{"id":282664,"date":"2024-02-29T07:20:23","date_gmt":"2024-02-29T07:20:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=282664"},"modified":"2024-03-01T08:05:22","modified_gmt":"2024-03-01T08:05:22","slug":"british-soldiers-in-ukraine-helping-fire-missiles-olaf-scholz-reveals","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=282664","title":{"rendered":"British soldiers in Ukraine helping fire missiles, Olaf Scholz reveals"},"content":{"rendered":"

Joe Barnes and James Rothwell \u2013 The Telegraph Feb 28, 2024<\/strong><\/h1>\n
\"\"<\/a><\/div>\n

Germany was accused of a \u201cflagrant abuse of intelligence\u201d after revealing that British soldiers are supporting Ukrainian forces launching long-range Storm Shadow missiles.<\/a><\/p>\n

Olaf Scholz said on Monday\u00a0that he would not deliver the Taurus, Berlin\u2019s equivalent of the Storm Shadow, as it would require soldiers assisting on the ground, citing the UK and French approach with their own systems<\/a>. Mr Scholz argued that following the UK would make Germany a \u201cparticipant in the war\u201d.<\/p>\n

The comments were seen as endangering British military and diplomatic personnel on the ground.<\/p>\n

Tobias Ellwood, the former chairman of the Commons defence committee, said: \u201cThis is a flagrant abuse of intelligence deliberately designed to distract from Germany\u2019s reluctance to arm Ukraine with its own long-range missile system. This will no doubt be used by Russia to racket up the escalator ladder.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mr Scholz was also criticised by German opposition MPs.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe chancellor\u2019s statement regarding France and Britain\u2019s alleged involvement in operating long-range cruise missiles used in Ukraine is completely irresponsible,\u201d Norbert Rottgen, a senior MP from Angela Merkel\u2019s former ruling party, the CDU.<\/p>\n

Mr Scholz is under mounting pressure to deliver the long-range missile to disrupt Russia\u2019s supply lines and prevent Moscow taking further territory.<\/p>\n

He said on Monday that German soldiers could not follow their British and French peers<\/a> in \u201cthe way of target control and accompanying target control\u201d. The Storm Shadow is co-produced by the UK and France.<\/p>\n

\u201cGerman soldiers can at no point and in no place be linked with the targets that this system [the Taurus] reaches. Not even in Germany,\u201d Mr Scholz said.<\/p>\n

Britain is known to provide intelligence on Russian targets but it is unclear what level of support is given to Ukrainian troops firing its missiles on the ground.<\/p>\n

On Tuesday, the UK Government announced it had a \u201csmall number\u201d of soldiers deployed inside Ukraine, specifying only that some were involved in medical training.<\/p>\n

Mr Scholz\u2019s speculation on the role played by British troops in Ukraine has heightened concern for the safety of diplomats and other personnel stationed in the country, defence sources told The Telegraph.<\/p>\n

It has also increased the threat of potential Russian overseas intelligence operations on British soil, the sources added.<\/p>\n

In response to Mr Scholz, the Ministry of Defence simply referred queries to Kyiv on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

\u201cUkraine\u2019s use of Storm Shadow and its targeting processes are the business of the armed forces of Ukraine,\u201d a spokesman told The Telegraph.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe UK, along with other allies, is providing a range of equipment to Ukraine to help it counter Russia\u2019s illegal and unprovoked aggression.\u201d<\/p>\n

Taurus missiles are capable of deeper strikes and contain more sophisticated bunker-busting technologies than the British Storm Shadow and French Scalp cruise missiles delivered last year.<\/p>\n

The German missile, which has a range of 310 miles, could easily strike politically sensitive targets, such as Moscow or the Kerch bridge linking Russia with occupied Crimea.<\/a><\/p>\n

Justin Crump, chief executive of Sibylline, an intelligence consultancy, said: \u201cBritish support to Ukraine is hardly news to Moscow given repeated leaks, but this has previously been veiled in ambiguity \u2013 itself drawing on a trick from Russia\u2019s own playbook.<\/p>\n

\u201c[Mr] Scholz though has more clearly pierced this veil. His assertion is a gift to Russian propagandists<\/a>, already forming a key part of Russia\u2019s effort to undermine Nato cohesion and support for Kyiv during this critical period ahead of US and UK elections.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cMore immediately, it will drive Russia to redouble efforts to target foreign forces present in Ukraine and make inflated claims of losses.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mr Scholz has a deep mistrust that Ukraine would ignore his orders not to strike those targets, analysts said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt has become very clear that the reason why he is not in favour of delivering Taurus is because he fundamentally does not trust the Ukrainians to use those missiles in a way that [does] not go against what he perceives as Germany\u2019s interests,\u201d Fabian Hoffman, a doctoral research fellow at the Oslo Nuclear Project, said.<\/p>\n

\u201c[Mr] Scholz is absolutely frightened that any of these Taurus missiles could be used in an attack against a politically sensitive target, either in Ukraine or Russia.<\/p>\n

\u201cSimply the theoretical ability to strike targets as far as Moscow with German weapons systems<\/a> creates a blockage in the chancellor\u2019s head\u2026 a massive fear of escalation potential and the consequences this could have for Germany.\u201d<\/p>\n

Experts say that Germany could overcome its fears of escalatory strikes by pre-programming donated Taurus missiles to prevent such attacks.<\/p>\n

The US is known to have installed geo-blocking software on its Himars rocket launchers sent to Ukraine, preventing Kyiv\u2019s forces from firing into Russian soil with the weapons system.<\/p>\n

Source <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The angry response to Olaf Scholz\u2019s claim that UK military personnel are assisting with the use of key weapons systems against Russia suggests that they may indeed be involved. Meaning that British and NATO personnel are actively involved in the war with Russia <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":39262,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[19,91,116],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-282664","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-Behind_The_News","category-russia","category-ukraine"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/282664","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/39262"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=282664"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/282664\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":282667,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/282664\/revisions\/282667"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=282664"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=282664"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=282664"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}