The ‘Hochbunker Pallasstraße’ is an overland bunker from the World War II times located near Heinrich von Kleist park and the Pallasseum, with which it constitutes a two structure complex.
The bunker was built during the second phase of the World War II (1943-45). During the first half of the war Gemany was on the offensive and felt itself pretty safe, the feeling that was also fueled by the grandiose and self important idelogy of the nazis. However, after they started a war with the Soviet Union and after the odds turned during the Battle of England, germans began to fear for their safety and started to build bomb shelters and bunkers. Also Berlin, due to its position, was a target of the Allied Bombings.
Land Bunker Pallasststrasse was built to protect the patrons of the nearby Berliner Sportpalast, an entertainment venue that did not survive to our times.
After the war there was no longer a use for the bunker, and so the US army, under which auspicies the building fell, proceeded with a plan of razig it to the ground. Various attempts were made to blow up the bunker, but the building simply refused to budge, proving its great capabilities for fulfilling its original purpose. The Americans tried to explode it many times over the late 1940’s, but none of them managed to make a dent in the construction of the bomb shelter.
The plan was abandoned after some seroius damages from multiple explosions started to show, nut not on the Pallaststrasse bunker, but on all the buildings in its vacinity. In the 1970’s it was incorporated into the Pallasseum building complex.
Today it mostly remains unused, from time to time serving as a set for art events, movies and music videos.