Quote Originally Posted by TheGrey View Post
Hey! I was there, too, from early 1989-1992. Small world.
Oh, I wasn't stationed in Berlin, I was there for what they called the BOT - Berlin Orientation Tour. It was awarded as a "morale booster" to soldiers and was basically a 4 day vacation to Berlin disguised as "professional development." It was a little mind blowing to go into East Berlin and to be told that the East German Polezei had no authority over us, could not detain us and we were not even supposed to acknowledge their existence. Even more mind blowing to be told that if we were detained or otherwise harassed we were to contact - no lie - the Soviet Military Police as they were the only ones who had legal jurisdiction in Berlin as far as the Allies were concerned. This is because unlike the rest of Germany, Berlin at that time was still administered by the 4 allied powers, US, UK, France and the USSR.

We saw a few groups of Russian soldiers and they were very friendly, especially the officers. They made a big show of smiling and waving and saying hello to us.