Herr Doktor Strangelove
Germany attacked Russia in 1941. It didn’t end well. Now, unbelievably, they are at it again. A leaked recording of a conference between some of Germany’s top military brass on 19 February into how to launch cruise missiles into Russia, including taking out the Kerch Bridge linking Crimea to the Russian mainland, suggests we are on the brink of a major expansion of the war – one that could see sites in Western Europe incinerated. Doctor Strangelove would be proud.
Not even at the height of the Cold War was either side mad enough to fire missiles into the other’s territory. Germany, egged on by the US, France and the UK, is planning to do just that. The escalatory timeframe could be measured in hours from the launch of dozens (up to 100) of German Taurus cruise missiles at infrastructure and munitions depots – so all of us should sit up and pay attention. The opposite is happening: the Western media is lulling us to sleep.
President Putin has made clear this week that the ongoing use of cruise missiles against Russia is risking nuclear confrontation. Instead of reflecting and analysing the wisdom of the direct involvement of Western powers in attacks on Russia, we are subjected to mindless and reckless spin:
“Gleeful Russia relishes German Taurus leak scandal” says Politico. If that wasn’t puerile enough it goes on: “Champagne corks are popping in Moscow. Russian President Vladimir Putin's circle is gloating about the leak of secret talks.”
Reuters: “Germany accuses Russia of seeking to divide Europe with leaked call.”; “Fear Kremlin has more juicy bits to release in the future”, blethers another.
BBC: “Germany under pressure to explain intercepted phone call”. Guardian: “Individual error let Moscow intercept military call, Germany says.” Telegraph: “German officer who leaked military secrets to Russia avoids sacking.” Really? That’s the big news?
In other words, the mainstream media, in a seemingly coordinated way, has largely spun the story into a narrative about the leak rather than the content of the leak. Missing from the majority of western news reports were the most important details: deliberately inverting the hierarchy of news information to bring the most trivial information to the top. Why is this being done? Where is the trenchant analysis, the sober assessment of implications stripped of emotional rhetoric?
It doesn’t matter whether you love Putin, hate Putin, think the war is Russia’s or America’s fault, or whether you want to see Russia or the West defeated. Grown-ups should be paying serious attention to the risk that the Western powers are exposing all of us to.
This was not a chat over a stein of beer and a frankfurter; the men in the virtual room included the head of Air Force Operations Brigadier General Frank Graefe and Air Force Chief Lieutenant-General Ingo Gerhartz. It was called in response to a request from Defense Minister Pistorius – himself, undoubtedly, prompted by the Americans (remember Under-Secretary of State Victoria Nuland’s threat that Russia would face some “nasty surprises” this year).
One of the key topics leaked was how to hit Russia using German missiles, using German targeting and even German military personnel but still retain a fiction of “the Ukrainians did it”. One of the favoured solutions the officers discussed was to set up a secure link to transmit the targeting data between Büchel Air Base (west of Frankfurt) – home to both a US nuclear strike force and advanced German air force systems – and some Ukrainians who, on instruction from Büchel Air Base, would launch. The Germans could handle all the complex technical linking of satellites and other data needed by the ground-hugging German missiles. This crosses red line after red line and we have to ask: is it prudent to attack a nuclear power in this way? Imagine the response if Russia or China did exactly this to the USA? Any guesses what the response would be?
There is something unfathomable about German policy. They sat back schtum and silent when their source of cheap energy, Nord Stream 2, was taken out, almost certainly by the Americans. Their economy is being depressed by rising energy bills which is driving a de-industrialisation process – a recent example being Miele whiteware manufacturer announcing they are shifting thousands of jobs to Poland because of prohibitive energy costs. Chancellor Sholz has launched a €200 billion energy subsidy - indebting future generations – to mask the damage. Now they want to imperil the German state by flinging missiles at Russia?
Vladimir Putin has a particular attachment to the Kerch Bridge. The 19km bridge – the longest in Europe – was built at a cost of $USD 3.5 billion after the Russian annexation of Crimea following the 2014 Maidan coup. It represents a strategic asset that Russia built to integrate the peninsula with the rest of Russia. The Ukrainians and their allies would dearly like to see it gone.
The Ukrainian battlefield is littered with German Leopard tanks and other fighting vehicles. Ukraine’s failed counter offensive has been a graveyard for thousands of soldiers but also for the illusion that Moscow can be defeated in the Russian east of Ukraine – or that the West can turn Sevastopol, home to the Russian Black Sea fleet since 1783, into a NATO port. Yet they press on.
German historian Tarak Cyril Amar has listened to the recording a number of times and believes that Russia published the recording – acknowledged to be authentic by Germany – as a warning shot.
In a recent interview he says the plans discussed represent an all-but formal declaration of war.
“The question none of them ever ask is: what would happen to Germany? What would happen on the day after? It is an insane recording.”
Despite the common rhetoric that Russia must be stopped in Ukraine or they will march into Piccadilly Circus next week, the German generals and their US masters are clearly complacent, confident that Russia would never dare attack a NATO country.
This was reflected in German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock calling on her government this week (after the leak was revealed) to "intensively consider" delivery of Taurus cruise missiles to Ukraine. The next day France’s Emmanuel Macron urged European leaders not to be “cowards” in defence of Ukraine – the Germans said they felt targeted by the comments.
Amar believes this sense of impunity is pushing Russia to a point it may feel it must strike back. “What Russia has said is, ‘If NATO corners us, be aware that we know our conventional forces are too small but we have a massive nuclear arsenal,” Tarik Amar said.
The West has recklessly overplayed its hand. The military and political elites are driving us towards a precipice. Starved of serious analysis, our populations are complacent. The gates of hell are creaking open and the western media is acting as an opiate. Prudence and diplomacy should return to European politics before the West pokes the Russian bear one time too many.
Eugene Doyle
Eugene is a community organiser based in Wellington, New Zealand
