Lithuania Fears Putin May Plan a 'False Flag' Strike on the Baltics'

Lithuania also fears Putin may be planning a 'false flag' strike on the Baltics. A classified police report, cited by German media WDR and NDR and the Suddeutsche newspaper, said one of the aircraft was loaded with military ammunition. German interior minister Alexander Dobrindt said the bomb failed to detonate only because its detonator appeared to have been “ripped”, potentially averting a mass-casualty incident.

Investigators believe the drone carried a powerful plastic explosive, possibly Semtex, and had been modified to evade electronic detection. Authorities are treating the case as a suspected act of “foreign powers” and part of a “professional hybrid threat scenario”. Suspicion has fallen on Russia because Leipzig Airport serves as a key Nato and German military logistics hub and the European base for Ukraine’s Antonov Airlines.

Some German politicians, including intelligence committee member Roderich Kiesewetter, directly accused Russia of orchestrating the attempted attack, but the government has stopped short of making that allegation. I consider the threat to Germany posed by hybrid attacks orchestrated by Russia to be serious, he said.