Germany deepens military, police, and cyber ties with Israel

Germany is systematically expanding its cooperation with Israel in the military, police, and cybersecurity spheres.

Agreements formally signed at the beginning of this year are currently being implemented. The “Cyber Pact and Security Pact”, concluded in January, provides for closer cooperation between the respective police forces as well as the establishment of a “Cyberdome” in Germany.

Berlin hopes that security cooperation with Israel will deliver “practice-based know-how from a country with a high frequency of military operations”.

Another agreement signed in February enables a major intensification of military cooperation, with the objective of making the Bundeswehr (German Armed Forces) practically “war-ready”.

The stated aim is for Israeli ground forces to transfer capabilities and experience gained in Israel’s past and present wars to the German military.

Through its “unrivalled expertise in ground operations”, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) is assisting the Bundeswehr in “adapting to an increasingly volatile global environment”.

“The most important partner outside NATO”

According to an analysis published by German Foreign Policy, German-Israeli military cooperation, much like collaboration in arms production, dates back to the late 1950s.

During that period, West German military personnel began training Israeli soldiers in the operation of German weapon systems delivered under a secret agreement.

Sporadic records document joint military training involving German mountain infantry from the 1980s onwards.

From 1998 onwards, exchange programmes for officer candidates were introduced alongside “regular meetings at the general staff level”.

Official German government data indicates that between 1984 and 2014, “up to 493” Israeli military personnel, including officers, took part in training and other programmes conducted by the Bundeswehr.

In return, 254 German soldiers were sent to Israel for military training programmes and exercises.

It remains uncertain whether these figures reflect the full extent of the cooperation, as military collaboration with Israel is generally kept secret, as noted in a Federal Government response to a parliamentary inquiry in the Bundestag.

Furthermore, German-Israeli cooperation is by no means limited to ground forces. Since 2017, the German Air Force has participated in multiple bilateral exchange programmes with the Israeli Air Force within the framework of the “Blue Flag” exercises.

Speaking on behalf of his service branch in 2022, the Chief of the German Air Force, Ingo Gerhartz, stated that the IDF was the military’s “most important partner outside NATO”.

IDF prepared the German military for operations

The intensification of German-Israeli military cooperation has been pursued systematically since the 1990s.

The growing proximity of bilateral ties was confirmed in 2002 by retired Lieutenant General Helmut Willmann.

Serving as Chief of the German Army from 1996 to 2001, Willmann was tasked, among other duties, with institutionalising links between his units and IDF ground forces.

Willmann argued that because the Bundeswehr was undergoing a transformation from a “peacetime military into an operationally ready force”, the German side “naturally” sought to establish “contact with armed forces that have more experience than us in this field”.

In his assessment, it was obvious to everyone that “cooperation with the Israeli military naturally provided us with professional advantages”.

In 2014, for example, a training visit to Israel by German military personnel was announced—though it took place with a delay in 2015—under which soldiers were to study urban and tunnel warfare.

The Bundeswehr underscored the armed forces’ intense interest in the “specific operational experience of the Israeli armed forces”.

Commenting on increasingly close military relations with Israel in October 2021, Colonel Juergen Haffner, the Defence Attache at the German Embassy in Tel Aviv, confirmed that “the Bundeswehr has an incredibly close interest in the IDF, and vice versa”, adding that the frequency of reciprocal visits was “incredibly high”.

War preparations continue in Europe

Today, as the Bundeswehr faces the requirement to become “war-ready” without delay, cooperation between the German armed forces and the battle-tested IDF is being further expanded.

On 20 February—eight months after Israel’s initial war of aggression against Iran and several days prior to a second wave of US-Israeli attacks on the country—Lieutenant General Christian Freuding, the current Chief of the German Army, and Major General Nadav Lotan, the Commander of the Israeli Ground Forces, signed a cooperation agreement designed to link the ground forces of both nations closely across four domains.

The plans encompass joint “training and exercises”, “joint capability development”, the “sharing of operational principles”, and “exchange programmes, especially for junior officers and officer candidates”.

Following the signing of the agreement, Freuding was reportedly briefed by Lotan on “tactical lessons learned from the current war”. Which Israeli war this referred to remained unspecified.

The report noted that, through the IDF’s “unrivalled expertise in ground operations”, it is helping the Bundeswehr “adapt to an increasingly volatile global environment”. Their cooperation was described as forming a “highly effective alliance”.

Cyber pact and security pact advance

Beyond armaments and military matters, Germany and Israel are also deepening cooperation between their law-enforcement and cybersecurity agencies.

On 11 January, German Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu signed a “Cyber Pact and Security Pact” to this end.

One dimension of this agreement on “digital defence” involves measures to intensify cooperation between the police forces of both countries, which is already considered very close.

The accord also aims to advance improvements in “unmanned aerial vehicle detection and defence”, realise the “establishment of a joint artificial intelligence and cyber innovation centre”, and support “information exchange and networking regarding a Cyberdome”.

According to the Interior Ministry, this Cyberdome is a “semi-automated system for the detection, analysis, and response to cyberattacks”.

Whether “response” entails retaliatory cyberattacks against an alleged adversary remains unclear.

Overall, according to a government statement, Interior Minister Dobrindt hopes that “the exchange of information with Israel will provide practice-based know-how from a country with a high frequency of operations”.