Free Republic

‘I believe the Russians are mobilizing right now for a war that they think is going to happen in five or six years... with somebody within the next five or six years.” So says Lt. Gen. Frederick “Ben” Hodges, commander of U.S. Army Europe... "American engagement is essential if the West is to deter a revanchist Russia that has set out to “redraw the boundaries of Europe,” Gen. Hodges says... Russian President Vladimir Putin “has done in Ukraine,” he says, “is a manifestation of a strategic view of the world... This level of assistance suggests Ukraine “is not a foray,...

Following yesterday's summary of the utter farce that the Minsk Summit/Ukraine "peace" deal talks have become, the various parties involved appear to be fracturing even faster today. The headlines are coming thick and fast but most prescient appears to be: Despite John Kerry's denial of any split between Germany and US over arms deliveries to Ukraine, German Foreign Minister Steinmeier slammed Washington's strategy for being "not just risky but counterproductive." But perhaps most significantly is France's continued apparent pivot towards Russia. Following Francois Hollande's call for greater autonomy for Eastern Ukraine, former French Pres Nicolas Sarkozy has come out in...

Cyprus will offer Russia military facilities on its soil, President Nicos Anastasiades said on Friday. In an interview with a local newspaper, Anastasiades said that a pact strengthening defense relations between the two countries will be signed when he visits Moscow on Feb. 25. "There is an old (defense) agreement which is to be renewed as it is. At the same time, some additional facilities will be provided just like we do with other countries - France and Germany for example," Anastasiades said. Cyprus is currently providing facilities to French planes, such as refueling and maintenance at an air force...

...Sir Richard - who stepped down as deputy Nato commander in Europe last year - has said the UK should be taking a more active role in diplomatic efforts. "Where is Britain?" he was reported as saying by The Times. "Where is Cameron? "He is clearly a bit player. Nobody is taking any notice of him. He is now a foreign policy irrelevance."

Twice authorities have intercepted drones being used to deliver contraband into prisons, leaving German states planning new ways of keeping criminal activity away from criminals. But is the law behind the curve on this new technology? The justice ministry in Lower Saxony said that in future it might deploy so-called “drone-trackers”—devices equipped with infrared, night vision and sometimes even radar—at prisons. “We’re aware of this problem and are keeping an eye on it,” said Lower Saxony justice minister Antje Niewisch-Lennartz. Drones have only recently appeared on governments’ radars. At the end of January, a drone carrying a package containing a...

American threats to arm Ukraine are a "bluff" aimed at making Russia blink as the crisis in east Ukraine deepens, according to senior EU diplomats. Angela Merkel and François Hollande’s mission to Moscow comes following a “radical deterioration” and Western intelligence showing “beyond doubt” that thousands of Russian are fighting in Ukraine, senior diplomats said. The general consensus among Western diplomats, including Nato, is that there is no military solution to the Ukraine crisis although attitudes are hardening in Washington as fears grow that Kiev is on the edge of military and economic collapse. One European diplomat said that reports...

Shares in Greek banks crashed by more than a quarter yesterday as Athens urged Berlin not to go on humiliating a ‘proud nation’. Yanis Varoufakis, Greece’s new finance minister, issued an extraordinary defiant statement invoking the rise of the Nazis when Germany was crippled by debts between the wars. After a tense meeting with his German counterpart in Berlin, Wolfgang Schaeuble, he declared: ‘We didn’t even agree to disagree.’

End 'Gross Indignity', Greek FM Varoufakis Tells Germany Yanis Varoufakis is in Berlin attempting to renegotiate Greece's debt Greece's new finance minister has urged Germany to help end the "gross indignity" of the Greek debt crisis. Yanis Varoufakis said "too much time, hopes, lives" had been wasted by Greece's forced austerity programme. He was speaking after talks with his German counterpart, Wolfgang Schaeuble, who said a reduction of Greece's debt was off the agenda. Mr Varoufakis has been seeking support for Greece's plan to renegotiate its massive international bailout. On Thursday evening, thousands of people gathered in front of the...

British spies have warned the government they may cut off ties with their German counterparts over a parliamentary inquiry into spying by the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA). Focus magazine reported on Thursday that top spies at Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) are concerned that the Bundestag’s (German parliament) inquiry into the NSA could uncover secrets about how they cooperate with their German allies. Gerhard Schindler, head of Germany’s foreign intelligence agency, the Bundesnachrichtendienst (BND), reportedly told the leaders of the inquiry about the increased tension with his British colleagues on Wednesday evening. “Without information from British signals intelligence, we would...

