The Blind Chicken’s Dilemma

Intelligence agencies are once again being discussed in Germany: in parliament, in talk shows, at the bar. And once again, the debate follows a principle all too familiar; no one knows anything for sure, but everyone knows better.

Bets are being taken. Does Federal Intelligence Service President Schindler need to go? Head Chancellor Altmaier? Interior Minister de Maizière? Each one is on the chopping block.

“The Chancellor’s Office, led by the Christian Democratic Union for 10 years, is responsible for the German intelligence community behaving properly,” drummed Social Democratic Party General Secretary Yasmin Fahimi.

But the problems go beyond political party lines. It’s hard to believe, but it was 11 years ago that the chancellor of the ministry was named Steinmeier. The Social Democrat, until today a ruling of high rank, had increased communication between the Federal Intelligence Service and the National Security Agency to an unprecedented level in its history. The one-time close ranks had a reason. Europe and the United States found themselves challenged by Islamist terrorism more than ever.

Compliance with previous boundaries and rules — which may exist domestically, but are questionable abroad — was considered an old way of thought. The new tone was echoed in the grim threat of Interior Minister Otto Schily when addressing Islamists, “Those that love death can have it.” Have the Germans partly lost control over the opaque world in which intelligence agencies operates?

The Americans repeatedly colored outside the lines anyway. With gigantic nets, they trawled for anything they could get. Whether it was a terrorist was not so important. They even listened in on the chancellor’s cell phone. Angela Merkel can be happy about it in retrospect: It dampens excitement in Paris regarding an alleged German-American cooperation to collect information in France and Austria.

It should now be necessary for the Americans to be aggressively restrained. And current needs would actually require a new form of cooperation between the elected officials in Washington and Berlin for joint control of intelligence agencies. But the Germans are reluctant to part with their role as critics within the U.S. They are indebted to the superpower, and that is Berlin’s problem. Germany’s agencies see and hear too little without the help of the United States.

The NSA laid grain for the blind German chickens once again in 2007 and warned Germany of the Islamist group Sauerland, who had already put together explosives for a mass murder at the Frankfurt airport. The higher regional court in Dusseldorf imposed a sentence of up to 12 years of imprisonment in the case.

The NSA can save lives in Germany. This fact alone will again and again contribute to future silence in the highest German security circles when dealing with the U.S. Regarding the former Sauerland group, it has been heard that a hydrogen peroxide buyer from Oberusel also had contacts in Hessen. Information like this muffles the now and then overly loud sounds in talk shows and at the bar. We all live with a dilemma, irrespective of the intelligence agencies.