Former first lady Nancy Reagan is helped by George Shultz, secretary of state under former President Ronald Reagan, as they arrive beside a replica of the Berlin Wall on Friday at the Reagan Library in Simi Valley.

Mr. Gorbachev, open this gate!
Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!
--- Ronald W. Reagan, 1987 at Brandenburg Gate, Berlin

“He (Reagan) believed that to seek to accommodate any political system, which left millions of people in oppression, was morally wrong." --- Mrs. Thatcher said of Reagan

Speakers reflect on fall of Berlin Wall at Reagan Library event
里根图书馆-柏林墙倒台二十周年纪念

By Anna Bakalis

Posted November 7, 2009 at midnight

Years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, former U.S. Secretary of State George Shultz and former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev were sitting in a backyard near Stanford, where Shultz was teaching.

The two men discussed what they thought was the turning point in ending the Cold War.

Gorbachev said it was two leaders — he and President Ronald Reagan — sitting in a room together, talking.

Shultz said it was Reagan’s decision to show military might in 1983 by sending missiles to West Germany.

“The strength we put on display was never used,” Shultz said. “Strength works hand in hand with diplomacy.”

Twenty years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, Shultz and other key figures in the end of the Cold War spoke Friday to a sold-out audience of about 900 at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library and Museum.

Hosted by former first lady Nancy Reagan, diplomats, world leaders and Reagan’s top advisers spoke throughout the day as part of “Ronald Reagan and the Fall of the Wall: Reflections From Yesterday, Lessons for Today.”

Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall! Shultz said when he joined the Marines during World War II, he was given a rifle and told to use it only if he was willing to pull the trigger — not for empty threats. He said Reagan lived by that idea, too.

“When he said something, they knew he meant it,” said Shultz, who served as Reagan’s secretary of state for almost eight years.

In 1987, Reagan stood in front of the wall’s Brandenburg Gate and said, “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!”

For almost 30 years, the wall separated East Germany from West Germany; 137 people died trying to get to the other side of the wall.

The conference featured panels with Richard Allen, former national security adviser; Ed Meese, former U.S. attorney general; John Lehman, secretary of the Navy; and Martin Anderson, chief domestic policy adviser.

In the morning panel, a member of the audience asked the former Reagan advisers to respond to the notion that Reagan’s participation in the end of the Cold War was minimal — the end was coming regardless of his participation.

Allen said on the first day Reagan was president, he walked into the Oval Office, and among a few items on his desk, nearby was a plaque that read:

[size=16]“There’s no limit to what man can accomplish, as long as he’s willing to let someone else have the credit.”[/size]

Allen said Reagan “knew he stood on the shoulders of other people.” Reagan wouldn’t accept the credit, instead offering it to others like British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and Colin Powell, Reagan’s national security adviser from 1987-89.

Thatcher sent a letter to the library that was read aloud just before Shultz’s speech. In it, Thatcher said of Reagan: “He believed that to seek to accommodate any political system, which left millions of people in oppression, was morally wrong.”

A panel discussion on what the fall of the wall achieved, and some of the remaining obstacles democracy faces in Eastern Europe included Vaclav Klaus, president of the Czech Republic; Leszek Balcerowicz, the former first deputy prime minister of Poland; and Mart Laar, former prime minister of Estonia.

Shultz said that when he first arrived at the Reagan Library on Friday morning, he was offered a tour through the 40th president’s library. Instead, he and his wife went to Reagan’s final resting place. He then saluted the nation’s 40th president.

“There was only one ‘Mr. President’ — the one that I served with,” Shultz said.

“柏林墙倒塌”重现洛杉矶
Berlin Wall Downfall in LA

视频链锁：

http://www.ntdtv.com/xtr/gb/2009/11/10/a378097.html

【大纪元11月10日讯】（大纪元记者袁玫洛杉矶报导）

20年前，象征共产主义和自由世界分界的“柏林墙”被推倒了，这是近代人类社会民心向背、争取自由的胜利表征。为庆祝“柏林墙倒塌” 20年纪念日，洛杉矶各界数百民众8日午夜在温第博物馆(Wende Museum)前著名的Wilshire大道上重现当年历史。

这个由温第博物馆联合洛杉矶市府一起主办的“推倒柏林墙”活动，10月开始在Wilshire大道上盖起一道围墙。由指定的艺术家、团体、学生在上面画出自己的心声。8日午夜12时，民众群心群力将这片围墙推倒，以纪念人类历史上争取自由的重要时刻。

同时，今年10月15日温第博物馆将10块柏林墙砖带入美国、立在博物馆馆前空地，由Kent Twitchell、Thierry Noir、Marie Astrid Gonzalez、Ferrah Karapetian 在其上作画，并将成为温第博物馆永远的珍藏，供人凭吊、回忆。

当晚参加活动的政要、当年亲身经历柏林墙倒塌的德裔美人、华裔、民主人士都在现场表达了心声。当模拟的围墙被推倒时，人们由衷的发出呼声。

温第博物馆创始人、活动主办人Justinian Jampol表示，Wilshire上的模拟柏林墙给予大家一个机会去追思。当年，超过200东德人为越过柏林墙争取自由而死。但这个人类历史里程碑是全世界都不能忘记的。

