**German air force chief reveals secret UK operations in Ukraine**
Head of the Luftwaffe sparks alarm in Berlin and London by discussing method of delivering cruise missiles to Kyiv on an unsecure phone line intercepted by Russia
The head of the German air force used a telephone line that was not encrypted to discuss highly sensitive military secrets including the use of British “people on the ground” who would be able to help Germany deploy cruise missiles to Ukraine.
Britain and other Nato allies will be dismayed at the security breach, described by Olaf Scholz, the German chancellor, as “very serious”.
Russia intercepted talks between Lieutenant General Ingo Gerhartz and three senior Luftwaffe officers as they used standard off-the-shelf Webex video conference software, running on an office line, for top secret military planning.
Included was confirmation that the British military is deployed in Ukraine, and could be used for training to help prevent German political embarrassment, as well as important details on the deployment of British Storm Shadow missiles.
Gerhartz, head of the operations and exercises department, held the 38-minute conference call on February 19, while outside Germany, to discuss the potential deployment of German Taurus cruise missiles to Ukraine amid political divisions in Scholz’s coalition over the move.
Gerhartz began the call by stating that “no one knows why the federal chancellor is blocking the dispatch of the missiles — this gives rise to all sorts of outlandish rumours”.
“If we’re asked about delivery methods. I know how the British do this. They always transport them in Ridgeback armoured vehicles. They have several people on the ground,” he said, according to a Russian transcript of the call which has been confirmed as authentic by the German defence ministry.
In another security breach, Gerhartz explained how the French “send [Audi] Q7s loaded with Scalp missiles to Ukraine”. The air force general is said to have joined the conversation from his mobile phone from a hotel room in Singapore.
Gerhartz said he did not understand why Germany was not sending its cruise missiles to Ukraine
The revelations will help Russian intelligence to track and locate, potentially targeting, such vehicles in Europe and on Ukraine’s territory. Gerhartz said that Britain had outfitted Ukrainian aircraft with Storm Shadows and could help with the transfer of Taurus missiles to Ukraine.
Another officer, thought to be Brigadier General Frank Graefe, said the military “must be very careful from the beginning to avoid any wording that would implicate us in the conflict” beyond preliminary training of Ukrainian soldiers in Germany.
“Once they have been trained, we’ll ask the Brits if they would take over at that stage. I believe this would be the right course of action. Just imagine the uproar if the media were to find out,” he said, in a reference to missile transfers from a base in Bavaria and “our car trips to Poland”.
Germany has about 600 Taurus missiles and is considering sending 100 to Ukraine in two batches of 50 to ensure the missile “won’t change the course of the hostilities”.
“That’s why we don’t want to send all of them. And not all of them in one batch. We may first send 50 missiles, and then give them another 50. This is absolutely clear, but this is big politics,” said Gerhartz. “I have learnt from my French and British colleagues that the situation with the Storm Shadow and Scalp missiles is the same.”
The officers went on to discuss targets the Ukrainians might hit with the missiles, which have a 500km range, such as Russian ammunition depots and the Kerch Bridge to Crimea.
The German officers believe it would take 10 to 20 Taurus missiles to bypass Russian air defences and destroy the bridge in an aircraft operation. “There’s no real reason to say we can’t do it; it just depends on the political red lines,” said the air force chief.
In one politically incendiary revelation, Gerhartz described how the military would pretend to the German public that “information exchanges” used in targeting for the missiles would be handled by MBDA, the Taurus manufacturer.
“This is a ruse, of course, but quite likely it looks different from the political point of view. If the information exchange goes through the manufacturer, it has nothing to do with us,” he said.
Gerhartz played down the prospect of a quick deployment telling his team that the capability of the missile manufacturer for bringing non-operational missiles held in armouries was up to eight months.
The blunder will alarm other Nato allies and comes after Scholz angered the British last week with indiscreet comments on deployment of Britain’s Storm Shadow missiles to Ukraine, seemingly based on the video conference call.
The German chancellor said the interception, now being used by Russia as a propaganda coup, was “a very serious matter”. “That is why this is now being clarified very carefully, very intensively and very quickly,” he said yesterday.
The Bild newspaper was told: “There are indications that an insufficiently secure means of communication was used in view of the content that was obviously discussed. This is, among other things, the subject of further investigations.”
Tobias Ellwood, the former chairman of the Commons defence committee, said the Russians had leaked the intercept to disrupt German politics by highlighting the division between the military, which is prepared to send the missiles and Scholz, who is blocking the move.
