Germany (catch all, incl. terrorism)

[davidbfpo]

From The Soufan Group's conclusion on Berlin:

Among the many counterterrorism challenges European authorities face, they will now face even greater pressure to secure venues that were not designed to be secure, against a weapon that was not designed to be a weapon.

Link:http://soufangroup.com/tsg-intelbrie...uck-in-berlin/

This point has been made, when it is quieter by those who advise on preventing attacks, that the enemy can easily adapt and bypass such static defences - however sophisticated (see BBC story with much "spin"). When vehicles were stopped from parking directly outside airport terminals here it was pointed out transferring an IED to a luggage trolley(s) would be just as effective - sadly as proved by Brussels airport.

Yesterday's BBC story:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-36806691

A better BBC report today, by a different author:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-38377884

[OUTLAW 09]

Could not resist this comment....explains a lot of why Germans do not bend much when hit with a terrorist attack as do say the US or France....Germany has been the epicenter of terror attacks since 1967 and accept that they will continue for the next years as the solution to a number of serious global problems will actually never be resolved as the leadership need to resolve them simply fails to be there at this moment in space and time.....

Angela Merkel doing her own shopping before Christmas, as always
http://www.bild.de/politik/inland/an...1827056089021#
…

Maybe part of the problem is that our western leaders have become largely detached from their respective civil societies......AND detached from those important word combinations ......humanity....human rights...moral values.....self determination

Understand the meaning of this photo and you will understand Germans.....notice her security detachment and then compare it to Obama's or Trumps...yes while Germany is much smaller it does have "power" equal to the US...just in a different way.....actually being a former defeated enemy Germany could teach the US a thing or two about democracy......and the rule of law......and transparency....

[OUTLAW 09]

Germany is prosecuting a first #FakeNews case. The guy is looking at 3 years in prison. EXCELLENT! Although 10 years would be better.

[CrowBat]

IMPORTANT.....since Germany allows Israeli citizens immediate residency visas and they no longer need visitor visas the number of younger Israeli's bailing out of Israel into Germany is massive.....ALL because of the current Israeli government and they are tired of the constant conflict inside Israel....

I noticed this about two years ago - and was really surprised at how many. Particularly considering the country from where they de-facto fled is supposed to be one of 'milk and honey'...

Resolution of the Israeli Palestinian issue will greatly ease tensions across the entire ME....a simple fact....

Sure. But, this issue is not going to be solved any time soon.

[AdamG]

Place your bets now, people.

DUSSELDORF, Germany — Several attackers wielding axes injured around five people at the main train station in the west German city of Duesseldorf late Thursday, local police told AFP.
Two suspects were arrested, said police, who warned that others may have fled the scene.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world...ice/ar-AAo4QMA

[davidbfpo]

From the BBC:

Seven people have been injured in an axe attack at the main railway station in the western German city of Duesseldorf, police say.The attack happened at about 21:00 local time (20:00 GMT) on Thursday.
One man has been arrested. The 36-year-old suspect from the former Yugoslavia suffers from psychological problems, Duesseldorf police said.
They said the assailant "attacked people at random". No fatalities have been reported.

Link:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-39225847?
As is the pattern early reports referred to several suspects and a large-scale search was needed. The suspect was arrested having thrown himself in a river.
I note the BBC also reported today that:

Public video surveillance appears set to become more commonplace in Germany after the lower house of parliament approved a package of new measures.

Link:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-39231046?

[OUTLAW 09]

From the BBC:Link:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-39225847?
As is the pattern early reports referred to several suspects and a large-scale search was needed. The suspect was arrested having thrown himself in a river.
I note the BBC also reported today that:Link:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-39231046?

Germans as a hold are reluctant to install widespread CCTV due to massive privacy issues...which are actually far more stringent than what one sees in the US....

But after a series of successful police arrests in non terror related crime incidents many are now more accepting of CCTV in critical areas...train stations...public transportation and buses...airports.......

All legislature is coupled though with the statement on exactly how long the data can be held and then how it is destroyed and that it cannot lead to mass storage of data in a central repository as is much of the data in the US is held...

