase in wages. It was brutally dispersed by Soviet forces with Stasi help, and at least 30 protesters were executed afterwards.

Getting there: U5 to Frankfurter Tor 

See Also: Photographing Berlin – 13 of the Best Locations To Explore

Fernsehturm TV Tower

Berlin’s TV Tower is a classic gargantuan Communist-era construction, built to provide a steady TV signal across the Berlin region while demonstrating ruling Party power to anyone that saw it.

It’s a superb viewpoint over central Berlin. It’s 368 metres – 1,207 feet high to the top of the antenna, so the viewing gallery is around 1,000 feet above street level.  It also has a revolving restaurant, which in recent years has been sped up to two revolutions per hour – up from the single revolution per hour during the Communist era.

If you happen to be in Berlin on a sunny day, take a minute or two to look closely at the glass orb of the tower. You’ll see a cross-shaped reflection caused by the sun, which caused much amusement at the time it was built. The Walter Ulbricht-led East German regime had been suppressing the use of crosses on churches – only for this reflection to appear any sunny day. This phenomenon became known as the ‘Pope’s Revenge’, and the Tower was also called St Walter after the Party General Secretary. 

Getting there: Alexanderplatz U- and S-Bahn

Alexanderplatz and World Clock

Alexanderplatz was the main transport hub of central Berlin as long ago as the mid-19^th century. After destruction towards the end of World War Two, it was expanded to four times its original size under the GDR authorities, and by the early 1970s was surrounded by typical contemporary socialist-era buildings and the showpiece TV Tower.

The square was also pedestrianized during the GDR period, and the Welt-Uhr (World Clock) was also added in 1969. It now lists 169 cities around the world, each within its respective time zone, with offsets listed where appropriate. The original version had something of a Communist bias to it – Pyongyang and Ulaanbaatar were listed, but not Seoul, for example. But this was rectified when it was restored in 1997.

Alexanderplatz was somewhere the GDR liked to show to the outside world, a model Socialist public space. But it ended up being the gathering point for one of the main demonstrations against the GDR regime on 7^th October 1989, the occasion of the state’s 40^th anniversary. Within five weeks, the Berlin Wall had fallen.

Getting there: Alexanderplatz U- and S-Bahn

Checkpoint Charlie

Checkpoint Charlie is the most famous of the six crossing points between West (American sector) Berlin and East Berlin.

The crossing point was on the corner of Friedrichstrasse and Zimmerstrasse. The East Germans had built heavily around the site, with a large area set aside to process (search) vehicles planning to cross the border.

The original building was replaced around 1980, replaced by another which was removed to the Allied Museum in Zehlendorf soon after the fall of the Berlin Wall. The building now there, with added sandbags, is a replica. It has long been the most touristed of the Berlin Cold War sites, with plenty of shops selling kitsch souvenirs. The ‘soldiers’ at the Checkpoint who used to charge visitors to have their photos taken with them have recently been removed by city authorities.

Getting there: U6 to Kochstrasse

Checkpoint Charlie Museum

I’ve visited this Museum, in a house a few metres from the crossing point, three times over twenty-plus years, and I still think it’s a great introduction to the history of the Berlin Wall.

I’ve spent the best part of two hours there each time I’ve visited, mainly because the walls are absolutely crammed with exhibits and stories of escapes and attempts to cross to the West. My favourite exhibit is the car with the escapee squeezed into the bodywork of the vehicle.

The one thing I’ll say against the Museum is that it could do with a makeover. I’m sure it hasn’t changed since my first visit in 2000, so if you’re planning a return visit bear in mind that you’ll be seeing pretty much the same thing. I returned there because I was showing friends and later my wife around the city. And because there are so many stories, I simply found new ones each time I visited. 

Getting there: U6 to Kochstrasse

Potsdamer Platz Watchtower

The Berlin Wall was guarded by over 200 watchtowers, most of which have long since been demolished. They were staffed by armed border guards with a brief to shoot to kill anyone trying to cross the border into West Berlin.

This watchtower – on Erna-Berger-Strasse, to the south of Potsdamer Platz – was built in 1971, and would have had a slightly elevated view over the abandoned wasteland that Potsdamer Platz was at the time. 

That view is lost to history, as the whole area has been built up, the steel, glass and concrete of the surrounding buildings completely changing the former perspective. However, you can still visit the tower daily between 11.00 am and 5.00 pm, and see the small exhibition there.

