The Curtain Rises: Eastern Europe, 1989 : CHAPTER 7 EAST GERMANY : ‘The Wall Is History,’--and So Is Honecker : There will be no ‘China solution’ in East Berlin. And 28 years of separation end.

Mikhail Gorbachev came to East Berlin on Oct. 5, his arrival oddly not covered on East German television. On the same day, the East Germans tightened security on East Berlin border crossings and banned visa-free travel to Czechoslovakia. The following day, at a wreath-laying ceremony, Gorbachev spoke with a crowd of reporters who pressed him about East Germany’s ability to undertake reforms.

“We know our German friends very well,” Gorbachev said, “as well as their ability to recognize and to learn from life and to forecast the political road ahead and to introduce corrections if necessary. They have our full confidence.” To those trying to read between the lines, Gorbachev’s comment seemed clear.

The next day, as riot police broke up demonstrations in Leipzig, Potsdam, Dresden and East Berlin, Gorbachev and Honecker talked for three hours. Gorbachev said afterward that issues facing East Germany would be solved in East Berlin, not Moscow. He said he hoped the government would work with “all forces in society.”

The demonstrations continued the next day. On Oct. 9, after meeting with a visiting Chinese Politburo member, Honecker ominously compared the “counterrevolutionary rebellion in Beijing” to the “present campaign of defamation against” East Germany. There were even more alarming indications that Honecker was ready to apply the Chinese strategy of June massacre at Tian An Men Square in his own nation.

Kurt Masur, 62, the director of the Gewandhaus musical theater in Leipzig, was among those increasingly distressed by the brutality of police action against demonstrators in that city and the persistently circulating reports that police were to be issued live ammunition before the demonstration planned on Oct. 9. That afternoon Masur summoned three top Communists to an urgent meeting in Masur’s home. Also present were a church official and a prominent writer.

Masur said the situation was dangerous: If armed police fired into a crowd, he said, East Germany could erupt in civil war. The party officials, drawing on their own sources, could offer nothing in dispute of Masur’s fear. By 4:30 p.m., they prepared a statement, promising dialogue and calling for calm. It was broadcast over Leipzig radio and announced in churches. When the demonstrators assembled at 6 p.m., the police withdrew to the side streets and the demonstration, involving about 70,000, went off peacefully.

(The role of Egon Krenz, then the Politburo’s security chief, in the day’s events would later be the subject of controversy. Krenz’s supporters said that his personal intercession had prevented an attack by the police, who had indeed been issued live ammunition. Masur later contended, and Communist officials confirmed, that it was only after the demonstration began that Krenz--who in June had praised the Chinese action in Tian An Men Square--gave instructions to let the demonstration proceed peacefully.)

But Erich Honecker was in his last days as East Germany’s leader.

On Oct. 10, the East German Politburo held its regular weekly meeting in East Berlin. The session ran late into the night and continued the following day. At its conclusion, it was evident that Honecker’s grip was failing. A concluding statement said for the first time that the party was “open to discussion” on ways to make socialism more attractive. It said the party was willing to discuss issues of economic efficiency, supplies of consumer goods, reform of the media and “increasing travel possibilities.”

Reports that came out later described the Politburo meeting as bitter, with Honecker resolutely holding to the hard line, even as his oldest allies warned him that social pressure could not be contained indefinitely by riot police and force. The Politburo’s statement, the first hint of conciliation from the regime, was passed over Honecker’s objection. The first blow had been struck.

At the next Politburo meeting, a week later, Honecker’s support faded entirely. Willi Stoph, the 75-year-old prime minister, told Honecker it was time to go. The next day, Oct. 18, before a meeting of the Central Committee, Honecker resigned. He had been in power 18 years.

Krenz, 52, the Politburo’s youngest member, was appointed to replace him. He immediately launched a drive to win public support, touring factories and appearing on television, admitting the party had failed to respond to the country’s problems. But he said the socialist system in East Germany would not change, nor would the party surrender its leading role.

The pressure did not subside. The party’s media commissar had been forced out along with Honecker, and news of rebellion spread across the country. The demonstrations continued--in Dresden, Potsdam, Leipzig, East Berlin, Neubrandenburg, Jena, Gera, Rostock, Halle, Guben, Erfurt, Karl-Marx-Stadt, Dessau, Guestrow, Magdeburg, Altenburg, Arnstadt. Banned periodicals returned to the streets. Local officials met with opposition groups and listened to scathing criticism from townspeople who came to vent their anger.

The party bent. Margot Honecker, the former leader’s wife, was thrown out as education minister. Party first secretaries in a dozen provinces resigned under pressure. On Nov. 3, Krenz announced a new package of reforms in law, the economy and education and revealed that five more senior Politburo members would resign.

In Prague on Nov. 3, the West German Embassy was again jammed with some 4,000 East Germans. By nightfall, diplomat Steiner felt as though he were on his last legs. About 9 p.m., for perhaps the 10th time that day, he called the East German Embassy to see if any progress had been made in sending trains to pick up the East Germans. The voice on the other end said, “Just tell them to go. All they need is a passport or some kind of identification. Just tell them they can go.”

Steiner walked out to the front of the embassy, past the heavy, black iron doors. He was pale, stunned.

“They can go,” he said.

“They can go. The Wall is history.” There was a tone of amazement in his voice.

“I’m telling you, the Wall is history.”

The next day, as 1 million people demonstrated in East Berlin to demand free elections, Krenz said any East Germans wishing to resettle to the West could do so immediately through Czechoslovakia. That weekend, 10,000 a day made the crossing.

On Nov. 8, the 11-member Politburo resigned. Seven were reappointed immediately and four newcomers were added. On the evening of Nov. 9, a party official told reporters a new law on travel had been drafted that would allow East Germans to cross to the West, through any crossing, without exit visas.

The first East Germans, not quite believing what they had heard, crossed that night with no resistance from the guards.

The Wall had fallen.

As the news spread over West German television, thousands streamed across that Thursday night. Hundreds of West Berliners crossed to the East, shouting, “The Wall is gone, the Wall is gone!” A crowd gathered at the Brandenburg Gate, where youngsters climbed atop the Wall. At 3 a.m., in a blaze of light, the crowd was still there, chanting “Open the gate!”

Over the weekend, an estimated 2 million East Germans traveled to West Berlin for what resembled a three-day street fair amid the bright lights, glittering hotels and dazzling shop windows. Auto horns blared, sirens wailed, couples strolled down the Kurfuerstendamm, laughing and smiling and toasting each other with open bottles of beer and wine.

“We couldn’t believe we could get out,” said one man who made the crossing with his wife. “We just wanted to try it. But we will go back.” Most did return, but for three days, West Berlin had its biggest traffic jam ever and its biggest party.

They had made it. Over the years, at least 80 had died making the run across the no-man’s land to the West. Chris Gueffroys, the latest and perhaps the last victim, had been killed attempting to breach the Wall only nine months before it fell. Scores had gone to prison for trying. The tunnels dug under it, the deceptions employed to cross over it, were the stuff of spy novels. It had brought superpowers to the brink. It was the ultimate symbol of the Cold War, the East-West divide. And now, like Erich Honecker, who supervised its construction in 1961, it was gone.

Lech Walesa left Warsaw for a trip to Canada, the United States and Venezuela. The day he left, the Ministry of Finance reported to the Parliament that an agreement would be signed in December with the International Monetary Fund, which would provide Poland with $1 billion in credit to help restructure the economy.