“Why did Russia spill the beans on this? Why did they share this? I think they’re wanting to show that efforts are being made for the military to pursue this … to agitate politics in Germany, where Scholz is obviously very unpopular. They see this as a method to disrupt, to sow discord,” Ellwood said.
“The conversation shows a determination that they’re preparing for this to happen. But there’s an acknowledgment of the political differences that still sit above them.”
Germany is increasingly seen by Britain and other allies as unreliable after the latest security breach, which potentially compromises arms transfers to Ukraine and the use of cruise missiles by Kyiv.
“We know Germany is pretty penetrated by Russian intelligence so it just demonstrates they are neither secure nor reliable,” Ben Wallace, the former defence secretary, said.
Last week Wallace said of Scholz, after he revealed details on British Storm Shadow deployment, that “as far as the security of Europe goes he is the wrong man, in the wrong job at the wrong time”.
My favourite part about this embarrassing non-journalism is that the the times journalist tasked with writing it apparently doesn’t speak German and [used a (bad) transcript by Russian propaganda](https://x.com/jochenbittner/status/1764342492374139006?s=46). Accordingly there are some idiotic mistakes in there such as that nonsense on “ridgebacks” or on “Audi Q7”. It took random people on Twitter to [tell](https://x.com/brunobrussels/status/1764342925582909733?s=46) this journalist that he had copy and pasted nonsense.
Discussing such matters on an unsecured line is an incredible level of incompetence… I’m at a loss of words for that.
My semi conspiratorial take on this is that they (the UK & Germany) have actually agreed on leaking this to the public to test Putins respons to the fact that Nato countries actually have boots on the ground in Ukraine (Even if it’s not in a direct combat function) Because if he doesn’t really react then Nato can push the Russian so-called ‘red line’ a little bit more yet again.
I haven’t read this particular article, but does it, as some other, mention missilies being delivered using Audi Q7s? If so, that’s a peak 2020s journalism moment lmao.
Everywhere there’s a conflict there are special forces involved. Really nothing new.
Just do a Putin and deny. What breach? You must be making things up.
On the other hand, admitting something like that makes it Putin’s move. He going to nuke or not?
Putin’s clown posse threatening with nuclear annihilation in 3, 2, 1…
Like what? I hope this is another mistranslation otherwise the UK needs to act on this
Maybe they leaked it so that they wont need to send those rockets at all… The pressure was very high on them to send the rockets. So they could have leaked ths discussion on purpose to sabotage the whole thing on their own, so they wont need to send them at all…
Other than that I can hardly believe a personel at this level of competence could do such a mindblowing failuer…
Let’s be honest, the Russians knew all about foreign troops there already.
Im not surprised
[deleted]
WTF is it with the Germans… first it was Scholz and then this German air force chief ?
Well, at least we know the army stopped using faxes
So there already are NATO troops in Ukraine? Like Macron and Kallas proposed?
Duck it, I’m joining the Bundeswehr to fix it 😕
Honestly I’m just glad we have the cajones to do something like this.
It was already leaked months ago by Jack Teixera that there are a few dozen military personnel from NATO countries in Ukraine.
>One of the leaked files, reviewed by The Guardian, that appears to be dated March 2023, suggests U.S. officials assessed at the time that there were 97 special forces from NATO countries operating in Ukraine, including 14 U.S. special forces. According to the leaked document, the U.K. deployed the largest number of special forces in Ukraine—50. This was followed by Latvia (17), France (15), the U.S. (14), and the Netherlands (1).
They are most likely there for training, helping integrate weapons like storm shadow, sharing intel etc.
Strategic ambiguity:
* France: Troops not excluded
* Germany: Blow Kersh bridge
* Germany: Secret UK operations
Who’s next?
I’m not in the military, but when you’ve got this situation, you need to: LIE, DEFLECT, EVADE, SHUT THE F*CK UP AND DENY EVERYTHING!
On whose side are you on, dude?
I’m sure the Russians knew already.
So the only people this is revealed to is westerners
We need to cut Germany off from as much access to any of our intelligence as possible. Tell the Germans as little as possible and let them know as little as practically possible because they are a fucking sieve when it comes to information.
Wallace is right. Germany is far too infiltrated with Russian spies and their cybersecurity is extremely lacklustre. Why on earth are Germany’s top military brass using fucking Webex to discuss potentially sensitive military information?
surprise everyone has assets in ukraine.
