Comment: Is Germany’s external spy agency a liability for Europe?
February 6, 2023 3 Comments
GERMANY’S EXTERNAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY, the Federal Intelligence Service (BND), constitutes a liability for Europe’s security and is in desperate need of a drastic and immediate overhaul. That is the conclusion of a blunt editorial penned last week by James Crisp, the Brussels-based Europe editor of Britain’s Daily Telegraph newspaper.
Founded in the early stages of the Cold War under American tutelage, the BND operated for several decades on the frontlines of the existential clash between the United States and the Soviet Union. Deservedly, the agency received strong criticism about the Nazi past of some of its senior officials in the early days. Yet, like West Germany as a whole, by the 1970s it had largely managed to democratize its institutional structure and practices.
Crisp argues, however, that the BND, once one of Europe’s most important intelligence agencies, has been “hollowed out since the Cold War” and is today viewed by its European counterparts as “complacent and arrogant”. Consequently, the string of embarrassments that the BND has suffered lately, culminating in the discovery of an alleged Russian spy in its ranks, is hardly coincidental, according to Crisp. Even this recent discovery appears to have occurred only after the BND was tipped off by an allied intelligence agency.
The German spy agency has not fared much better in the American-led war in Afghanistan, or during the latest phase of the Russo-Ukrainian war. Unlike the American intelligence agencies, the BND did not subscribe to the view that Moscow would invade its neighbor to the west. Bruno Kahl, the agency’s president, was actually in Ukraine for consultations when Russian tanks began to head toward Kyiv. In what has rightly been described as a humiliation, Kahl was trapped inside Ukraine and had to be smuggled out of the country by a German special forces unit, just as Russian bombs began falling on the Ukrainian capital.
How does one account for the current state of the BND? To some extent, the spy agency’s culture has been shaped by that of the broader postwar German state, which has gone out of its way to reconcile with Russia. Successive German administrations have viewed their rapprochement with Moscow as a cornerstone of Europe’s security trajectory. Consequently, it can be said that Berlin has a history of underestimating the security threat posed by Russia. Read more of this post
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[Updated] Self-styled creator of pro-Russian ‘Z’ symbol reportedly assassinated
February 7, 2023 by Ian Allen 1 Comment
By the late 2010s, Mangushev had spent nearly a decade in Russian ultra-nationalist street gangs. Eventually a pro-Kremlin paramilitary group he founded and led, known as Svetlaya Rus (Light Rus), was conscripted by the Russian military to assist in grey zone operations in the separatist regions of eastern Ukraine. It was in Ukraine that Mangushev’s group merged with other armed ultra-nationalist clusters to form the so-called Yenot (Raccoon) private military company, or Yenot PMC. Soon after the outbreak of the war in Ukraine, Mangushev began to describe himself (without evidence) as the creator of the ‘Z’ symbol that the Kremlin uses as a sign of support for the Russian military campaign.
In the ensuing years, Yenot PMC paramilitaries saw action in several battles in Ukraine and in Syria. In the meantime, Mangushev worked alongside close Putin ally Yevgeny Prigozhin, the alleged owner of the Wagner Group, one of the world’s largest private military companies. There was much fanfare in Russian nationalist social media circles last year, when Mangushev (using the moniker “Bereg”) announced he had joined the Russian Armed Forces at the rank of captain. It is believed, however, that Mangushev’s Russian military title was nominal, and that continued to operate as leader of the Yenot PMC. Read more of this post
Filed under Expert news and commentary on intelligence, espionage, spies and spying Tagged with 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, assassinations, Igor Mangushev, Russia, Svetlaya Rus, Yenot PMC