"Aktuelle Kamera" interview with a detained West Berliner, Deutscher Fernsehfunk
Two men in a television studio before a dark curtain: a young man in a jacket (left) faces an interviewer (right). The agency caption names them as Rainer Schröter, a 17-year-old West Berliner held on remand, and Herbert Kröning of the Deutscher Fernsehfunk, and presents Schröter's on-air warning as evidence that West Berlin's mayor Willy Brandt was inciting border provocations. A detainee's statement is the voucher; the blame is placed on one named official.
- Date
- December 21, 1961
- Period
- Cold War
- Made by
- Deutscher Fernsehfunk (GDR state television), photographed for Zentralbild (ADN) by Werner Krisch
- Region
- Western and Central Europe
- Country
- East Germany
- Medium
- Photograph
- Issuer type
- Media
- Regime
- German Democratic Republic
- Leader
- Walter Ulbricht
- Audience
- Mixed
- Purpose
- Demonize
- Themes
- Media and information, Security and surveillance
- Event
- Cold War
- Techniques
- TestimonialScapegoating
- Source
- Identified Openly sourced: the speaker is who they say they are
- Source
- Bundesarchiv (German Federal Archives), Bild 183 collection, via Wikimedia Commons, retrieved September 29, 2026
- Rights
- CC BY-SA 3.0 DE (Bundesarchiv cooperation release on Wikimedia Commons; file page states the licence)
Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-89196-0001 / Krisch, Werner / CC-BY-SA 3.0 DE
Text on the object
[No lettering is legible on the photograph. The agency caption in the Bundesarchiv record reads:] Zentralbild-Krisch-21.12.1961-Untersuchungshäftling Schröter warnt vor Brandts Provokationsaufforderungen. Der Deutsche Fernsehfunk stellte am Abend des 21.12.1961 in seiner Sendung "Aktuelle Kamera" eines der Opfer der Aufforderungen des Westberliner Verwaltungschefs Willy Brandt zu Grenzprovokationen gegen die DDR vor. Es handelt sich um den 17jährigen Westberliner Maschinenschlosserlehrling Rainer Schröter, der am 9. Dezember dieses Jahres mit drei weiteren Verbrechern von Westberlin aus einen Anschlag auf die Staatsgrenze der DDR verübt hatte, Schröter befindet sich in Untersuchungshaft. Bis zu seiner Festnahme wohnte er im Westberliner Bezirk Tiergarten, Lessingstr. 6. Darauf hingewiesen, dass der Westberliner Verwaltungschef Brandt erneut zu direkten Provokationen an der Staatsgrenze der DDR aufgerufen hat, indem er erklärte, es sei Vorsorge getroffen, "denen hinter der Mauer zu Weihnachten und Neujahr Überraschungen zu bereiten", warnte Rainer Schröter alle Westberliner Bürger, sich für derartige Vorhaben mißbrauchen zu lassen. UBz: Rainer Schröter (links) wird von Herbert Kröning interviewt."
[No lettering is legible on the photograph. The agency caption in the Bundesarchiv record reads:] Central-picture [Zentralbild]-Krisch-21.12.1961-Remand prisoner Schröter warns against Brandt's calls for provocations. The Deutscher Fernsehfunk presented on the evening of 21.12.1961, in its programme "Aktuelle Kamera", one of the victims of the calls by the West Berlin administrative chief Willy Brandt for border provocations against the GDR. It concerns the 17-year-old West Berlin machine-fitter apprentice Rainer Schröter, who on 9 December of this year, together with three other criminals, had carried out from West Berlin an attack on the state border of the GDR; Schröter is in remand. Until his arrest he lived in the West Berlin district of Tiergarten, Lessingstr. 6. Pointing out that the West Berlin administrative chief Brandt had again called for direct provocations at the state border of the GDR, by declaring that provision had been made "to prepare surprises for those behind the Wall at Christmas and New Year", Rainer Schröter warned all West Berlin citizens against letting themselves be misused for such plans. Picture caption: Rainer Schröter (left) is interviewed by Herbert Kröning."
The words that carry the claim are the Zentralbild caption in the Bundesarchiv record (as reproduced on the Commons file page), not printed on the picture. Spelling, double space and the closing stray quotation mark are as in that record. Translation is literal, machine translation by Claude, not fluent-reader verified.
