Officials from the Federal Criminal Police Office arrested an employee of the Bundeswehr Procurement Office in Koblenz on Wednesday. The suspicion: He is said to have spied for Russia. The said the Attorney General, who is investigating the case. The office in which the man works ensures that the troops are equipped – a betrayal of secrets from here to Russian authorities is particularly explosive in the context of Moscow’s war of aggression against Ukraine and the retrofitting of the Bundeswehr that was started as a result.
The military counter-intelligence service (MAD) and the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution have apparently had their sights set on the employee for some time. What she and the BKA investigators found out sounds alarming. According to this, Thomas H. contacted the Russian consulate general in Bonn several times from May this year, as well as the Russian embassy in Berlin – and is said to have offered himself as a informant.
A BND employee was arrested in December
On one occasion, the German national is said to have actually passed on information that he had obtained from his work for the Bundeswehr, according to the federal prosecutor’s office. The investigators assume that they were intended for a Russian intelligence service. Exactly what information was involved has not yet been made public – the investigators also did not say in which area of procurement the accused works and what information he had access to through his service.
The German security authorities have long assumed that Moscow has been interested in everything to do with the Western military and its equipment, especially since the start of the major invasion – especially in Germany, which is one of Ukraine’s most extensive supporters. As recently as July, Martina Rosenberg, President of the MAD military intelligence service, which is also responsible for counterintelligence in the Bundeswehr, warned of Moscow’s curiosity. Since February 24, 2022, the topics of espionage and cyber defense have “clearly come to the fore” in her service, said Rosenberg. Federal Minister of Justice Marco Buschmann wrote on the short message service X that vigilance remains “the order of the day” in view of the new suspicion of espionage.
In December, the most serious case of espionage in the western security apparatus in connection with the Ukraine war became known – the case of the BND employee Carsten L. He is said to have transmitted top secret documents of the BND’s technical reconnaissance to the Russian secret service FSB. The Bundeswehr Colonel L., who was delegated to the foreign intelligence service, should probably also provide details on the German Iris-T-Procure air defense systems in Ukraine. Apparently, Carsten L. didn’t need much persuasion from the Russian side either. A few weeks before L’s arrest, a Bundeswehr reserve officer had been given a suspended sentence for acting as a secret service agent for Russia, which, however, took place before the full-scale invasion began.
In the past few months, the German security authorities have repeatedly noticed alleged Russian spying attempts on Bundeswehr installations. For example, suspicious drones were noticed over barracks – even where Ukrainian soldiers were being trained on Western weapon systems. The Bundeswehr therefore began to procure more jammers against drones.
Now the troops aren’t having any technical problems, but rather a human security gap. The screening measures for Bundeswehr employees in sensitive areas were tightened a few months before the start of the Ukraine war. It is not yet known whether the accused Thomas H. had to go through such a strict review. Moscow’s diplomatic missions, which he apparently willingly contacted, are notorious in German security circles: In addition to real diplomats, there are also secret service agents disguised as such – agents and liaisons for informers. The federal government has already expelled more than 40 since spring 2022.
The employee of the procurement office who has now been arrested was brought before an investigating judge on Wednesday. He is now in custody.