Europe was made whole in 1989. Now concern about migrant ‘invaders’ is turning the continent, and other global regions, into fortresses
Polish border guards patrol a barrier erected to keep out asylum seekers bussed through Belarus in the summer of 2022.Polish border guards patrol a barrier erected to keep out asylum seekers bussed through Belarus in the summer of 2022.T
o drive into the heart of West Berlin on a dark, snowy night in December 1988 was to descend on to the cinematic frontline of the cold war. Watchtowers manned by armed East German border guards, searchlights, barbed wire, the blackened facade of the gutted Reichstag by the frozen River Spree – it was all there, just like the movies. Yet it was only too real. Holding centre stage: theUS president Ronald Reagan had made a similar sojourn the previous year.
Or could there? Thirty-plus years later, thousands of kilometres of new walls, security barriers, fences and barbed wire have sprung up in and around Europe. The EU/Schengen area is now surrounded or crisscrossed by 19 border or separation fences totalling 2,048km in length, up from 315km in 2014. Similar trends are discernible worldwide. Everywhere, it seems,What is so-called “Fortress Europe” afraid of? Historically, walls were built to defend against enemies.
No one sensibly suggests a wall, ditch or berm could have stopped Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Governments claim barriers serve another purpose: deterring transnational terrorism and crime. Yet the real reason walls are back in vogue
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