Comment by hylaride
6 hours ago
As a geopolitical nerd, I've consumed a lot of non-fiction espionage content. In general, there's a general theme that German intelligence is a joke at best. He must have gotten too greedy or very lazy/sloppy.
6 hours ago
As a geopolitical nerd, I've consumed a lot of non-fiction espionage content. In general, there's a general theme that German intelligence is a joke at best. He must have gotten too greedy or very lazy/sloppy.
The CIA actually build the Gehlen Org (now BND) from some ex-Nazis as spy's against the communists. Is all a very sad joke.[0]
[0] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2006/jun/08/secondworldwar...
"If you want to tell Putin something, say it to the BND" is more or less known in that context.
>German intelligence is a joke at best
i'm not qualified to pass any judgement here, just Wirecard comes to mind. Routing sensitive payments, including to the network of secret informants, through Wirecard while the Wirecard guy (son of a KGB spy) was safari-ing (and posting photos of it) in Syria with the Wagner mercenaries... He lives right now in Russia, and it looks like German intelligence hasn't exacted any revenge.
TBF, Jan Marsalek (the Wirecard guy) is Austrian, although Wirecard was a German company.
Neither has anybody else towards any individual living in "run away to Russia" street.
Name one EU country's intelligence service that has a reputation, any reputation - good or bad. European intelligence services (ex-Russia/Ukraine) are a bunch of jokers. They are lagging behind so much vs their adversarial peers.
The French have a reputation. And the British although they are part of Europe, not the EU.
Didn't European intelligence services warn US of specifics of 9/11?
Maybe that's what they want you to think.
> Name one EU country's intelligence service that has a reputation, any reputation - good or bad. European intelligence services (ex-Russia/Ukraine) are a bunch of jokers. They are lagging behind so much vs their adversarial peers.
MI5/MI6 (unless you literally mean the European Union). They benefit from Five Eyes, though.
The French system is considered quite good, but focused on the Middle East and Africa. It's actually quite capable, considering how independent minded they are, often refusing cooperation with others. Though their intelligence quality can vary outside those core areas.
The Dutch are quite highly regarded and punch above their weight. The AIVD got inside the Russian Gozy Bear hacking group and the MIVD also caught the GRU trying to hack the OPCW in The Hague - even exposing their taxi receipts.
The Nordic states are known to have capable services that operate quietly, especially focused on Russia. The Finns especially.
The Baltic states also take it seriously, obviously focused on Russia.
TL;DR there are many capable intelligence agencies working in the EU, but they're usually much smaller and focused. Also - they usually prefer to NOT be in the limelight.
I meant the EU. Obviously including MI5 is kinda cheating.
The French are too myopic around the Middle East and Africa. They don't have any visibility into, say, Russia, even though Russia is asymmetrically embedded into them. That's an example of the problem they, and most others, face - they can't adapt rapidly to changing trends in the global scene.
I still remember the disaster that is January 2022. The US was continually stating that the Russians were planning an invasion, based on CIA intelligence, yet in the lead-up to the war, literally every EU country was calling the US a warmonger. And now with the US becoming increasingly hostile to the EU, the EU countries have been completely blindsided by that too.
And let's not forget, no Western nation has any reasonable intelligence presence in Israel, the culprit here, except for maybe the US and UK. Israel enjoys a disproportionate amount of intelligence asymmetry vs them.
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Good luck untangling who is at what level. Especially if your connection to the outside world is barely more than a needle's eye.