WHAT is interesting is just how the German police are now using social media especially twitter...they get on it immediately and control the narrative and tell the audience how and where to go ......

This is the second attack by a true crazy and after the first incident when "terrorist attack" was making the rounds on twitter....the local police in English stated....

"WTF...this is not a terrorist attack so stop this!!

[OUTLAW 09]

Russian info war against Germany and Europe is heating up...

Lisa 2.0: how the pro-Kremlin media have been justifying last year's false story with a new one. @DFRLab
https://medium.com/@DFRLab/lisa-2-0-...c7#.c5vmc7a1m#

Moderator adds: There is a separate thread on Operation Liza:http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/...ad.php?t=23567

[OUTLAW 09]

Hmm...so the closed notes version is that Yemen has always been a royal goatf*ck...

What happens when Arabs living in poverty and chaos are unwanted by their more prosperous and secure co-ethnics? Oh wait...

Maybe Merkel can stretch her arms even wider?

Bashing of Merkel will not get one far....yes a hassle for Germany but all those refugees created a grand total of 23,000 paying jobs and the economy is booming without effecting it at all...what many commenters actually miss....and all those overfilled relocation centers IE gyms..will be emptied by May....AND all refugees will have been biometrically registered as well.....

Of the thousands of refugee status requests that were in backlog..only 43,000 remain not decided and those will be finished by JUN...so all in all....over 1M registered..fed..clothed and a large number of children in kindergartens and schools and tens of language classes later...a majority of Germans do not give a single thought...

AND what is interesting is the secular impact of those refugees especially coming from Syria and Iraq on the more conservative Turkish population...

Side note....far more "tips" about radicalize individuals" are now coming in from those "refugees" than ever before....as they fully understand the "threat" far better than most.

BTW...an interesting security development that even the US does not have....

There has been massive development on AI driven speech recognition software as part of internet and comms legal monitoring that now allows a person to simply read a set number of paragraphs in their native language and the AI software can identify down to the tribe and location where the individual is from allowing for a better identification of those arriving without passports and or IDs....

Will at some point be marketed/sold to the US.

[OUTLAW 09]

BUT THEN......

German court convicts Pakistani for espionage for IRGC/QF, specifically pre-attack terror targeting intelligence

Moderator Adds:http://bigstory.ap.org/article/291f2...ny-spying-iran

[OUTLAW 09]

I never said that the Sunni Arabs have turned the conflict sectarian; that was Assad’s doing. Nevertheless, they have committed their own acts of sectarian violence, albeit nowhere near the level of Assad.

I would imagine that Syrian Sunni Arabs would treat Syrian Kurds, Syrian Alawis, Syrian Christians and Syrian Druze, far better than foreign Shia militias would treat them.



That might win the FSA a few battles, but would lose them the war to be sure. They want to be included in the settlement process and continue to receive TOWs.

I am well aware of the sectarian cleansing at work in Syria, however, I would put the onus on Damascus and Teheran, with Moscow being a collaborator rather than instigator. Arguably, Merkel’s bid for sainthood has been conducive to this cleansing as Syrian Sunni Arabs are welcomed into Europe and taken off of Assad’s hands.

No, Hitler would not be “envious”. Stalin would be disappointed and complain at the slow and chaotic pace of the cleansing process. I did not bring these mass murderers up to compare them to Assad, because he is more akin to Karadzic and Tudjman, but to reiterate that this is a very old way to deal with restive populations.

For those that believe the story about Merkel's sainthood really do need to fully and completely understand Germany since WW2.....

Germany fully and completely understands refugees when a major portion of them were uprooted in Poland...and the Czech Republic...Crimea....Ukraine and physically tossed out at the end of the war with many dying along the way...and then having to resettle all of them into both the GDR and BRD....

The second refugee wave came with the Wall coming down from GDR.....and that resettlement phase is just now ending with more coming back East than going West...25 years after the Wall came down....

So when a country has "empathy" for refugees then Trump and many others declare them "crazy"....

