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With the backing of Soviet first secretary Leonid Brezhnev, Erich Honecker now took on the mantle of leadership, ruling with his small clique, including the minister of state security, Erich Mielke. Ulbricht retained the official title of head of state, but this new leadership was now closely aligned with Moscow. The ailing and somewhat bitter Ulbricht would suffer a stroke and pass away in August 1973. The Wall was his legacy, and by 1976 construction of a fourth-generation Wall began. βGrenzmauer 75β would be state-of-the-art in design and construction, a world away from the prefab first version of 1961. The new iteration was speedily installed, comprising L-shaped reinforced concrete sections
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Iain MacGregor (Checkpoint Charlie: The Cold War, the Berlin Wall and the Most Dangerous Place on Earth)