Europe prepares for WW3: Now Germany reveals plans to mobilise nationwide defence and 800,000 NATO troops after Kremlin nuke risk – as US broadcasts new weapon Kyiv can use to cease Russia after permitting long-range missile strikes

European nations are gearing up for an all-out war on the continent as Ukraine launched US-made missiles into Russia for the first time and Vladimir Putin officially lowered the threshold for Moscow to consider a nuclear strike.

Germany‘s foreign minister yesterday vowed her country ‘will not be intimidated’ by Putin, just one day after German media revealed the nation will transform into a NATO staging ground if the conflict to the East should escalate.

According to a 1,000-page document entitled ‘Operationsplan Deutschland’, Germany would reportedly host hundreds of thousands of troops from NATO countries and serve as a logistics hub for sending huge quantities of military equipment, food and medicine toward the front.

The German army is also instructing companies and civilians on how to protect key infrastructure and mobilise for national defence, envisaging a situation in which Russia expands drone flights, spying operations and sabotage attacks across Europe.

Businesses have been advised to create crisis plans detailing employee responsibilities during emergencies and will be instructed to stockpile diesel generators or install wind turbines to ensure energy independence.

Germany’s preparation follows examples set by Nordic countries, where pamphlets and emails have already been sent to millions of homes with advice on seeking shelter, stockpiling supplies and rudimentary military training.

Finland reminded its citizens of their ‘national defence obligation’ and recently launched a new information website, while Sweden laid out a detailed guide on how to seek shelter and what to do in case of a nuclear attack.

Their instruction manuals follow similar advice issued by their Baltic neighbours Norway and Denmark, which both put out checklists for food and medicine supplies citizens should have ready.

Meanwhile, the US is set to provide Ukraine’s army with shipments of landmines to slow the advance of Russian ground troops as Putin’s forces wear down Ukrainian defensive lines in Donetsk.

Officials in Washington confirmed late last night that American anti-personnel mines would be sent to Ukraine on the proviso the punishing weapons are only used to repel Russian attacks on Ukrainian territory.

Putin yesterday signed off on an updated version of the Kremlin’s nuclear doctrine that broadens the scope for Moscow to turn to its fearsome atomic arsenal on the same day that US-made missiles rained down on Russian soil. 

The new document, first announced in September, allows Putin’s strategic forces to deploy their devastating weapons if Russia or Belarus is threatened by a non-nuclear nation supported by a nuclear power.

Threats that could warrant a nuclear response from Russia’s leadership include an attack with conventional missiles, drones or other aircraft, according to the updated document. 

Ukraine’s strike on an ammunition depot in Russia’s Bryansk region yesterday with US-supplied ATACMS (Army Tactical Missile System) meets these criteria, with Moscow saying that it marks a ‘new phase of the Western war’.

‘This is, of course, a signal that they want to escalate,’ Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov said, while foreign intelligence chief Sergei Naryshkin said attempts by NATO countries to facilitate Ukrainian missile strikes deep inside Russia ‘would not go unpunished’.

But Ukraine’s foreign ministry issued a defiant statement in spite of the Kremlin’s nuclear sabre-rattling, declaring that ‘Ukraine will never submit to the occupiers and the Russian military will be punished for violating international law’.

‘We need peace through strength, not appeasement,’ the ministry added, as Volodymyr Zelensky called on Kyiv‘s allies to ‘force’ Moscow into a ‘just peace’ and vowed his troops would ‘never surrender’.

The US provision of ATACMS to Ukraine for strikes in Russia along with shipments of anti-personnel mines suggests the Biden administration is scrambling to leave Ukraine on the best possible footing ahead of Donald Trump‘s return to the White House.

In Eastern Ukraine, Russia’s forces are steadily grinding towards the logistics hub of Pokrovsk having taken large swathes of territory in the Donetsk region in recent months.

Putin’s army took 185 square miles of Ukrainian territory in October, a record since the first weeks of the conflict in March 2022, according to an analysis of data provided by the real-time conflict tracker from the Institute for the Study of War.

There are mounting concerns that Trump could push for a hasty ceasefire requiring Ukraine to cede significant portions of its territory – a prospect that leaves both sides fighting to capture as much land as possible to strengthen their position ahead of negotiations.

Russia’s threats were also dismissed by German foreign minister Annalena Baerbock yesterday.

Speaking in Poland at a meeting of EU foreign ministers marking the 1000th day of war in Ukraine, Baerbock said of Putin’s aggression: ‘He didn’t just start doing this 1,000 days ago. He started back in 2014.