[Azor]

Germany fully and completely understands refugees when a major portion of them were uprooted...and physically tossed out at the end of the war with many dying along the way...and then having to resettle all of them into both the GDR and BRD...

Yes, after centuries of German imperialism, and after a German attempt to exterminate the Slavic peoples, albeit with a few dozen million to be kept as slave labor.

The Germans received their just desserts after launching the most horrendous campaign of destruction and mass murder in history. Although the Communist Parties of the Soviet Union, China, Vietnam and North Korea were never held to account for their crimes, Hitler was outdone only by Mao, unless one examines the intensity of Hitler's spree.

The Germans have also attempted to minimize the role of the Wehrmacht in Germany's war crimes as well as the knowledge and therefore complicity of the average German.

The second refugee wave came with the Wall coming down from GDR...and that resettlement phase is just now ending with more coming back East than going West...25 years after the Wall came down...

IDPs are different.

So when a country has "empathy" for refugees then Trump and many others declare them "crazy"...

The German government has admitted that most of the people are in fact migrants and not genuine refugees.

In any event, in 1939, the Germans set out to destroy Europe by transforming it into Greater Germany and killing off other Europeans. Now, Germany is at it again by opening its borders to all migrants and demanding that its neighbors allow themselves to be colonized as well. In both cases, Germans care naught for the sovereignty of Europe's nation-states.

[OUTLAW 09]

Yes, after centuries of German imperialism, and after a German attempt to exterminate the Slavic peoples, albeit with a few dozen million to be kept as slave labor.

The Germans received their just desserts after launching the most horrendous campaign of destruction and mass murder in history. Although the Communist Parties of the Soviet Union, China, Vietnam and North Korea were never held to account for their crimes, Hitler was outdone only by Mao, unless one examines the intensity of Hitler's spree.

The Germans have also attempted to minimize the role of the Wehrmacht in Germany's war crimes as well as the knowledge and therefore complicity of the average German.



IDPs are different.



The German government has admitted that most of the people are in fact migrants and not genuine refugees.

In any event, in 1939, the Germans set out to destroy Europe by transforming it into Greater Germany and killing off other Europeans. Now, Germany is at it again by opening its borders to all migrants and demanding that its neighbors allow themselves to be colonized as well. In both cases, Germans care naught for the sovereignty of Europe's nation-states.

NO the German government has not openly and privately admitted that all refugees are migrants and not refugees....

Of the 1.2M that arrived....there are a number from North Africa and African countries that are migrants and their refugee requests are largely refused and then told they must leave and many do....the interesting and non reported fact is that their own countries do not want to take them back...

The remaining 1.1M are actually Syrian and Iraqi refugees with already over 800K refugee status requests being approved via their court system......and the remaining number will be court cleared by the end of the year...

Show me any Western country who could have organized such a massive undertaking on the fly and then registered biometrically all and moved their requests through a legal system in the speed the Germans have done....no one can match it.....

You seem to forget the GDR citizens who flooded Berlin in the 50s until the Wall was built...almost the same size of a problem....but handled and mastered as well.

So please get the narrative straight....

If you noticed the video footages coming out of the Med yesterday where they are 3K in the Med floating around...largely African and North African....and some numbers of Syrians.........

Since the clamp down on the EU border many Iraqi's and Syrians are holding up inside Turkey right now....or they are arriving in an orderly fashion via family reunification programs.

At 3K USDs a pop or 8-10K for a family the human smugglers are making great money these days....end that you end the problem....end the wars in Iraq and Syria and you end that flow...

In the end at the least Germany has created over 32K jobs around immigration and at 350-550 Euros a month for a family or single individual which is literally millions that is being injected into the economy every month...they have one heck of a stimulus program ongoing and it is growing the economy and lowering over joblessness....the lowest rate since 1989 now.....and the US is what at and the economy is overall slowing down again?????

And yet those outside Germany complain and complain and complain about how bad it is....

AND the secondary effect is that those Iraqi and Syrian refugees are pointing often to radicalized jihadists who have been living in Germany for a long while as they feel that it is their duty since Germany took them in.......

