Marienborn border crossing memorial

Marienborn border crossing memorial site - darkometer rating : 6 - Helmstedt-Marienborn was the largest of the border crossing complexes of the GDR (East Germany) on the border with the FRG (West Germany), the most sinister stretch of the Cold War era " Iron Curtain " that divided Germany for ca. 40 years. Today it's one of the prime national monuments commemorating that time (together with the associated border memorial at Hötensleben ). > More background info > What there is to see > Location > Access and costs > Time required > Combinations with other dark destinations > Combinations with non-dark destinations > Photos More background info: in addition to being a major border crossing point for entering the GDR , Marienborn was also the entry point for the principal special "transit route" West Germans could take to drive to West Berlin (see Checkpoint Bravo/Dreilinden-Drewitz ) without properly/officially entering GDR territory, a scheme devised as part of the policies of easing East-West relations in the early 1970s. The checkpoint (code-named “Alpha” – cf. Charlie ) on the western side of the border was (naturally) a fairly modest affair, but the one in the GDR became a real monster, esp. in the 1970s when the vast complex of over 80 acres in area was built, whose core now is the memorial site. Some 1000 border guards, customs and border police and other personnel worked here – including Stasi secret service officers – until the border crossing became redundant with the collapse of the GDR (and the Eastern Bloc as a whole) in 1990. Only after this, did the full details of the inner workings of the GDR border crossing "security" system emerge.