What a dumpster fire. If high level talks like that can happen over Webex, it speaks a lot about the culture and processes of the whole organisation.
So now, the question is what else has been intercepted? Or rather what hasn’t… I m sure Germany s alliés will be very keen on sharing anything.
You are fired
German top brass doesn’t look too clever these days, lol
Germany has about 600 Taurus missiles and is considering sending 100 to Ukraine in two batches of 50 to ensure the missile “won’t change the course of the hostilities”.
what does that mean
Reminder that people were labelled as Russian troll for saying something like this before.
I wouldn’t drive an Audi Q7 in Ukraine if the translation is correct
Once again, I wonder if these apparent intelligence ‘faux pas’ we keep seeing are actually intentional, designed to be incremental ‘creep’ towards openly supporting Ukraine with troops (at least in a support capacity, rather than frontline).
German intelligence isn’t *this* careless and UK intelligence is unlikely to be caught flat-footed by a random unsecure phonecall from Berlin. If *we* the public are seeing this, we’re *supposed* to see this – and so are the Kremlin.
It feels like they’re testing Moscow’s response.
Why does Germany do everything in the name of “peace” now the world is closer to midnight. I know I’m an American but this is NATO level stuff. There’s gonna be trust issues ahead for sure
German MIC: world class
German military: 🤡
Fucking cock, that’s our boys on the ground you have endangered. Sack the dick.
Russian media told us over a year ago already that UK (and VS, France) had soldiers assisting the Ukraine army. They all said the Russians lied.
Apparently the Russians didn’t lie and it was the West who lied.
Everybody lies, you can’t trust Russian propaganda, you can’t trust Western propaganda.
The article is based on a wrong translation, I‘m afraid.
There’s no mention from the Germans of either „Rigdeback“, „transport“, „armoured vehicles“ or Audi “Q7”.
The original is: “Sie machen es komplett im Reach Back. (…) Sie QC’en auch die Ukrainer beim Beladen des Scalp.“
Meaning: „They do it completely in Reach Back. (…) They also qc the Ukrainians when loading the Scalp.“
Big brain moment where this joker decides to discuss secret operations on an unsecured telephone line. Russians aren’t good at spying, Germans behaving like idiots more likely.
38 comments
**German air force chief reveals secret UK operations in Ukraine**
Head of the Luftwaffe sparks alarm in Berlin and London by discussing method of delivering cruise missiles to Kyiv on an unsecure phone line intercepted by Russia
The head of the German air force used a telephone line that was not encrypted to discuss highly sensitive military secrets including the use of British “people on the ground” who would be able to help Germany deploy cruise missiles to Ukraine.
Britain and other Nato allies will be dismayed at the security breach, described by Olaf Scholz, the German chancellor, as “very serious”.
Russia intercepted talks between Lieutenant General Ingo Gerhartz and three senior Luftwaffe officers as they used standard off-the-shelf Webex video conference software, running on an office line, for top secret military planning.
Included was confirmation that the British military is deployed in Ukraine, and could be used for training to help prevent German political embarrassment, as well as important details on the deployment of British Storm Shadow missiles.
Gerhartz, head of the operations and exercises department, held the 38-minute conference call on February 19, while outside Germany, to discuss the potential deployment of German Taurus cruise missiles to Ukraine amid political divisions in Scholz’s coalition over the move.
Gerhartz began the call by stating that “no one knows why the federal chancellor is blocking the dispatch of the missiles — this gives rise to all sorts of outlandish rumours”.
“If we’re asked about delivery methods. I know how the British do this. They always transport them in Ridgeback armoured vehicles. They have several people on the ground,” he said, according to a Russian transcript of the call which has been confirmed as authentic by the German defence ministry.
In another security breach, Gerhartz explained how the French “send [Audi] Q7s loaded with Scalp missiles to Ukraine”. The air force general is said to have joined the conversation from his mobile phone from a hotel room in Singapore.
Gerhartz said he did not understand why Germany was not sending its cruise missiles to Ukraine
The revelations will help Russian intelligence to track and locate, potentially targeting, such vehicles in Europe and on Ukraine’s territory. Gerhartz said that Britain had outfitted Ukrainian aircraft with Storm Shadows and could help with the transfer of Taurus missiles to Ukraine.
Another officer, thought to be Brigadier General Frank Graefe, said the military “must be very careful from the beginning to avoid any wording that would implicate us in the conflict” beyond preliminary training of Ukrainian soldiers in Germany.