Getting there: U- or S-Bahn to Potsdamer Platz, then walk across Stresemannstrasse, turning down Erna-Berger-Strasse. It’s 100 metres along the street on the right.

DDR Museum

Museums telling the story of East Germany tend to go about it in two different ways. On the one hand there are the grim Stasi Museums in the likes of Dresden, Leipzig and Bautzen, where you see and learn about the conditions in which prisoners were held. The other approach is much lighter, showing everyday life in the GDR, from long-defunct food brands to gaudy ‘80s wallpaper and décor, with sections on youth organisations like the Young Pioneers (such as the DDR Museums in Pirna and Thale).

The DDR Museum in Berlin is much closer to the latter approach.  Much of the exhibition – a lot of it is interactive, and brilliant for kids – covers everyday life in the GDR. And it beautifully captures the little details, especially the living room and kitchen. And it also covers some of the grimmer side of life in East Germany, with a reconstructed Stasi police cell a reminder of what became of you if you fell foul of the not-so-secret police.

The highlight for us was an exhibit on the Stasi guide to dissident hairstyles. A chart showed a series of acceptable styles, together with less conformist ones. If you had one of the latter, you could expect a lot of bother from the Stasi.

Following on from this, you can also adopt a name and make up your own GDR persona, and work out how well you would – or wouldn’t – conform to the mores of the Stasi. I channelled my inner rebel into creating a character who was just 4% compliant with the totalitarian way. Which rather pleased me, I must say. I also thoroughly enjoyed my ‘drive’ in a fine red Trabant, the much-sought-after but much-derided national car of East Germany.

Tränenpalast – Palace of Tears

This inauspicious 1960s building was the westbound-only crossing point for visitors from West Germany – and indeed the West – returning from East Berlin.

They were often visiting their relatives and friends confined to East Berlin, so it was the scene of countless emotional farewells. Hence its nickname, which means ’Palace of Tears’ in English.

The large hall now hosts an exhibition on Berlin during the Cold War, and you can pass through the East German passport gates as people did until 1989.

Getting there: It’s just around the corner from the Friedrichstreasse U- and S-Bahn station.

Stasi Museum, Normannenstrasse

No visit to the Cold War sites of Berlin is complete without learning about the dreaded Stasi. The mostly undercover police – their name is an abbreviation of Staatssicherheit (State Security) were modelled on the NKVD in Stalin’s Soviet Union, intended to be the sword and shield of the East German Communist regime.

If anything, the Stasi surpassed their Big Brother in Moscow, with a vast network of paid and unpaid informants believed to number as much as 1 in 6 of the East German population. For 30 years the Ministry was headed by Erich Mielke, a ruthless old Stalinist who even had a file on his superior, Erich Honecker.

The Stasi Museum is housed in a vast bland office block in the eastern suburb of Lichtenberg. The Museum’s exhibition focuses on the Stasi’s many methods of surveillance of the population of the GDR, with covert cameras, bugging devices and much more.

You can also visit Erich Mielke’s offices, along with those of his senior Ministry staff. This area is a disconcerting step back to the 1980s – everything has been left as it was when the staff stopped working in the building after the fall of the Berlin Wall.

Getting there: U5 to Magdalenenstrasse

See Also: Stasi Museum Leipzig

Hohenschönhausen Stasi Prison

While the Normannenstrasse museum shows how the Stasi operated, this secret Stasi prison takes things to another level entirely. It shows how vicious and brutal the Stasi could be, and the appalling conditions in which prisoners were kept.

The complex wasn’t widely known as a prison. Disguised vehicles would shuttle arrested and abducted people to the site for interrogation, torture and indefinite incarceration.  The prison was depicted in the excellent 2006 movie The Lives of Others, in which a playwright is placed under surveillance at the orders of a GDR minister.

Visits to Hohenschönhausen are by guided tour, which you need to book in advance. The tour guides are often former prisoners themselves, or at least have first-hand experience of the repressive GDR regime and the Stasi. Tours are conducted in English, but you’ll either need to bring a group of six or more people with you or join another pre-booked group for the tour. Your best bet is to call +49 30 98 60 62 30 to arrange your visit. Full information on guided tours can be found here.

See Also: Stasi Museum Dresden – The Complete Guide

Bornholmer Strasse Bridge

The night of 9^th November 1989 was very confusing. The East German (GDR) government did not intend to open the border with West Berlin (and therefore West Germany) that evening, but they were planning to change some regulations allowing East Germans to apply to travel across the border.

