European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - January 03, 1990, Darmstadt, Hesse                                East German refugees Helmut and Brigitte Rosa with their son Andre spent their first weeks in West Germany at a red Cross shelter in Schwabach. They want a life in West Berlin without  is  the Wall continued from Page 9 and sit on it now like children playing with a Doberman suddenly Blind toothless and sedate. It is also like the Wall of biblical Jericho sundered amid the shouts of inc masses. The Wall is really two Walls in some places with a strip of no Man s land in Between. In others it is an underwater Fence in a River. It would stretch 103 Miles if straight about As Long As Connecticut is wide. The unbroken Chain of irony that Marks is 28-year history is even longer. Example Easl German officials lore the Wall open nov. 9 for the same reason they built in to Stop their people from leaving in Masse. Last germans used Berlin As an escape Roulo at the rate of nearly 2,000 people a Day just before the communists divided the City on aug. 13,1961. The exodus through other East bloc countries mis year reached similar proportions. Example East German Leader Walter Ulbricht said Al a press conference in june 1961 that no one intends to build a Wall to solve the refugee problem. Two months later inc Wall a Cal up under the supervision of Ulbricht s protege Erich Honecker. Honecker. Who succeeded us Bucht in 1971, predicted last january that the Wall would remain intact for 50, maybe 100 years. Now the Wall is oozing people and Honecker is disgraced and under House arrest example the communists caught . Officials off guard when they built the Wall and again when they opened it. The allies had suspected in 1961 that the soviets might close Access routes across East Germany. Their attention was diverted when workers started stringing barbed wire across the City in the Middle of the night for All its contingency plans inc West had not been braced for w hat was  wrote former Berlin radio correspondent Norman Gelb in his 1986 Book about the All. The new infuriated president Kennedy who Learned of it while sailing Olf Cape cod. What angered him Golb wrote was the rack nation that All the Effort that had gone into forecasting what the communists would do and into preparing an appropriate response had been in  in 1989 president Bush was criticized for failing to quickly respond to the opening of the Wall. What next. Berlin Page 10 the trip to Freedom wires and lies could t Stop the yearning by Vince  and efik Battien  bureaus Athrin Stel or could see the Border from her hiding place in the Cornfield. A fervent  to lease fas Germany had brought Kathrin her husband and their two children to this Farmer s Field in Hungary. This was August before the flood of refugees from Prague and Budapest before the Berlin Wall opened. It was a Lime when Bonier Crossings still were dangerous. When tripwire. Hares and guards with loaded weapons turned Back All hut the most determined. Hast germans crossing into West Germany still were measured in he hundreds per Day. In september and october there were thousands. By november hundreds of thousands. No one could have known in August that the Avalanche that was building would Cven Lually tear Down the Iron curtain. Certainly not the Stel cars. They just wanted a Chance to see Disney world. Kathrin s sister lives in the West and often sent postcards from her family s frequent travels most recently a trip to America. It was the postcard from hoi Ida s Disney world that did ii. It prompted the decision to leave Karl Marx Stadt. Kathrin and Horst. Bolh m their 30s, gathered sons Candy 15. And Ilko. 12. And loaded up the family station Wagon. They drove through Czechoslovakia to Hungary. When hungarian soldiers refused to Lei them pass into Austria they abandoned the car and hid in the Cornfield until dark. Kathrin could see the Border but just when the family was about to make ils move two guards approached. The soldiers stopped nearby and began to Chat. 1 he Stel ers stood perfectly still Tor an hour. It began to ram. Final the soldiers left Anil the a stars and stripes special report Stel ers crossed the Cornfield. We crawled under the first tripwire Kathrin said. But the second had a wire underneath and i hit it with my foot. 11 set off flares. We ran through the next Cornfield and ran and ran and  she remembers Thunder and losing both her shoes. At the Fence her husband threw the boys Over the barbed wire