Actually quiet simple if you think it through......

[Azor]

NO the German government has not openly and privately admitted that all refugees are migrants and not refugees...

I said “most” not “all” and was mistakenly referring to Frans Timmerman, although Thomas de Maziere seems to share Timmerman's view. Yet on balance of the migration flows and rejected asylum applications from 2014 through 2016, more than 50% of the migrants would be economic migrants from the Balkans and Africa, and not refugees. Within the “refugee” pool, I take a dim view of Afghans and Iraqis, as most of those countries are not warzones; by contrast, almost no place is truly safe in Syria.

Yet even from Syria, a number of the “refugees” include middle and upper-middle class Alawis, Christians and Druze fleeing conscription in the NDF. Does the average Syrian in the refugee camps of Lebanon, Turkey and Jordan, or living in rebel-held areas have USD $3,000+? I doubt it. How can a fighting-age male Alawi with Shabiha connections fleeing conscription in the NDF truly compare to a Sunni Arab of the Civil Defense who responds first to the Russo-Syrian shelling, bombing and gassing? Even the Kurds of Rojava are far more secure than the Sunni Arabs.

In 2015, 1,092,000 migrants arrived in Germany. Only 44% (447,000) filed asylum applications and 12% “disappeared” (130,000). Of these asylum applications, only 59% (283,000) were processed, of which 50% (141,000) were recognized and 50% (142,000) were rejected i.e. economic migrants. A further 300,000 migrants arrived in Germany in 2016...

Of the 550,000 migrants whose asylum applications were rejected in Germany from 2014 to 2016, only 25% 138,000 have been deported or left. But what of the 412,000 rejected migrants who refuse to leave? The 279,000 migrants who have not yet filed? The 130,000 “missing” migrants? At least 1% of the resident German population is illegal.

RE: Syria Thread

By the way, the entire discussion of Germany’s border and immigration policies only came up because I asserted that Merkel is enabling Assad by allowing him to transfer the undesirable or restive part of his population to the European Union, and Germany in particular. Yet instead of addressing that point, we have now ventured into arguing over the postwar deportation of Germans and Merkel’s policies. Most of your comments after my last reply were focused on Trump rather than Syria, despite the fact that Trump is not a major actor in the Syrian Civil War, save for rapping Assad across the knuckles once.

[OUTLAW 09]

I said “most” not “all” and was mistakenly referring to Frans Timmerman, although Thomas de Maziere seems to share Timmerman's view. Yet on balance of the migration flows and rejected asylum applications from 2014 through 2016, more than 50% of the migrants would be economic migrants from the Balkans and Africa, and not refugees. Within the “refugee” pool, I take a dim view of Afghans and Iraqis, as most of those countries are not warzones; by contrast, almost no place is truly safe in Syria.

Yet even from Syria, a number of the “refugees” include middle and upper-middle class Alawis, Christians and Druze fleeing conscription in the NDF. Does the average Syrian in the refugee camps of Lebanon, Turkey and Jordan, or living in rebel-held areas have USD $3,000+? I doubt it. How can a fighting-age male Alawi with Shabiha connections fleeing conscription in the NDF truly compare to a Sunni Arab of the Civil Defense who responds first to the Russo-Syrian shelling, bombing and gassing? Even the Kurds of Rojava are far more secure than the Sunni Arabs.

In 2015, 1,092,000 migrants arrived in Germany. Only 44% (447,000) filed asylum applications and 12% “disappeared” (130,000). Of these asylum applications, only 59% (283,000) were processed, of which 50% (141,000) were recognized and 50% (142,000) were rejected i.e. economic migrants. A further 300,000 migrants arrived in Germany in 2016...

Of the 550,000 migrants whose asylum applications were rejected in Germany from 2014 to 2016, only 25% 138,000 have been deported or left. But what of the 412,000 rejected migrants who refuse to leave? The 279,000 migrants who have not yet filed? The 130,000 “missing” migrants? At least 1% of the resident German population is illegal.

