As bad as it was, all that history set the stage for what came next. Twenty-five years ago, the people of East Germany found their voice and spoke. They stated in no uncertain terms that they wanted the freedom to see their friends and families on the other side of an arbitrary line. The freedom to move. The freedom to choose. And, amazingly, the people in power did what they so rarely do: they listened. And they responded by letting it happen.

It would have been so easy for the people in power to have responded in the same manner as previous generations of Eastern Bloc leaders had before. Or, for that matter, like their contemporary Chinese counterparts did in Tiananmen Square earlier that year. But they didn’t. The Soviet Union decided to let their client states choose their future and the Americans, British, and French didn’t meddle too much either. Instead, the people themselves chose to take a different path.

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