23 August 2000: Link to photographs of German Army Lt. Col. Guenther Guerdian's office at the US Army's Fort Bragg, North Carolina.
18 August 2000
Source:
http://195.170.124.152/archiv/2000/08/18/ak-in-ne-14048.html
See also: http://www.heise.de/tp/deutsch/inhalt/co/8572/1.html
Translation by Cryptome.
Der Tagesspiegel Online (Berlin)
August 19, 2000
Burkhard Schroeder <burks@burks.de>
An intelligence service which treats its spies badly acts negligently. Because spies can disclose secrets afterwards. That is the present experience of the military intelligence service (MAD) of the German Federal Armed Forces. A former undercover agent for MAD in the neo-Nazi scene has placed documents of the secret service, photo and the names of its liaison officers on the Internet (see http://cryptome.org). The ex-informer, Michael P.<Para64@email.msn.com>, announces that he will in the coming weeks also publish secret discussions and internal documents of MAD. The former paratrooper now studies computer technology for the future. The Internet provides the chance now to him to apply pressure to the German Federal Armed Forces.
The conflict between Michael P. and the German Federal Armed Forces has been smoldering a decade. Applications, letters, process documents fill dozens of files, and a procedure before an Administrative Court goes into a third year. Both sides persist in their position. Michael P. is considered Quixotic, and he does much to confirm this accusation. The opposite side fights with all administrative deceptions which an authority knows in order to protect itself from attacks on its existence.
The soldier Michael P. thinks conservatively. Terms like "native country" and "obligation" are sacred to him. Therefore he cannot figure out why his native country does not do anything for him although he served it under high risk. The price was high: He had to leave his homeland and to develop a new life abroad. Since then he wants to force the German Federal Armed Forces to protect his family.
In February 1989 Michael P. was introduced to two officers of the military intelligence service. The paratrooper was asked at that time to infiltrate the neo-Nazi organization "Nationalist Front " (NF) and obtain information about its infrastructure, members, sympathizers and plans for action. Michael P. accepted the task, "due to my military conviction and sense of duty". The undercover agent performed his task with excellence. Within a short time the NF head Meinolf Schönborn took him into confidence. Michael P. was introduced to the plans of the neo-Nazis to organize a "national employment command" (NEK) a kind right-wing RAF. The operations staff of the NEK planned notices on politicians and allied mechanisms, implemented from "line-faithful comrades", who should commit at the same time notices throughout Germany. The undercover agent should be trained in Syria.
The dubious secretary
In a report for the MAD Michael P. described the plans of Schönborn to let other members of the "highest levels" of the "Nationalist front" eliminate at a "night of the long measurers". The informer learned that the neo-Nazis intensively questioned his past. His story withstood that doubt, although a secretary in the anteroom of the brigade commander of the German Federal Armed Forces in August village maintained close contact to the NF and had access to sensitive data. He determined that the secretary also performed clerical work for the neo-Nazis. Through their contact with the neo-Nazi leader Schönborn MAD evaluated the situation, however not politically, but only "had been in a friendly manner." MAD was fearful nevertheless for the safety of the undercover agent. From "superordinate welfare service obligation" the German Federal Armed Forces shifted him to Canada, later into the USA.
Owing to the information of the undercover agent the NF was banned in 1992 by the Minister of the Interior at that time, Rudolf Seiters. Michael P. analyzed the situation: He believed that it is wrong to "hold contempt for human beings" as does Meinolf Schönborn and a danger if he is allowed to proceed. These "fanatic extremists" did not let themselves be diverted also by detentions by their ideological goals.
Annoyance was complete when the paratrooper Michael P. entered the office of his superior: Lieutenant colonel Guenther Guderian, liaison officer of the German Federal Armed Forces in the US Army's Fort Bragg. There hung a picture of Guderian's grandfather, the Panzer General Heinz Guderian, including swastika. The German Federal Armed Forces officer had already said in a 1995 interview with the US-American newspaper "Fayettville Observer Times," that he was proud of his grandfather. For American ears it was an irritating estimate: The Hitler-loyal General Guderian was member of a "honor court" of the armed forces, all this at the resistance. Officers from the US military investigated the incident and found no cause for action. Also in the post-war period the elder Guderian had proven in his publishing house to be obstinate, he published as a right-wing extremist.
"In-house judgment errors"
After the incident with the picture Michael P. turned to the military assigned in Bonn whether haven-guesses a armed forces general the German Federal Armed Forces abroad adequately represent. The German Federal Armed Forces meanwhile did not see a large problem in maintaining the tradition of its officer: Portrait and swastika are not to be complained of. In his interview the Guderian grandchild gave an evaluation: he is not concerned with "ideological beliefs of national socialism". He does not see therefore "a necessity for political or legal consequences". The officer took action finally himself: He pasted poorly over the swastika with a piece of pasteboard.
But the German Federal Armed Forces do not forget soldiers who ask uncomfortable questions. A committee of inquiry of Bundestag busied itself in April 1998 with right-wing extremist incidents in the army. The committee refused to listening to paratrooper Michael P. although he had appeared as an interesting designated witness. The commander of the headquarterses, captain second lieutenant Lohre, first instructs the soldier in writing about the fact that he has to protect secrecy over "affairs, which to came to him in his official activity".
The paratrooper tried everything with the German Federal Armed Forces to be further employed. He was afraid of returning to Germany. Also he was worried about the safety of his wife and his two children. The MAD however considered the neo-Nazis of the banned NF harmless. Vice Admiral Hans Frank advised the soldier in December 1997 also that "after human discretion an endangerment is today no longer given to its person and its family." The German Federal Armed Forces cannot do anything for him. His application to serve the overseas army and the native country remain unanswered for months. Even Annelie Buntenbach, Green Member of the Bundestag, tried to intercede - in vain. In a letter to the delegate an undersecretary of state of the Verteidungsministeriums admits "in-house judgment errors ".
Nevertheless the paratrooper was discharged from the military in 1998 - with praise. Michael P., 36, who lives at this time with his family in the USA, using temporary funds which are entitled to a former member of the German Federal Armed Forces for three years. "About military intelligence service we give no information in principle", says the press statement of the Secretary of Defense. Therefore there is also no statement whether MAD considers the neo-Nazis of the former NF still harmless so Michael P. can return to Germany. Meinolf Schönborn, leader of the NF, was sentenced in 1995 to two years and three months detention because of continuation of the banned NF and use of anticonstitutional symbols. Today he is free. The ex-chief ideologist of the NF, Steffen Hupka, works today in the command structure of the NPD in Saxonia-Anhalt.