The German government is between a rock and a hard place. The USA are our allies. We depend on them for our national security for all sorts of reasons. And the most pertinent risk is indeed global terrorism. Without the help of the US intelligence sources, we couldn't stop remotely as many terrorist cells.
So the government may have had two bad choices: Either risk to have a major terrorist attack happen on their watch, or cooperate with the US more closely than the public would want.
The government may not even have had that choice since a lot of the actual fault may lie in relatively low levels of the BND, and only the oversight was inadequate. (Like it is in the US even more so)
> And the most pertinent risk is indeed global terrorism.
I'm not sure what a "pertinent" risk is, but it's the most media-friendly. But compared to the consequences of climate change, or even the current economic crisis, it should really be downgraded. I don't have hard stats regarding the increase in suicides due to the crisis, but there is no way the number of terrorism-related deaths in Europe is even in the same ballpark.
> Without the help of the US intelligence sources, we couldn't stop remotely as many terrorist cells.
Really? How many is that exactly? The only country which seems to be regularly try new terrorists cells is the US, and the scenario seems to be the same every time: an FBI informer helped radicalize and provided weapons to some youths with lots of personal issues, which turns into another success of law enforcement.
It's similar to people being afraid of flying, and in the same time don't mind hitting highway in crappy old car. Things blowing with people inside/around just works much better with our primary instincts.
If you're clever enough, you can realize this and actively fight it, but you'll end up feeling alone and surrounded with bunch of idiots. No-win scenario.
They rejected 40,000 US requests that were deemed outside the co-operation agreement and have now discovered 2,000 which are "suspicious".
The article suggests the agreement excluded German and US organisations, the "suspicious" 2k were relating to other European institutions. It sounds like a case of it being within the written agreement but that the agreement was too broad, or at least should have been changed with the shift in political rhetoric.
So the government may have had two bad choices: Either risk to have a major terrorist attack happen on their watch, or cooperate with the US more closely than the public would want.
The government may not even have had that choice since a lot of the actual fault may lie in relatively low levels of the BND, and only the oversight was inadequate. (Like it is in the US even more so)