Germany is seeking to strengthen its foreign intelligence agency by giving it new powers and preparing for a potential break with the United States, Politico reported on 17 February.
‘We want to continue to work closely with the Americans,’ Mark Heinrichmann, chairman of a special committee in Germany’s Bundestag that oversees the country’s intelligence services, told Politico. -But if the (U.S.) president, whoever he is, decides in the future to act on his own, without the Europeans… Then we should be able to stand on our own feet.
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz wants to strengthen and unblock the country’s Foreign Intelligence Service, giving it much broader powers to commit acts of sabotage, conduct offensive cyber operations and more aggressively carry out espionage.
Current legal restrictions on the service’s activities are no longer justified, especially given the growing threat of Russian sabotage, German officials say.
Chancellor’s spokesman Thorsten Frei, who is in charge of intelligence reform, said that in the event of attacks on Germany, it would not be enough to simply observe, it would be necessary to “have the ability to defend ourselves.”
Because of the weakness of German intelligence, the country relies heavily on U.S. covert activity to stop planned attacks. The U.S., for example, warned of a Russian plot to assassinate the CEO of Rheinmetall, the journalists wrote.
According to Politico, German officials were stunned when Washington temporarily suspended intelligence sharing with Ukraine last March to pressure Kiev during peace talks with Russia. A few months later, Merz promised to significantly increase the BND’s capabilities.
Berlin’s plan to strengthen its intelligence comes amid growing concern among German and other European leaders that U.S. President Donald Trump could act to halt U.S. intelligence sharing, on which Europe relies heavily, or use that reliance as leverage.
German leaders see this need as particularly urgent in their country, where the Foreign Intelligence Service, or BND, is far more legally restricted than intelligence agencies in other countries. The restrictions stem from deliberate safeguards put in place after World War II to prevent a repeat of abuses committed by the Nazi spy apparatus. But these restrictions have had the side effect of making Germany particularly dependent on the US for intelligence gathering, and this is now seen as a potential danger.
Germany’s BND was founded in 1956 with legal restrictions aimed at preventing a repeat of abuses committed by the Nazi Gestapo and SS – at the time, many of its agents were former Nazis.
Media: Germany seeks to strengthen its foreign intelligence agency with new powers