来自香港及北京在UCLA上课的华裔青年Charles Lau和Xu晓表示，看到围墙能深深体会当年人民的感受、感觉；希望目前仍然用专制统治着中国人民的中共能像围墙一样被打倒，被共产党破坏的中国人的历史、文化中那些美好的东西，可以得以复兴。

反共人士陈凯亦到现场向民众诉说天安门事件。他说，柏林围墙是1989年倒塌的，那之前，在东方天安门广场发生了屠杀事件，在大家在此庆祝反共胜利之时，不要忘记天安门广场前，中国人为自由丧失了他们的生命。

他表示：今天，在纪念柏林墙倒塌20周年之际，冷战仍然没有结束，与共产邪恶专制政权的斗争仍在继续。中共已成一专制变形虫，如瘟疫一样影响着全世界。因此，他提醒希望大家不要忘记天安门事件。

同时陈凯强调，中共将来一定会垮台，因为正义一定战胜邪恶、自由一定战胜奴役。

出生在二次世界大战末，来自东德的Angela Stimpson表示，当年，他们家庭因柏林墙活生生的被分隔两地，她的祖母天天以泪洗面。当这墙被推倒时，他们才能再次团聚。

8日半夜12时，对洛杉矶的人们来说，推倒共产主义象征的柏林墙是个深具意义的一晚。 (http://www.dajiyuan.com)

陈凯一语： Kai Chen's Words:

方政自从天安门惨案被中共坦克碾去双腿后从未停止对生命的热爱，也从未停止重新站起来的希望。 美国的人们使他这一宿愿实现了。 我作为一个运动员与热爱自由的人为他感到骄傲与高兴。 --- 陈凯

Fang Zheng, since he lost his legs to the communist tank on Tiananmen Square in 1989, has never lost his passion for life and his hope to regain his ability to stand up again. America has now fulfilled his dream. I as a fellow athlete and a freedom-loving person truly feel proud and happy for him. --- Kai Chen

------------------------------------------------------

A Chinese Dissident’s Triumph
方政的胜利-他又站起来了

– by Faith J. H. McDonnell

Posted by Faith J. H. McDonnell on Nov 12th, 2009 and filed under FrontPage.

Last month I watched history in the making.

No, I was not in Norway for the Nobel Peace Prize announcement. I was in a bare-bones meeting room at the U.S. Capitol Visitor Center in Washington, DC, watching a Tiananmen Square hero dance.

In 1989, Fang Zheng was a handsome young student at the Beijing College of Physical Science, a star sprinter and an Olympic hopeful. Fang was a member of the Communist Party, but like thousands of other students who were gathered in Tiananmen Square, he had hopes for a new era of freedom and democracy in China. That dream, as well as the dream of Olympic glory, was killed at Tiananmen Square.

On the morning of June 4, 1989 the Chinese Communists rolled in their monstrous response to the students’ peaceful protest. As the demonstrators frantically fled, Fang risked his own life to push a girl out of the path of an oncoming tank. The tank hit him, and caught in the treads, he went under. Miraculously, he survived, but both legs were crushed and had to be amputated.

When he recovered from a double amputation, Fang began training in discus and javelin throwing. In 1992 he won two gold medals and broke two regional records in the All-China Disabled Athletic Games. But the Chinese Government feared his success would call attention to a massacre that they denied had even taken place. They banned Fang from further competitions and attempted to pressure him to “admit” that his injuries were from a road accident, not the legacy of violence at Tiananmen Square. When Fang refused, he was denied his college degree, severely limiting his ability to find work. Even then, he determined to be a living witness to the oppression of the Communist system.

Although Fang was barred from attending the 2008 Beijing Olympics, an intrepid German journalist found a way to contact him for an interview. But before the interview could take place, the Chinese government notified Fang that he and his family would be allowed to leave China for the first time if he gave up the interview opportunity. Fang, Zhu Jin, and their little girl, Grace, traveled to the United States in February 2009. Ironically, the government’s attempts to isolate Fang from the outside world provided the greatest opportunity he has ever had to speak out, and to once again stand.

I first met Fang and his family in June 2009. They were the guests of honor at a reception to honor Chinese dissidents and commemorate Tiananmen at the home of Michael Horowitz and his wife, Dr. Devra Marcus. Horowitz, a fiery advocate for human rights and religious freedom, has been working with Chinese activists and house church leaders for years.

Although Chinese doctors and even specialists at M.I.T. had told Fang that he was not a candidate for prostheses, Dr. Marcus was determined that he should walk again. And always one to push the envelope of the possible, Horowitz said, “he will not just walk – he will dance!” They had consulted specialists who work with the troops at Walter Reed Hospital. And sure enough, by that evening in June, they had already found the doctors, therapists, and prosthetics creators who could make it happen. That night in his living room, Horowitz promised that we all would be invited to watch Fang Zheng and Zhu Jin dance.

