inception sv dynamo
Berlin is the capital and the largest city of Germany as well as one of its constituent ___MASK90___ states . With a population of approximately 3 . ___MASK15___ million people , Berlin is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union . Located in northeastern Germany on the banks of rivers Spree and Havel , it is the centre of the Berlin - Brandenburg Metropolitan Region , which has about 6 million residents from more than 180 nations . Due to its location in the European Plain , Berlin is influenced by a temperate seasonal climate . Around one - third of the city ' s area is composed of forests , parks , gardens , rivers and lakes . World War II ( often abbreviated to WWII or WW2 ), also known as the Second World War , was a global war that lasted from ___MASK14___ to ___MASK21___ , although related conflicts began earlier . It involved the vast majority of the world ' s nations  including all of the great powers  eventually forming two opposing military alliances : the Allies and the Axis . It was the most widespread war in history , and directly involved more than 100 million people from over 30 countries . In a state of " total war ", the major participants threw their entire economic , industrial , and scientific capabilities behind the war effort , erasing the distinction between civilian and military resources . Marked by mass deaths of civilians , including the Holocaust ( in which approximately 11 million people were killed ) and the strategic bombing of industrial and population centres ( in which approximately one million were killed , and which included the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki ), it resulted in an estimated 50 million to 85 million fatalities . These made World War II the deadliest conflict in human history . East Germany , formally the German Democratic Republic or GDR , was an Eastern Bloc state during the Cold War period . From ___MASK55___ to 1990 , it administered the region of Germany that was occupied by Soviet forces at the end of World War II  the Soviet Occupation Zone of the Potsdam Agreement , bounded on the east by the Oder  Neisse line . The Soviet zone surrounded West Berlin , but did not include it ; as a result , West Berlin remained outside the jurisdiction of the GDR . The German Democratic Republic was established in the Soviet Zone , while the Federal Republic was established in the three western zones . East Germany was a satellite state of the Soviet Union . Soviet occupation authorities began transferring administrative responsibility to German communist leaders in 1948 , and the GDR began to function as a state on ___MASK49___ . Soviet forces , however , remained in the country throughout the Cold War . Until 1989 , the GDR was governed by the Socialist Unity Party ( SED ), though other parties nominally participated in its alliance organisation , the National Front of Democratic Germany . The German reunification was the process in ___MASK20___ in which the German Democratic Republic ( GDR / East Germany ) joined the Federal Republic of Germany ( FRG / West Germany ) to form the reunited nation of Germany , and when Berlin reunited into a single city , as provided by its then Grundgesetz constitution Article 23 . The end of the unification process is officially referred to as German unity , celebrated on 3 October ( German Unity Day ). Following German reunification , Berlin was once again designated as the capital of united Germany . The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics ( USSR " ) was a socialist state in Eurasia that existed from ___MASK41___ to ___MASK33___ . A union of multiple subnational republics , its government and economy were highly centralized . The Soviet Union was a one - party federation , governed by the Communist Party with Moscow as its capital . Alt - Hohenschönhausen (" Old Hohenschönhausen ") is a district (" Ortsteil ") in the borough (" Bezirk ") of Lichtenberg , Berlin . Known also as Hohenschönhausen it was , until ___MASK65___ , the main and the eponymous locality of the former Hohenschönhausen borough . In 2008 the population was in excess of 41 , 000 . The Soviet Occupation Zone (" Sovetskaya okkupatsionnaya zona Germanii ", " Soviet Occupation Zone of Germany ") was the area of central Germany occupied by the Soviet Union from ___MASK21___ on , at the end of World War II . On 7 October 1949 the German Democratic Republic ( GDR ), which became commonly referred to as East Germany , was established in the Soviet Occupation Zone . The Day of German Unity is the national day of Germany , celebrated on 3 October as a public holiday . It commemorates the anniversary of German reunification in ___MASK20___ , when the goal of a united Germany that originated in the middle of the 19th century , was fulfilled again . Therefore , the name addresses neither the re - union nor the union , but the unity of Germany . The Day of German Unity on 3 October has been the German national holiday since ___MASK20___ , when the reunification was formally completed . It is a legal holiday for the Federal Republic of Germany . West Berlin was a city that existed in the period between the end of the Berlin Blockade on ___MASK23___ May ___MASK55___ to German reunification on 3 ___MASK54___ as a political enclave surrounded by East Berlin and East Germany . It was east of the Inner German border and only accessible by land from West Germany by narrow rail and highway corridors . It consisted of the American , British , and French occupation sectors established in ___MASK21___ and shared economic , political , legal , and sporting systems with West Germany , but was not " de jure " part of it . It had a special and unique legal status because its administration was formally conducted by the Western Allies . East Berlin , " de jure " occupied and administered by the Soviet Union , was the " de facto " capital of East Germany . The Berlin Wall , built in 1961 , physically divided East and West Berlin until it fell in 1989 . Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in central - western Europe . It includes ___MASK90___ constituent states , covers an area of , and has a largely temperate seasonal climate . With about 82 million inhabitants , Germany is the most populous member state of the European Union . After the United States , it is the second most popular immigration destination in the world . Germany ' s capital and largest metropolis is Berlin . Other major cities include Hamburg , Munich , Cologne , Frankfurt , Stuttgart and Düsseldorf . Erich Fritz Emil Mielke ( 28 December ___MASK3___  21 May ___MASK100___ ) was a German communist official who served as head of the East German Ministry for State Security (" Ministerium für Staatsicherheit "), better known as the Stasi , from 1957 until shortly after the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 . The Oder  Neisse line is the international border between Germany and Poland . It was drawn at the Potsdam Conference in the aftermath of the Second World War and is primarily delineated along the Oder and Lusatian Neisse rivers in Central Europe , meeting the Baltic Sea to the north , just west of the Polish seaports of Szczecin and winoujcie ( German : " Stettin " and " Swinemünde "). All prewar German territory east of the line and within the ___MASK8___ German boundaries ( 23 . ___MASK12___ % of the former Weimar Republic ) were placed under International Law Administrative status , with most of it being made part of newly - Communist Poland . The small remainder , consisting of the territory surrounding the German city of Königsberg ( now renamed Kaliningrad , in honour of Soviet head of state Mikhail Kalinin ) in northern East Prussia , was allocated to the Soviet Union ( as Kaliningrad Oblast of the Russian SFSR , today the Russian Federation ) after the war ( pending the final World War II peace treaty for Germany ). The vast majority of the native German population in these territories fled , or was killed or expelled by force . The Oder  Neisse line marked the border between the German Democratic Republic ( East Germany ) and Poland from ___MASK4___ to 1990 . East Germany confirmed the border with Poland in ___MASK4___ , while West Germany , after a period of refusal , finally accepted the border ( with reservations ) in 1970 . In 1990 the newly reunified Germany and the Republic of Poland signed a treaty recognizing it as their border . Hohenschönhausen was a borough of Berlin , that existed from ___MASK7___ until Berlin ' s 2001 administrative reform . It was composed by the localities of Alt - Hohenschönhausen ( core of the borough ), Neu - Hohenschönhausen , Malchow , Wartenberg and Falkenberg . The Sportvereinigung Dynamo ( German : Sportvereinigung Dynamo ) ( Dynamo Sports Association ) was the sport organization of the security agencies ( Volkspolizei , Ministry for State Security and customs ) of former East Germany . The sports club was founded on 27 March 1953 and was headquartered in Hohenschönhausen in East Berlin . From the date of its inception until 23 ___MASK99___ the president of the SV Dynamo was Erich Mielke , who was also the Minister of State Security . Dynamo was created in accordance with the multi - sports club model developed in the Soviet Union and adopted throughout Eastern Europe . From the beginning it had an overtly political as well as sporting agenda and its many successes were always portrayed as a triumph of the GDR state . During the German reunification in 1989 the SV Dynamo was liquidated . At its height the association had a membership of over 280 , 000 active members . Athletes of the association enjoyed considerable success both in national and international competitions , winning for example more than 200 olympic medals . After the German reunification the systematic doping of Dynamo athletes from 1971 until 1989 was revealed in German media reports . The systematic doping of athletes was done under the supervision of the Staatssicherheit and with full backing of the government . The Cold War was a state of political and military tension after World War II between powers in the Eastern Bloc ( the Soviet Union and its satellite states ) and powers in the Western Bloc ( the United States , its NATO allies and others ). Historians do not fully agree on the dates , but a common timeframe is the period ( the second half of the 20th century ) between ___MASK16___ , the year the Truman Doctrine ( a U . S . policy pledging to aid nations threatened by Soviet expansionism ) was announced , and ___MASK33___ , the year the Soviet Union collapsed . The Berlin Wall was a barrier that divided Berlin from ___MASK24___ to ___MASK27___ . Constructed by the German Democratic Republic ( GDR , East Germany ), starting on ___MASK57___ August ___MASK24___ , the Wall completely cut off ( by land ) West Berlin from surrounding East Germany and from East Berlin until government officials opened it in ___MASK99___ . Its demolition officially began on ___MASK57___ June 1990 and was completed in 1992 . The barrier included guard towers placed along large concrete walls , which circumscribed a wide area ( later known as the " death strip ") that contained anti - vehicle trenches , " fakir beds " and other defenses . The Eastern Bloc claimed that the Wall was erected to protect its population from fascist elements conspiring to prevent the " will of the people " in building a socialist state in East Germany . In practice , the Wall served to prevent the massive emigration and defection that had marked East Germany and the communist Eastern Bloc during the post - World War II period . The Potsdam Agreement was the agreement between three of the Allies of World War II , United Kingdom , United States , Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , for the military occupation and reconstruction of Germany  referring to the German Reich with its pre - war ___MASK8___ borders including the former eastern territories  and the entire European theatre of War territory . It also included Germany ' s demilitarisation , reparations and the prosecution of war criminals . Moscow ( or ) is the capital and most populous city of Russia , with ___MASK23___ . 2 million residents within the city limits and ___MASK90___ . 8 million within the urban area . Moscow has the status of a Russian federal city .