The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and European missiles manufacturer MBDA have signed the first export contract of the Meteor active radar guided beyond-visual-range air-to-air missile (BVRAAM), for an estimated amount of $1 bn, reports today French newspaper La Tribune. The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and European missiles manufacturer MBDA have signed the first export contract of the Meteor active radar guided beyond-visual-range air-to-air missile (BVRAAM), for an estimated amount of $1 bn, reports today French newspaper La Tribune. MBDA's Meteor active radar guided beyond-visual-range air-to-air missile and Advanced Short Range Air-to-Air Missile fitted on an Eurofighter Typhoon The Meteor missiles...

NORFOLK Ayaan Hirsi Ali stood before a slide of the caged Jordanian pilot about to be set afire by Islamic State group extremists. That, she said at Chrysler Hall on Tuesday night, will be the norm if they are not defeated. "You are going to see people beheaded, their hands and legs cut off, the mass enslavement of women," warned Hirsi Ali, a sharp critic of Muslim leaders and radicals and an advocate of women's rights. "We have had over a long period of time... even before the Reagan administration, so many warning signs that we have ignored," Hirsi Ali...

Members of the Russian parliament are creating a task force to estimate the damages inflicted on Russia by Germany during WWII, in a bid to demand financial compensation from the German state almost 70 years after the end of the conflict, Russian daily newspaper Izvestia reported on Tuesday. The initiative is a direct response to trade sanctions imposed on Russia by the US and EU, for its annexation of Crimea from Ukraine in March and continuous support of separatist fighters in Eastern Ukraine since, according to Mikhail Degyaterov, an MP from the Liberal Democrat Party of Russia, who has proposed...

... The USSR got some German assets, furniture, clothes

Two hooded gunmen opened fire at a man in a kebab restaurant at one of Malmö’s largest shopping centres on Saturday afternoon, in full view of several families and their children. Their victim, thought to be Ashkan Moayed Abedi, a member of the Wolfpack Brotherhood criminal gang, escaped into the carpark where he was then gunned down in front of shocked shoppers. He died later in hospital. “They fired perhaps ten or twelve shots," ... Abedi, 30, was a key player in the gang war which took place in Sweden's third largest city between 2007 and 2011, leaving at least...

Over 9,000 people died in the Baltic Sea on January 30, 1945, in an attempt to evade the Red Army. The Wilhelm Gustloff was the largest shipwreck in history, but little is known about the catastrophe seven decades on. At around 9 p.m. on January 30, 1945, Adolf Hitler was speaking to the German people. In the packed dining hall of the luxury liner "Wilhelm Gustloff," as in most of the rest of the country, a radio was broadcasting Hitler's address, but the thousands of refugees from Pomerania and East and West Prussia who had struggled onto the ship weren't...

Police armed with pistols in heavily gun-controlled European countries are realizing a hard lesson fast–jihadists with no respect for the law are side-stepping gun control and stockpiling weapons that will give them the upper hand in confrontations with officers. Europol chief of staff Brian Donald says there were two “large seizures” of firearms–particularly “assault weapons”–over the last two weeks and more seizures are expected as investigations and tracking continues.

Germany’s defense minister Ursula von der Leyen said Friday that her government planned to make the military one of the most sought after employers in the country. Von der Leyen was presenting a proposal for a more attractive Bundeswehr at the German parliament, the Bundestag. “This isn’t a sprint; rather, we have a marathon ahead of us,” the minister said. Von der Leyen, who belongs to the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), proposed more part-time work, better promotion opportunities and legally-stipulated working hours—a first in the German military. …

When it comes to war crimes and crimes against humanity, the German government is unyielding—particularly when it comes to finding excuses for why it should do nothing when it comes to potential German perpetrators. For more than 16 months, Chancellor Angela Merkel’s government has been in possession of a list containing the names of German companies thought to have helped Syrian dictator Bashar Assad and his father Hafis build up Syria’s chemical weapons arsenal over the course of several decades. Ultimately, it became one of the largest such arsenals in the world. […] Berlin immediately classified the list and has...

Germany’s foreign intelligence agency, the Bundesnachrichtendienst (BND) collects 220 million pieces of information about foreign phone calls and SMS every day, Zeit Online reported on Friday. According to BND documents seen by journalists, five locations around Germany are used to collect the millions of so-called “metadata” about foreigners’ phone calls. It is not yet clear where the BND obtains this much data. But the parliamentary committee at the Bundestag (German parliament) investigating surveillance by the US National Security Agency (NSA) has established that the BND taps satellite communications and internet cables. …

In a decision announced on Wednesday, a Frankfurt court upheld the dismissal of a man from his job at Frankfurt airport over his close friendship with a foreign citizen with ties to terrorist group ISIS. Judges found that the man, who was in regular contact with the terrorism suspect on a mobile number known only to his close friends, and had lent the suspect €2,000, was too much of a security risk to work in sensitive areas at the airport. The man had first come to police attention after being fined for a minor traffic offense, which was flagged up...