Tuesday, the German government crossed a political Rubicon of sorts when it publicly blamed Russia for a drone attack at Leipzig/Halle Airport on August 4 (see A Polish Drone Factory Hit, an Italian Ammo Plant Burns. This Is the Warm-Up; the War Is Coming. – RedState).

Even as Russia was being denounced and Chancellor Friedrich Merz vowed, "The federal government will make the perpetrators of hybrid attacks pay a price. They will pay for this," several IEDs were employed or discovered at a high-voltage electrical transmission facility in the German state of Brandenburg.

The Turnow-Preilack substation is one of the region's most critical high-voltage nodes, connecting Brandenburg's largest power plant, Jaenschwalde, to the 50Hertz transmission grid.

Rockets carrying conductive material were fired into extra-high-voltage lines, causing two short circuits, Interior Minister Jan Redmann said at a press conference.

He added that authorities were searching the site, and the number of devices found, in the double digits, was still rising.

At a joint press conference, German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul and Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt laid blame for the incident at the feet of Russian intelligence.

The dangerous conduct of the Russian Federation described just now is part of a long series of attempts to destabilise, spread disinformation, threaten, sabotage and show aggression towards Europe. Unfortunately, Germany is no exception here. Russia’s leadership is treating our country with blatant hostility. I would like to emphasise that this state of our relations is not in the interests of the Federal Government.

We expressly regret that this is the case. Since the beginning of the illegal war of aggression against Ukraine, we have underscored time and again that our objective is to bring the war to an end, to restore the peaceful order in Europe and to return to constructive relations. However, this requires a minimum level of willingness to do so on the part of the Russians. We must acknowledge that Russia is displaying no willingness to compromise.

At the press conference, Wadephul and Dobrindt announced retaliatory action.

The last Russian consulate in Germany was ordered closed.

The "Russia House" cultural center was shuttered.

A longer list of sanctioned Russians was promised.

Immigration controls for Russians would be tightened.

The Russian ambassador was summoned to hear the protest.

Additional, unspecified, actions were ordered against the Russian "shadow fleet."

Russia's response was pretty much as expected. 

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Vladimir Putin accused Germany of planting evidence and carrying out the attacks. The Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said, "Berlin is sponsoring terrorism," and promised retaliatory action. Putin's favorite talk show host, Vladimir Solovyov, did not disappoint. In a performance much like one would expect on "The View" or at any hour on MSNOW, he said that Germany had forfeited its right to be considered a legitimate state and Russia should demand the re-institution of East Germany.

There is a domestic political angle in this that bears watching. While the main German parties united in the action, their reaction trailed that of the leftist Green Party.

"The federal government's analysis came a bit late, and the steps it's taking aren't enough for me," said Sara Nanni, the Greens' security policy spokesperson, in a DW interview. "I don't think anyone in Moscow is afraid or giving it a second thought right now."

As an example, she said Germany should be taking tougher action against the Russian shadow fleet. This would be necessary to "stop the flow of money to the Russian war machine," she said.

Keep in mind that the Greens never found anyone they couldn't surrender to.

The AfD, which I think is the favored party among American conservatives, or at least it is with me, continues to toady to the Russians in the style of Tucker Carlson and the Halal Right. It is poised to win control of the state of Saxony-Anhalt on Sunday, giving it its first major electoral victory. Pursuing strong action against Russia with one of its states effectively under Russian control would be a bad move.

This is why the federal government — composed of the conservative CDU/CSU bloc and the center-left Social Democratic Party (SPD) — is being careful about stepping up its rhetoric, as doing so could potentially help the AfD secure an absolute majority in Saxony-Anhalt. On the other hand, it can hardly afford to place the blame for the events in Leipzig on Russia while also responding in only a relatively mild manner.

Still, there is hope. At least the Germans had the courage to name the perpetrator of the hybrid warfare attacks. It had the courage to take some small steps. Perhaps the AfD can be persuaded to abandon their inclination to go full Quisling and find common cause with their political foes in the face of the real enemy. Or maybe not.

As Winston Churchill once philosophized, “The Hun is always either at your throat or at your feet.” The events of the last month may have resulted in a lethargic, flaccid Germany that had seemingly lost the will to resist extinction after two decades of governance by self-loathing communist and communist-adjacent chancellors. Maybe it took a little terrorism to make the Hun get snappy.