Museumsportal Berlin

The permanent exhibition of the Federal Commissioner for the Stasi Records (BStU) documents the history of the GDR’s Ministry for State Security (MfS).
As the »shield and sword of the Party«, the MfS ensured the rule of the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED) for nearly forty years. It was the domestic secret police, an investigative authority and the foreign intelligence agency rolled into one, and was answerable only to the SED leadership.
The State Security persecuted »subversive elements«, i.e. people whose ideas or attitudes deviated from the SED norms. The MfS used sophisticated plans of action aimed at »psychic demolition«, i.e. to systematically intimidate, harass or criminalize the people concerned.