“Once they have been trained, we’ll ask the Brits if they would take over at that stage. I believe this would be the right course of action. Just imagine the uproar if the media were to find out,” he said, in a reference to missile transfers from a base in Bavaria and “our car trips to Poland”.
Germany has about 600 Taurus missiles and is considering sending 100 to Ukraine in two batches of 50 to ensure the missile “won’t change the course of the hostilities”.
“That’s why we don’t want to send all of them. And not all of them in one batch. We may first send 50 missiles, and then give them another 50. This is absolutely clear, but this is big politics,” said Gerhartz. “I have learnt from my French and British colleagues that the situation with the Storm Shadow and Scalp missiles is the same.”
The officers went on to discuss targets the Ukrainians might hit with the missiles, which have a 500km range, such as Russian ammunition depots and the Kerch Bridge to Crimea.
The German officers believe it would take 10 to 20 Taurus missiles to bypass Russian air defences and destroy the bridge in an aircraft operation. “There’s no real reason to say we can’t do it; it just depends on the political red lines,” said the air force chief.
In one politically incendiary revelation, Gerhartz described how the military would pretend to the German public that “information exchanges” used in targeting for the missiles would be handled by MBDA, the Taurus manufacturer.
“This is a ruse, of course, but quite likely it looks different from the political point of view. If the information exchange goes through the manufacturer, it has nothing to do with us,” he said.
Gerhartz played down the prospect of a quick deployment telling his team that the capability of the missile manufacturer for bringing non-operational missiles held in armouries was up to eight months.
The blunder will alarm other Nato allies and comes after Scholz angered the British last week with indiscreet comments on deployment of Britain’s Storm Shadow missiles to Ukraine, seemingly based on the video conference call.
The German chancellor said the interception, now being used by Russia as a propaganda coup, was “a very serious matter”. “That is why this is now being clarified very carefully, very intensively and very quickly,” he said yesterday.
The Bild newspaper was told: “There are indications that an insufficiently secure means of communication was used in view of the content that was obviously discussed. This is, among other things, the subject of further investigations.”
Tobias Ellwood, the former chairman of the Commons defence committee, said the Russians had leaked the intercept to disrupt German politics by highlighting the division between the military, which is prepared to send the missiles and Scholz, who is blocking the move.
“Why did Russia spill the beans on this? Why did they share this? I think they’re wanting to show that efforts are being made for the military to pursue this … to agitate politics in Germany, where Scholz is obviously very unpopular. They see this as a method to disrupt, to sow discord,” Ellwood said.
“The conversation shows a determination that they’re preparing for this to happen. But there’s an acknowledgment of the political differences that still sit above them.”
Germany is increasingly seen by Britain and other allies as unreliable after the latest security breach, which potentially compromises arms transfers to Ukraine and the use of cruise missiles by Kyiv.
“We know Germany is pretty penetrated by Russian intelligence so it just demonstrates they are neither secure nor reliable,” Ben Wallace, the former defence secretary, said.
Last week Wallace said of Scholz, after he revealed details on British Storm Shadow deployment, that “as far as the security of Europe goes he is the wrong man, in the wrong job at the wrong time”.
My favourite part about this embarrassing non-journalism is that the the times journalist tasked with writing it apparently doesn’t speak German and [used a (bad) transcript by Russian propaganda](https://x.com/jochenbittner/status/1764342492374139006?s=46). Accordingly there are some idiotic mistakes in there such as that nonsense on “ridgebacks” or on “Audi Q7”. It took random people on Twitter to [tell](https://x.com/brunobrussels/status/1764342925582909733?s=46) this journalist that he had copy and pasted nonsense.
Discussing such matters on an unsecured line is an incredible level of incompetence… I’m at a loss of words for that.
My semi conspiratorial take on this is that they (the UK & Germany) have actually agreed on leaking this to the public to test Putins respons to the fact that Nato countries actually have boots on the ground in Ukraine (Even if it’s not in a direct combat function) Because if he doesn’t really react then Nato can push the Russian so-called ‘red line’ a little bit more yet again.
I haven’t read this particular article, but does it, as some other, mention missilies being delivered using Audi Q7s? If so, that’s a peak 2020s journalism moment lmao.
Everywhere there’s a conflict there are special forces involved. Really nothing new.
Just do a Putin and deny. What breach? You must be making things up.
On the other hand, admitting something like that makes it Putin’s move. He going to nuke or not?
