Berlin 1945 and Today
Warsaw was devastated after the WWII. It is estimated that about 85% of the buildings were destroyed, and only about one thousand people lived in the ruins, compared to more than one million before the war. The communist government that was installed by the Soviet Union after the war initially decided to build <i>a new capital city</i>, because it was calculated that it would be cheaper to build a new one than reconstruct the old one. Later, people started to move back, and Warsaw was reconstructed instead.<p>There is a short movie based on a Russian airplane photo footage taken in 1945, the City of Ruins:
<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vx3aGiurRbQ" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vx3aGiurRbQ</a><p>The general feeling is also quite well represented in "The Pianist (2002)", which I highly recommend.