Germany’s Defence Minister Boris Pistorius has revealed that a second senior Luftwaffe officer used an insecure phone line to join a secret call to discuss Taurus missiles, including British “troops on the ground” in Ukraine.
The sensitive phone call was picked up by Russian agents and was then leaked, Pistorius insists that there was no “data leakage.”
During a special meeting at the Bunderstag’s Defence Minister Pistorius revealed Air Force Inspector Ingo Gerhartz has incorrectly dialled into the sensitive call, Spiegel magazine reported.
Pistorius said, “I am not willing, I want to make this clear again, to fall for Putin here and expose my best officers, whether they made a mistake or not.
“[This is] exactly what Vladimir Putin expects of us.”
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Two weeks ago the German Chancellor Olaf Scholz “referred to British and French troops being in Ukraine.”
Secret military communications were intercepted by Russia and then leaked in what has been described as a “major breakdown” in “secure communications” after the call was unencrypted.
Moscow has warned that that this demonstrates that NATO are “preparing for war” against Russia.
On Monday Poland sparked alarm as the Polish Foreign Minister has said that “NATO soldiers are already present” who are operating in Ukraine.
This admission by the Polish Foreign Minister could spark an immediate escalation with Moscow as Russia’s Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) chief Sergei Naryshkin warned last week that if NATO troops are on the ground in Ukraine this will put the world “on the brink of nuclear war.”
On 27 February, the spokesperson for the Prime Minister Rishi Sunak admitted that there is a “small number of personnel in country supporting the armed forces of Ukraine, including for medical training.”
The spokesperson insisted that the UK currently has “no plans to make a large-scale deployment.”
The Kremlin has said that this “shows involvement of the West” in the war inside Ukraine and Dmitry Peskov said that is it not clear if German forces are had acted on their own or was this part of some sort of state policy.
The Telegraph reported that the 38-minute phone call was played on Russian TV and Moscow believes that NATO are “planning a war” against Russia.
The deputy head of Russia’s Security council said, “Our age-old rivals – the Germans – have again turned into our sworn enemies.
“Look, with what thoroughness and in such detail the [Germans] discuss striking our territory with long-range missiles, choose targets to hit and discuss how to inflict the maximum harm to our motherland and our people.”