RE: Syria Thread

By the way, the entire discussion of Germany’s border and immigration policies only came up because I asserted that Merkel is enabling Assad by allowing him to transfer the undesirable or restive part of his population to the European Union, and Germany in particular. Yet instead of addressing that point, we have now ventured into arguing over the postwar deportation of Germans and Merkel’s policies. Most of your comments after my last reply were focused on Trump rather than Syria, despite the fact that Trump is not a major actor in the Syrian Civil War, save for rapping Assad across the knuckles once.

Merkel enabled Assad's forced refugee flows?? I thought it was starvation...ethnic cleansing..constant cluster munitions, naplam and bunjerbusters driving IDPs and refugees??

Really.....

Trump is now a serious contender for his Syrian failed policies...actually he is worse than Obama as he has virtually no idea what to do other than continue Obama's agenda.....

Outside of a politically at home motivated TLAM strike what else has he actually done...increasing SOF but Raqqa is bogged down as well....

REMEMBER we are talking about "the Donald"...the same one who stated "I will eradicate IS/AQ from the face of the earth and do it immediately"...well 100 days in and outside of TLAMs what else has he done??

BUT WAIT...now he is in NKs face....AND Syria....??

He remains me of a 12 year old with ADAH on Ritalin....who cannot figure out how to use the TV remote.....

[OUTLAW 09]

Added by Moderator

This post has been copied from the Manchester (UK) bomb attack thread and has been edited slightly:

What is interesting about this particular attack...the UK slams down an info wall and yet on the Berlin truck attack killing just ten less and having the same number of injured the German authorities were open and forthcoming with all information...or in the Paris attacks all information was flowing as fast as the authorities would actually allow it.

One thing French, German and Brussels authorities have learned..open up all channels of communications to the public and ask for as much help as they can provide...videos...photos...tweets..observations etc....

The failures around the German truck attacker are even played out in public and thus the public has no feeling that the government is not trying to coverup mistakes and is in fact learning from their own mistakes....something the UK is not doing right now....

Example..German investigators had learned about the trucker attacker being involved in drug sales as a finance mechanism....they raided six locations inside Berlin yesterday rolling up 10 major drug dealers and 6 of them were high value jihadist targets....

Ever since that Dec attack German authorities have been raiding and raiding and raiding and arresting along the way....after the London car attack yes you saw some activity but not to the levels seen in Brussels, Paris and Berlin....

Very interesting article on German counter-terrorism system and jihadists....

Excellent, detailed work by @janraudszus ~> The Jihadist terrorist threat and German Counter-terrorism http://www.capesic.cat/en/2017/05/25...er-terrorism/#

Germany has long maintained that to fight any terrorist problem it is strictly an intel service and police fight.....and long term.....AND I seriously doubt there is any western nation state that has been hit with terror attacks that openly debates the failures by police and security services as does Germany...

In some ways this quite public debate allows the public to understand that the police and security services are admitting if they failed and are learning from their mistakes and allows for the public to feel that their security concerns are being taken seriously....

[OUTLAW 09]

Well worth reading this interview by the Economist....
http://www.economist.com/blogs/kaffe...ermany?zid=307

So although it is long, I am publishing the transcript of our conversation.

Among Mr Ischinger’s most striking points were his arguments that:
Germany is increasingly open to military action
Brexit makes EU defence integration easier
Germany’s deployments in Afghanistan, Mali and Lithuania mark a real turning point
NATO’s 2%-of-GDP target for defence spending is not sufficient on its own
The 2% should be replaced with a 3% target encompassing defence, foreign policy and aid
Mr Trump’s statements make it harder for European leaders to contribute more to NATO
Germany should not contemplate its own nuclear weapon
Mr Macron’s election is an “enormous and unique” opportunity to relaunch the Franco-German partnership as a model for the whole EU
The Kohl-Mitterrand era of co-operation (in the 1980s) can be (partly) revived, starting with joint military procurement
Mr Macron understands Germany “perfectly”
Germany and France should consider a rewrite of the Elysée Treaty in 2018, codifying the alliance between the two countries
Germany should consider backing EU majority voting on foreign and security affairs
Germany and France might eventually share nuclear weapons and an army, but only in the very long term#
Notions of Germany as the new leader of the liberal world are “totally unhelpful”
Russia’s current belligerence towards the West may not last
Germany and the West must keep the door open to Mr Putin
Europe and Canada cannot reform their relationship with Russia without America
Mrs Merkel’s patience and Russian language skills give her unique advantages in talks with Mr Putin
Germany must “engage, engage, engage” with Mr Trump
Mr Trump has “good and experienced pros” in his team but “believes in unpredictability as a negotiating strategy”

