‘Naive’ Germans must wake up to realities of war, says spy chief

GERMANY is “naive” and needs to wake up to the realities of war, the country’s former spy chief has said.

In an interview with The Telegraph August Hanning, the former head of the BND, the German foreign intelligence service, said: “Germans need to wake up… Many haven’t realised that we are in a conflict with Russia – that’s been underestimated.

“People are shying away from the truth. Russia is in a conflict with Nato, and Germany is of course part of that conflict,” Mr Hanning said, adding that the country had been shaped by a naive pacifism since the end of the Second World War. “People haven’t realised there is a serious danger – there is sympathy for Russia too, particularly in east Germany and among elements of the far-left and the far-right Alternative for Germany, factions of which call for an end to sanctions on Russia.”

Speaking after Russian state media released a conversation between senior German military officers that revealed details of British troops on the ground in Ukraine, Mr Hanning said Germany “needs to be more careful”.

“When you are a party to a conflict, you need to be prepared as you will possibly be a target, so you need to protect your communication.” The German defence ministry said Moscow was able to access the conversation because one of the officers involved called from an insecure line at his hotel in Singapore.

Mr Hanning said that these security failures were “unfortunately not uncommon”.

“When I was state secretary, politicians often had conversations on public lines that should have been secure.”

The former spy chief warned that he expected “much more to come” after saying last week that the leak was the “tip of the iceberg”.

He said: “The leak was definitely a political success [for Russia]. There is mistrust now around Germany from other Nato states, so the Russians achieved their goals.”