{"id":362029,"date":"2025-08-21T12:32:15","date_gmt":"2025-08-21T12:32:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/362029\/"},"modified":"2025-08-21T12:32:15","modified_gmt":"2025-08-21T12:32:15","slug":"germany-looking-for-soldiers-spies-and-nurses-dw-08-21-2025","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/362029\/","title":{"rendered":"Germany looking for soldiers, spies and nurses \u2013 DW \u2013 08\/21\/2025"},"content":{"rendered":"

Germany’s Federal Intelligence Service (BND)<\/a> and its military, the\u00a0Bundeswehr<\/a>, have both set up recruiting stands at the international gaming<\/a> conference Gamescom<\/a>, which opens to the general public Thursday in the western German<\/a> city of Cologne.<\/p>\n

BND spokeswoman Julia Linner says tech-savvy visitors are welcome to come to the agency’s stand to play “BND Legends \u2014 Operation Blackbox,”\u00a0which sees players assume the identity of an undercover agent to foil a cyberattack. The game, which the BND plans to make available on a public platform, tests players’\u00a0ability in a number of specific situations.<\/p>\n

Spokeswoman Linner, who says “the agency itself is a blackbox to many, we wanted to open it a little,”\u00a0notes that gamers tend to have skill-sets conducive to spy agency effectiveness \u2014 including digital prowess, communications skills, a team attitude and stress resistance.<\/p>\n

Germany’s army is recruiting at Gamescom for similar reasons. Visitors to their stand can drive tanks or fly helicopters in simulators, or do an actual physical workout in bulletproof gear under a giant poster reading: “Are you ready for the next level?”\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Like the BND’S Linner, army spokesman Marco Mann says, “We’re where our target group is.”\u00a0Mann says the Bundeswehr, which has been present at Gamescom since 2009, wants to let young people know what an attractive employer it is.<\/p>\n

Critics, however, worry about the appropriateness of such a situation<\/a>, with pacifists like J\u00fcrgen Gr\u00e4sslin of the German Peace Society (DFG) saying, “In killer games, players take on various roles in which they simulate murder, they are even given bonus points for killing an enemy.”<\/p>\n

“The Bundeswehr,” he says, “has no reason to be at Gamescom.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Germany’s Federal Intelligence Service (BND) and its military, the\u00a0Bundeswehr, have both set up recruiting stands at the international…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":362030,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5310],"tags":[2000,299,1824],"class_list":{"0":"post-362029","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-germany","8":"tag-eu","9":"tag-europe","10":"tag-germany"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115066774968195952","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/362029","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=362029"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/362029\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/362030"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=362029"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=362029"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=362029"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}