Aug. 15, 1961 - The United States, Britain and France formally protested to the Soviet Union today against Communist East Germany's closing of the border between East and West Berlin. The Allied protest was made in a letter from the three Western commandants in Berlin to the Soviet commandant. It described the Communist action as "illegal" and the most "flagrant violation" of the four-power agreements on Berlin since the Soviet blockade of West Berlin in 1948. But none of these charges changed the fact that the inter-city border has been effectively closed, that the flood of refugees from East Berlin and East Germany has been slowed to a trickle, and that a state border has been created out of the intercity border.