Four months later, some 150 friends, fellow Chinese dissidents, and members of Congress and the media, we watched Fang Zheng twirl Zhu Jin around the impromptu dance floor as if he had been doing it all his life.


Dancing again: Fang Zheng with his new legs.

And more than that, we watched history in the making. We witnessed the healing of yet one more wound inflicted by Communist oppression. We rejoiced with the Chinese dissidents, the hope of democracy in China. We blessed the handiwork of American doctors and therapists who had so generously donated their time and their very considerable talent to helping Fang to walk again. We marveled at the state-of-the-art computerized hundred-thousand dollar legs, also generously donated to Fang. And we heard something that seems to be in short supply around Washington, DC these days – praise for America.

Over and over, Fang Zheng and the other Chinese former dissidents thanked America and the American people. Fang said that he was full of gratitude for “the greatness and goodness of America” and the American people who had helped him and his family through his journey to that moment. And Dr. Yang Jianli, one of Fang’s fellow dissidents and a former prisoner of the Chinese laogai, said that Fang Zheng’s newfound freedom was “a celebration of American values – values we treasure even more than you do.”

It was a nice change from the normal leftist lambasts and apologies for America’s greedy ways to hear expressions of gratitude for an America I actually recognize – full of good and generous people, bolstered by freedom and democracy. Chinese dissidents presented awards to all of those whose generosity had enabled Fang to stand: David McGill and Shane Namack from the Ossur Corporation, manufacturer of orthotics and prosthetic limbs for the United States’ armed forces; Michael Corcoran and Mark McVicker, directors of Medical Center Orthotics and Prosthetics; and Dr. Terrence Sheehan, Chief Medical Officer at Adventist Rehabilitation Hospital.

Another leader of the Tiananmen Square student movement, Dr. Feng Congde, compared Fang Zheng’s triumph over adversity to the words of Chairman Mao sixty years ago when he commanded, “Chinese people, stand up.” In spite of what the disciples of Mao did to him at Tiananmen Square, “Fang Zheng is standing up now,” said Feng.

But by Fang Zheng’s triumph, he seems to also be responding to another quote from Chairman Mao, recently espoused by White House Communications Director Anita Dunn, who called Mao one of her “favorite political philosophers.”

“You fight your war, Mao, repressing freedom and democracy, crushing the hopes and spirits of the Chinese people, and imposing State control on every aspect of people’s lives, and I’ll fight mine, overcoming the effects of your evil on my own body, with the help of those who love and honor freedom,” Fang seems to say, as the sounds of freedom reverberate under the U.S. Capitol.

Fang Zheng and his fellow dissidents, courageous fighters for freedom and human rights, are not only winning the war, they are changing history.

Faith J. H. McDonnell directs The Institute on Religion and Democracy’s Religious Liberty Program and Church Alliance for a New Sudan, and is the author of Girl Soldier: A Story of Hope for Northern Uganda’s Children (Chosen Books, 2007).

柏林墙遐想
Berlin Wall Inspiration and Thoughts

2009年11月12日 张汉废

20年前的11月9日柏林墙被推倒了；六四屠杀20年后，中国无形的柏林墙—中国墙反而更加坚固。

柏林墙由钢筋混凝土组成，其主要支撑作用的是钢筋，混凝土大部分作用是保护钢筋。推翻柏林墙的意义在于自由而不是统一。柏林墙被推翻首先是追求自由的德国人反抗；再有来自以美国为首的西方国家对集权的斗争。里根总统1987年6月12日在勃兰登堡门著名的演说：“戈尔巴乔夫先生，请推倒这座墙让德国人民自由吧；结束共产邪恶帝国吧。”在世界上第一次宣称共产党为邪恶帝国，这种道德勇气震撼着共产世界。德国总理默克尔在白宫长达５０分钟的精彩演讲的题目为：“我们知道欠你们多少”。表达了对美国积极帮助德国推翻共产邪恶政权的感激之情。

在中国至今仍有一道封锁和奴役中国人，使中国人丧失自由的无形的柏林墙—中国墙。中国的这道墙是由中国文化或者说中华民族作为钢筋编织成的结构；共产党作为混凝土而组成的。这是一道非常坚固的墙。中国具备推翻中国墙的条件吗？中国人爱好自由吗？中国人追求自由吗？在墙的里面中国人用漂亮的中国书法写着两个字：“国学”；墙外边海外华人也写上两个字：“爱国”。推翻共产党是推倒这座墙的第一步。如果只作到这一步，就像砸掉混凝土不拆除钢筋，换上其他保护材料还是一座牢固的墙。中国的文化不铲除，换什么朝代中国人也是奴隶；中国人不面对自己的这道墙就永远不会自由。

今天，世界上如果没有像当年林肯，里根等具有坚定的信念和道德勇气的伟大政治家，西方社会是很难再付出去解救中国奴隶。看看2007年美国CNN事件。因为中国人自己不想推翻这道墙，中国人自己不想获得自由。中国人宁可维护者“伟大的国家”而当奴隶。这就是为什么中国墙依然坚固而且越来越坚固。