Editing Checkpoint Charlie (section)

===Berlin Wall constructed===
{{main article|Eastern Bloc emigration and defection|Berlin Wall}}
On 13 August 1961, a barbed-wire barrier that would become the [[Berlin Wall]] separating East and West Berlin was erected by the East Germans.<ref name="pearson75"/> Two days later, police and army engineers began to construct a more permanent concrete wall.<ref name="dowty124">{{Harvnb|Dowty|1989|p=124}}</ref> Along with the wall, the 830-mile (1336&nbsp;km) zonal border became 3.5 miles (5.6&nbsp;km) wide on its East German side in some parts of Germany with a tall steel-mesh fence running along a "death strip" bordered by mines, as well as channels of ploughed earth, to slow escapees and more easily reveal their footprints.<ref name="black141">{{Harvnb|Black|English|Helmreich|McAdams|2000|p=141}}</ref>