Towards the end of his press conference, he was asked about these new rules, and when they would come into force. Unsure of himself, he said, ”As far as I know…without delay.” Within an hour, the West German networks ARD had broadcast his words, so most of the nation heard the news and Berliners rushed to crossing points around the city.

The first place where crowds of around 20,000 built up was at the Bornholmer Strasse crossing on the Bösebrücke bridge, above the present S-Bahn station. The Stasi border guards were overwhelmed by the sheer size of the crowds, and called their superiors for advice on what to do. Nobody in the Stasi hierarchy was willing to order officers to shoot at the crowds, and at 11.30 pm that evening officer Harald Jager opened the gate. The Berlin Wall was finally open, after 28 years.

I first visited the bridge in 2000, and all trace of the border crossing had long since been removed. There is a small outdoor exhibition at Platz des 9 November 1989, just off the end of the bridge. And if you’re ever passing Marienstrasse 16, two miles away in Pankow, the car port roof was formerly the roof of the Bornholmer Strasse border crossing.

Soviet War Memorials

There’s a saying about history – that it’s always the victors who get to write it. So it was – for over 40 years at least – in East Germany, which was liberated by the Red Army from the Nazis, only to have to endure another four decades of totalitarianism under Communism afterwards.

The largest of these is the Memorial at Treptower Park, in the former East of the city. The focal point is a huge statue of a Red Army soldier protectively carrying a child while standing on a broken swastika.  Although protection is not something they offered the surviving population in Berlin – far from it.

There is another large memorial in the former West Berlin, a few hundred metres west of the Brandenburg Gate in the Tiergarten.

Getting there: S9, S9 or S41 to Treptower Park; for the Tiergarten, the closest station is Brandenburger Tor (S1, S2, S25, S26 or U5)

Marzahn Plattenbau Tower Blocks

When the Berlin Wall fell in 1989, there was a clear, discernible contrast between the apartment blocks of West Berlin and the grubbier plattenbau of the East.  By the time I first stopped by in the city in 2000, many of the inner-city apartment buildings, in former East Berlin districts like Prenzlauer Berg, were already getting a full facelift.

The journey to the eastern suburbs of the city, especially Marzahn, was much more revealing.  I was travelling with a (former West) German friend who, as we rode past said, ”The Wall is gone, but the DDR is still here.”

Marzahn has been modernised since then, but it’s still starkly different to the inner city, and like Alexanderplatz, still gives you a very good idea of what Communist East Germany looked like.

Getting there: S7 to Springpfuhl, then trams 16, 18 or 27 along Allee der Kosmonauten.    

Tempelhof Airport Park

Tempelhof Airport, to the south of the city and within the western sector, played a pivotal role in the early years of the Cold War in Berlin.

The Soviets blockaded the city in an attempt to starve West Berlin. The only way to supply the population was by air, and the Berlin Airlift (Luftbrücke) kept the city supplied and fed during this critical period.

The Airport was finally closed in 2008, and it was decided to turn it into a vast urban park, called Tempelhofer Feld. Nowadays you’re far more likely to see toddlers hurtling down the runway on a tricycle than an aircraft. It’s also popular for cycling running, walking, impromptu football games and much more. A great use of an amazing space.

Getting there: U8 Leinestrasse from Neukölln, or U6, S41 and S42 to Tempelhof

Berlin Cold War Sites – Final Thoughts

I hope you’ve enjoyed my guide to the numerous Cold War sites in Berlin. If history is your main reason for visiting Berlin, then also check out my companion guide to Berlin World War 2 Sites, which also covers various places associated with the Nazis.

Also take a look at my guides to Photographing Berlin and the best Berlin Landmarks to visit. My guide to the best Churches in Berlin also covers a relatively unexplored aspect of the city.

Berlin is unquestionably one of the Best Places To Visit in Germany. This article is a good starting point if you’re planning your first trip to the country. And if you’re just planning to take a trip or two out of the city, then check out my guide to the Best Day Trips From Berlin. If you intend to visit more of the east of the country, take a look at my guide to the best places to visit in eastern Germany.

For more articles on the Cold War in Europe, check out some of my articles on our former home city, Prague. My feature on Communist Prague shows you the many places around the city where you can still glimpse its Communist past.  

The Cold War Museum in Prague is a fascinating trip deep underground below the centre of the Czech capital. Also take a look at my articles on the excellent Retro Museum Prague and the Trabant Museum Prague, a homage to the spluttering national car of the GDR.