[Azor]

From Der Spiegel: http://www.spiegel.de/international/...a-1153592.html

But I thought that spying "among friends, that isn't done"? Well, what of it, Angie?

Yet Der Spiegel has clearly violated sections 90A, 164, 185, 186 and 187 of the StGB with this article, by clearly engaging in:

• Insult
• Malicious gossip
• Defamation
• Disparagement of the state
• Incitement of popular hatred

Perhaps Angie can censor Der Spiegel and get her friends at Google, Facebook and Twitter to help out?

Introduction:

The chapter is only a few pages long, but it addresses a potentially explosive suspicion: Did Germany's foreign intelligence agency, the BND, spy on its most important partner, the United States, in the past?

For Chancellor Angela Merkel's government, the answer is clear. The BND has never spied on the United States, members of both the conservative Christian Democrats (CDU) and their government coalition partner, the center-left Social Democrats, are fond of saying, quoting former BND President Gerhard Schindler. And if it was true, then it was only a "coincidental capture" of data, that has since been deleted.

After three years of work, the German parliament committee of inquiry investigating NSA spying on Germany will release its final report next week. It will also contain a chapter drafted by the coalition on "findings about EU and NATO partners." The committee, the draft version of the report states, had no doubts about the statements made about the U.S.

But it should.

Documents that SPIEGEL has been able to review show that the BND, until a few years ago, actually had considerable interest in the United States as a target of espionage. The document states that just under 4,000 search terms, or selectors, were directed against American targets between 1998 and 2006. It is unknown whether they continued to be used after those dates.

[OUTLAW 09]

From Der Spiegel: http://www.spiegel.de/international/...a-1153592.html

But I thought that spying "among friends, that isn't done"? Well, what of it, Angie?

Yet Der Spiegel has clearly violated sections 90A, 164, 185, 186 and 187 of the StGB with this article, by clearly engaging in:

• Insult
• Malicious gossip
• Defamation
• Disparagement of the state
• Incitement of popular hatred

Perhaps Angie can censor Der Spiegel and get her friends at Google, Facebook and Twitter to help out?

Introduction:

Interesting comment in that it does not reflect that all NATO member ICs which includes the USG ICs all 17 of them....ALL "spy" on each other.....

This type of "spying" while not intended to actively recruit employees of those governments is considered to be normal...why it is designed to fill the gap on exactly what their decision makers are up to so the the "spying" country can adjust accordingly their FP or if they are in a FP decision cycle.....

BUT watch US reactions when say Mossad actively recruits a US Jewish citizen to reveal highly classified materials ie Pollack....

BUT if one knows the Cold War days the BND was never really trusted by US and UK and other NATO partners due to the closeness of the GDR, the Stasi and KGB....not because the Germans provided "bad" information when intel sharing.....

BTW..right now Germany is one of the leading intel services providing extensive HUMINT and SIGINT to the USG ICs on Trump and company.

WHEN using the German law paras be sure to mention that until a State prosecutor states and files an actual court case using one of those paras...it is only words, more words and more confusion....

BTW...notice that while you highlight this article the Steel Dossier on Trump which was raw HUMINT reporting never seems to get to the level of solid low level spying thus has creditability as 80% was verified....and is disregarded by many for that exact reason...low level raw HUMINT...

[OUTLAW 09]

Germany warns Turks not to bring security officials who face U.S. warrants
https://www.wsj.com/articles/germany...ts-1498490404#

OR they could be actually arrested by Europol under US warrants....