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“China has got a Wall too, and the State Security Police (Stasi) was a Secret Service like any other country has one too.” It’s obvious since quite some time now that the young generation of today’s reunited Germany lacks a basic understanding and knowledge about the realities in former East Germany. Not a day goes by without Politicians publicly imploring that they feel obligated to change that. It’s election year, and this commitment is designed to shed a good light on them. Their latest demands are to add
East German History to the curriculum of high schools. On one hand, it shows the helplessness of those Politicians, but it also means that they finally have recognized the need for change.
Just in time, in the year of the 20th Anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, a remarkable book has been published; an eye opener especially for people who have never mentally associated themselves with the East. This book should be a great asset to parents, teachers and especially to young students.
"Not with me…!" (“Ohne mich…!”) by Lothar Mork and Ludger Wimberg tells the true story of young Lothar Mork, who, at the tender age of 15, desperately tried to illegally leave communist East Germany. In the spring of 1963, Lothar and two of his friends were embarking on a 7 mile march from their hometown of Worbis towards the deadly border. They were determined to escape to West German, where, in their opinion, freedom and opportunity awaited them. What had begun as a teenage adventure,
eventually lead to disastrous experiences and then in the end to a dream fulfilled.
Lothar survived years in various communist prisons, developed a sense of survival along the way, and finally reached freedom and embarked on a career in Engineering and Operations. His efforts culminate in his promotion to Vice President of Operations in a large American Corporation.
This book tells the moving story of his life behind the iron curtain and his quest for freedom. It all started in April of 1963; just before his 16th birthday. The young State of East Germany was eating their youth alive; insurmountable, social conflicts started to emerge. In the West, more and more young people started to revolt against the establishment. The young people of East Germany too were searching for guidance and new values in life.
But there was no freedom in East Germany; an entire People was locked up behind hundreds of miles of barbed wire fences, minefields and concrete walls. Any act of opposition was brutally squashed. Consequently, some young people aligned with the Regime to get by, while others decide to escape.
This book is trying to shed some light on the path of how one comes to the tough decision to escape. Thorough understanding constitutes knowledge. The book describes every day events facing a young East German, who was opposed to Communism; from such things as admiring Western music, receiving care packages from relatives in the West, witnessing the forced collectivization in agriculture, the grip of the myriads of communist organizations, the ever present brutal forces of the State Security Police and the
mandatory
teachings of Marxism/Leninism and ‘Scientific Socialism’.
Those, who desire to understand, must learn. Reading this book makes it easy to comprehend these historical facts.
The book "Not with me…!" (“Ohne mich…!”) takes the reader into a world which was believed having ceased to exist. However, even 20 years after the collapse of Communism in Eastern Europe, many still have a nostalgic view back to those days, painting a murky picture of life behind the iron curtain. They keep downplaying the fundamentally rotten character of communist Regimes. Through such behavior, they unintentionally rehabilitate Communism. The book is trying to make a how ever so small contribution
to prevent that from happening.
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