Checkpoint Bravo

This article describes the Dreilinden checkpoint or Bravo checkpoint in Berlin-Nikolassee, which was used from 1969. For the checkpoint of the same name in Albrechts Teerofen on the old autobahn route, which existed until 1969, see the Dreilinden checkpoint and the Teltow Canal Bridge .

Checkpoint Bravo in 1987

Northern view from the A 115 towards the bridge house of the former Bravo checkpoint

Checkpoint Bravo was the name for the US part of the Dreilinden - Drewitz checkpoint . It was located in the Nikolassee district on the city limits from Berlin to the GDR since 1969 on the extension of the AVUS (now part of the A115 ) immediately south of the Zehlendorfer Kleeblatt and thus on the transit route between Berlin (West) and the Federal Republic of Germany .

Three checkpoints

Checkpoints

The Berlin architect and Senate Building Director Rainer Rümmler designed the facility, which was built between 1968 and 1972, including a gas station, rest stop and customs post

Checkpoint Bravo was one of three Allied checkpoints used by the USA in divided Germany and divided Berlin . It was named after the second letter of today's ICAO alphabet . Checkpoint Alpha was the western allied side of the Helmstedt-Marienborn border crossing and Checkpoint Charlie the allied border control point within Berlin .

The nomenclature checkpoint for checkpoint , in contrast to the GDR designation border crossing point (GÜSt) , results from the fact that the international legal legitimacy as a state border was not recognized from the west . In this regard, after the de facto recognition of the GDR as a state through the Basic Treaty of 1972, there was a change for the inner-German border , but not for the border around West Berlin .

The facility with check-in buildings, rest stops, gas station and bridge house (customs office) was designed by the architects Rainer Rümmler and Hans Joachim Schröder and was built between 1968 and 1972 by the North Building Department of the Berlin Regional Finance Directorate . The preserved buildings are under monument protection .

Before 1969

→ Main articles : Dreilinden control point and Teltow Canal Bridge

Before 1969, the Bravo checkpoint was on a motorway bridge over the Teltow Canal in the area of ​​the Albrechts Teerofen location (part of the Wannsee district in the south-western Steglitz-Zehlendorf district of Berlin). The Autobahn, now known as the A 115 , then had a different route south of the Zehlendorfer Kleeblatt. Immediately after the city limits, it led more than three kilometers west of the current route over GDR territory again, before another 150 m wide strip of West Berlin territory (Albrechts Teerofen) began on the bridge over the Teltow Canal , on which both the Allies were located Checkpoint as well as the customs / police clearance point of Berlin (West). Since the GDR wanted to avoid an uncontrolled passage through its territory between West Berlin and the checkpoint, it built a new section of the autobahn bypassing Albrechts Teerofen and closed this section. The old motorway bridge over the Teltow Canal with some markings of the checkpoint is still there, the lane of the old motorway was preserved for decades and was occasionally used for filming after the fall of the Berlin Wall.

literature

• William Durie: The United States Garrison Berlin 1945-1994 . Mission Accomplished, 2014, ISBN 978-1-63068-540-9 (English).
• Hans-Dieter Behrendt: Hello, GDR passport control. GNN Verlag, Schkeuditz 2008, ISBN 978-3-89819-243-9 .
• Peter Boeger, Alexander Dowe (Hrsg.): Panzerdenkmal Berlin-Dreilinden. History and background . Metropol Verlag, Berlin 2014, ISBN 978-3-86331-167-4 .
• William Durie, Dieter Riedel, Friedrich Jeschonnek: Allies in Berlin 1945–1994 . 2nd Edition. Berliner Wissenschafts-Verlag, Berlin 2007, ISBN 978-3-8305-0397-2 .
• William Durie: The British Garrison 1945-1994 . Past Publishing, Berlin 2012, ISBN 978-3-86408-068-5 .

Web links

Commons : Checkpoint Drewitz-Dreilinden  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

• Entry in the Berlin State Monument List
• Website of Checkpoint Bravo eV , which has set up a small memorial to the Wall regime and an open-air exhibition in a watchtower of the GDR border control system.
• Checkpoint Bravo: Dreilinden-Drewitz monument area on berlin.de
• Sights in Steglitz-Zehlendorf on berlin.de
• Photos from the Bravo checkpoint

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Location of the Checkpoint Bravo until 1969

Coordinates: 52 ° 24 ′ 59 ″  N , 13 ° 11 ′ 49 ″  E