Germany’s defence minister has said that one of the generals on a military conference call on Ukraine that was intercepted by Russia may have broken security protocol by using a non-secure line to dial in.
Boris Pistorius said the 38-minute phone call held over the platform WebEx that was subsequently leaked by Kremlin-controlled TV, had not been intercepted by an individual Russian spy but was most likely the result of a random sweep of insecure data on the sidelines of the Singapore airshow. One of the participants dialled in from his hotel room, and either his mobile phone or an insecure connection in his hotel provided the vulnerability, Pistorius said.
Speaking to journalists in Berlin on Tuesday morning, Pistorius said that disciplinary measures were being looked into, as the participant had contravened rigid security guidelines by not using a secure, authorised connection.
He said Germany was taking technical and organisational steps to ensure a similar incident was not repeated.
Amid widespread criticism towards Germany as well as sheer embarrassment over the call in which information about military tactics of Germany and its European and US allies were revealed – including that Britain and the UK had “troops on the ground” – Pistorius said he had spoken to many of his counterparts on Monday, and they had expressed “no sense of annoyance towards Germany”, and “reassured me that trust in Germany is uninterrupted”. He said there had been unanimity among Germany’s partners, that “we won’t let ourselves be divided by this Russian attack”.
He said that every one of Germany’s partners was “familiar” with such attacks, adding that the “breadth of such attacks is getting ever broader”.
Pistorius called the interception part of a “perfidious game” Russia was playing against western allies, accusing it of trying to “drive a wedge” between European and US allies, and added: “[We] will not allow Putin to get on our nerves.”
He refused to discuss the contents of the phone call, insisting that to do so would be “letting Putin set the agenda”.
Led by Lt Gen Ingo Gerhartz, the head of the German air force, or Luftwaffe, the meeting, which took place a fortnight ago, was in preparation for a briefing with Pistorius. It focused on Taurus missiles, and touched on the refusal by the German chancellor, Olaf Scholz, to donate the weapons to Ukraine, over his fears that their 500km range meant they could be used to target Russia, thus making Germany a party to the war.
As part of the conversation, the participants discussed how Britain was working closely with Ukraine in deploying Storm Shadow missiles, and suggested Britain had troops in Ukraine.
At the meeting, a transcript of which has been seen by the Guardian, the German officers concluded that use of the missiles in the near future would only be viable if German soldiers were involved on Ukrainian territory. The alternative, to train Ukrainian soldiers, in order to avoid putting German soldiers on Ukrainian terrain, was a possibility but would take months of preparation, they said.
They also discussed potential targets the Taurus could reach, including the strategically-vital Kerch Bridge, connecting mainland Russia and Russian-occupied Crimea.
Russia has interpreted the conversation as a direct German plan to attack Russia, saying the intentions indicate the will for a full-blown war.
Pistorius insisted that the communication system of Germany’s defence ministry had “not been compromised”. Amid criticism that WebEx is unsafe, he said that for certain conversations up to a specific level of security the platform was used, but not the version open to the public, rather one with an additional level of security, using Bundeswehr-controlled servers, and not foreign ones.
Pistorius said events like the Singapore airshow, which attracted high-ranking military personnel from across Europe, were notorious for attracting espionage and seen as the equivalent of a “laid out banquet” for Russian intelligence services. According to his information, the two-day event had been riddled with “extensive espionage operations” carried out by Russian intelligence. He said the German WebEx conference had been a “lucky hit” by spies working “within the framework of a comprehensive strategy”.
IT experts were in the process of forensically investigating the equipment used by the participants, Pistorius said, and the process of disciplinary action was being looked into.
However, he resisted calls to sack anyone involved. As long as “no serious” conclusions came out of the investigation, he said he would “not let any of my best officers become the victims of Putin’s games”.
