Day X

The year 1953 was difficult for the young German Democratic Republic. There were still people in the GDR—there were quite a lot—who maliciously rejoiced at temporary failures, sabotaged wherever they could, and dreamed of returning the old order. The West didn’t sleep—it prepared. Dozens of espionage organizations based in West Berlin wove a secret web, gradually and quietly preparing an uprising. They sent agents and provocateurs, threw weapons into the territory of the GDR… And then came June 17, 1953—the “X day.” Across cities of the GDR, a wave of unrest swept through, pogroms began, and murders followed. The enemy attempted to eliminate, by armed means, the first state of workers and peasants in the history of Germany.

This is what the novella “X Day” tells about—the tragic events, and the struggle of ordinary people of the new Germany against the hirelings of imperialist powers.