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Americans, Germans Remember the Fall of the Wall as a Turning Point

Marissa Melton

   There's a new statue of Ronald Reagan, the 40th U.S. president, on a
   terrace of the U.S. Embassy in Berlin, a stone's throw from the iconic
   Brandenburg Gate.

   It is a long time coming, for the Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation
   and other supporters of the project. They had been pressing Berlin city
   officials for years to erect a statue in a public place, but Berlin
   officials demurred, noting that many factors and people contributed to
   the fall of the Wall on Nov. 9, 1989.

   The Reagan supporters finally settled for a statue on the grounds of
   the embassy -- American soil in the heart of Berlin.

   U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo attended the unveiling Friday,
   calling it a "monumental moment" as the artwork appeared. The statue
   memorializes Reagan's 1987 speech in which he exhorted then-Soviet
   President Mikhail Gorbachev to "tear down this wall."

   Two years later, the Wall began to come down on live television. After
   a surprise announcement by an East German official that Easterners
   would be allowed to travel to the West, effective immediately,
   Berliners took hammers to the concrete barrier and started dismantling
   it themselves.

   WATCH: The Fall of the Berlin Wall, 30 Years On

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