Putin’s clown posse threatening with nuclear annihilation in 3, 2, 1…
Like what? I hope this is another mistranslation otherwise the UK needs to act on this
Maybe they leaked it so that they wont need to send those rockets at all… The pressure was very high on them to send the rockets. So they could have leaked ths discussion on purpose to sabotage the whole thing on their own, so they wont need to send them at all…
Other than that I can hardly believe a personel at this level of competence could do such a mindblowing failuer…
Let’s be honest, the Russians knew all about foreign troops there already.
Im not surprised
[deleted]
WTF is it with the Germans… first it was Scholz and then this German air force chief ?
Well, at least we know the army stopped using faxes
So there already are NATO troops in Ukraine? Like Macron and Kallas proposed?
Duck it, I’m joining the Bundeswehr to fix it 😕
Honestly I’m just glad we have the cajones to do something like this.
It was already leaked months ago by Jack Teixera that there are a few dozen military personnel from NATO countries in Ukraine.
>One of the leaked files, reviewed by The Guardian, that appears to be dated March 2023, suggests U.S. officials assessed at the time that there were 97 special forces from NATO countries operating in Ukraine, including 14 U.S. special forces. According to the leaked document, the U.K. deployed the largest number of special forces in Ukraine—50. This was followed by Latvia (17), France (15), the U.S. (14), and the Netherlands (1).
They are most likely there for training, helping integrate weapons like storm shadow, sharing intel etc.
Strategic ambiguity:
* France: Troops not excluded
* Germany: Blow Kersh bridge
* Germany: Secret UK operations
Who’s next?
I’m not in the military, but when you’ve got this situation, you need to: LIE, DEFLECT, EVADE, SHUT THE F*CK UP AND DENY EVERYTHING!
On whose side are you on, dude?
I’m sure the Russians knew already.
So the only people this is revealed to is westerners
We need to cut Germany off from as much access to any of our intelligence as possible. Tell the Germans as little as possible and let them know as little as practically possible because they are a fucking sieve when it comes to information.
Wallace is right. Germany is far too infiltrated with Russian spies and their cybersecurity is extremely lacklustre. Why on earth are Germany’s top military brass using fucking Webex to discuss potentially sensitive military information?
surprise everyone has assets in ukraine.
What a dumpster fire. If high level talks like that can happen over Webex, it speaks a lot about the culture and processes of the whole organisation.
So now, the question is what else has been intercepted? Or rather what hasn’t… I m sure Germany s alliés will be very keen on sharing anything.
You are fired
German top brass doesn’t look too clever these days, lol
Germany has about 600 Taurus missiles and is considering sending 100 to Ukraine in two batches of 50 to ensure the missile “won’t change the course of the hostilities”.
what does that mean
Reminder that people were labelled as Russian troll for saying something like this before.
I wouldn’t drive an Audi Q7 in Ukraine if the translation is correct
Once again, I wonder if these apparent intelligence ‘faux pas’ we keep seeing are actually intentional, designed to be incremental ‘creep’ towards openly supporting Ukraine with troops (at least in a support capacity, rather than frontline).
German intelligence isn’t *this* careless and UK intelligence is unlikely to be caught flat-footed by a random unsecure phonecall from Berlin. If *we* the public are seeing this, we’re *supposed* to see this – and so are the Kremlin.
It feels like they’re testing Moscow’s response.
Why does Germany do everything in the name of “peace” now the world is closer to midnight. I know I’m an American but this is NATO level stuff. There’s gonna be trust issues ahead for sure
German MIC: world class
German military: 🤡
Fucking cock, that’s our boys on the ground you have endangered. Sack the dick.
Russian media told us over a year ago already that UK (and VS, France) had soldiers assisting the Ukraine army. They all said the Russians lied.
Apparently the Russians didn’t lie and it was the West who lied.
Everybody lies, you can’t trust Russian propaganda, you can’t trust Western propaganda.
The article is based on a wrong translation, I‘m afraid.
There’s no mention from the Germans of either „Rigdeback“, „transport“, „armoured vehicles“ or Audi “Q7”.
The original is: “Sie machen es komplett im Reach Back. (…) Sie QC’en auch die Ukrainer beim Beladen des Scalp.“
Meaning: „They do it completely in Reach Back. (…) They also qc the Ukrainians when loading the Scalp.“
Big brain moment where this joker decides to discuss secret operations on an unsecured telephone line. Russians aren’t good at spying, Germans behaving like idiots more likely.