‘Germany in particular made the mistake back then, especially politically, of allowing itself to be intimidated by this fear and, above all, not listening to its partners – especially our Eastern European partners who made it clear at the time: We must not rely on promises from the Kremlin.

‘We must invest in our own security and protection,’ she concluded. 

The ‘Operationsplan Deutschland’, details of which were first released by Frankfurter Allegmeine, appear central to the German government’s contingency plan to prepare the country for war. 

German Lieutenant Colonel and Head of Hamburg State Command Jörn Plischke is one staunch advocate of the need to prepare for a possible war in Europe and has embarked on a drive to ‘shake up’ Germany’s industrial and agricultural sectors.

Speaking at a meeting at the Hamburg Chamber of Commerce, the Colonel declared companies in these sectors must train five extra truck drivers per hundred employees.

‘Seventy per cent of truckers on German roads are Eastern Europeans,’ Plischke said. ‘If there’s a war there, where will they be?’

He went on to implore companies to ensure they are self-sufficient by securing alternate energy sources and stockpiling supplies.

Meanwhile, NATO is holding its largest-ever artillery exercise just 70 miles from the border where the British Army is testing what military chiefs have described as a ‘game-changing’ weapon.

Finland, which joined the military alliance last year, is hosting up to 3,600 soldiers from 28 nations for the exercise, known as Dynamic Front.

Live fire drills began on Sunday in the northern Lapland region, and are part of a series of exercises, with further ones planned in Estonia, Germany, Romania and Poland.

The British Army is using the opportunity to put its Archer 155-mm guns to the test, weapons which can release high explosive shells or GPS-guided munitions and hit targets 30 miles away.

The guns have been labelled a battlefield game-changer by British troops, with Major Barney Ingram telling the i newspaper that ‘you can, realistically, with this capability, neutralise most targets’.

Meanwhile, Sir Keir Starmer yesterday offered his biggest hint yet that No. 10 would authorise Ukraine to fire UK Storm Shadow missiles into Russia on the same day that US ATACMS struck Russian targets. 

Speaking at the G20 summit in Brazil, the British Prime Minister said: ‘I’ve been doubling down in my clear message that we need to ensure Ukraine has what is needed for as long as needed to win this war against Putin.

‘I am not going to go into operational details. You would not expect me to. The only winner in that would be Putin and it would undermine Ukraine.’ 

He added that the rhetoric currently coming from Russia was ‘irresponsible’ and would not deter the UK’s response.  

Zelenksy’s plea to use UK Storm Shadow missiles on targets in Russia has so far been rebuffed by Downing Street for fears of escalating the conflict. 

A senior defence source said the UK prefers to ‘confirm by use’, for example, when a missile strikes.

But it is expected the restrictions will soon be relaxed after the US permitted Ukraine to strike Russia with ATACMS. 

The White House’s previous reluctance to authorise strikes on Russian soil with Western weaponry was thought to be the main obstacle preventing the UK from greenlighting the use of Storm Shadow missiles, given that the projectiles contain US-made components and often rely on targeting data provided by Washington.  

Following the ATACMS strike in Bryansk early yesterday, Moscow’s emergency ministry announced it had begun mass-producing mobile bomb shelters that can protect against shockwaves and radiation from a nuclear blast.

The new ‘KUB-M’ shelters will offer protection for 54 people for up to two days against natural and man-made hazards, Moscow’s emergency ministry has said.

‘The mobile shelter is a multifunctional structure that provides protection for people from various threats, including natural disasters and man-made accidents,’ its research institute explained, calling it ‘an important step towards improving the safety of citizens’. 

They can easily be transported on a truck and connected to water supplies, and can also be deployed in Russia’s vast northern permafrost, it added. 

In anticipation of Ukraine receiving permission to use ATACMS, Russia’s air force is said to have redeployed many of its fighter jets and strategic bomber aircraft away from the airbases in range of the missiles to sites further east.

But there are still more than 200 military facilities that could be battered by the US-manufactured munitions from positions along the 800-mile-long frontline.

Among the first likely targets for Ukrainian strikes could be the Kuzminka Military Base, a critical staging area for Putin’s forces between the Russian city of Rostov-on-Don and the Ukrainian border which acts as a hub for vehicle storage, troop assembly and operational planning.

Russia’s 381st artillery regiment is also located close to the Kuzminka base along with several logistics centres.

Meanwhile, in Kursk, Kyiv’s troops could seek to target the headquarters of Russia’s 448th Missile Brigade or regional assembly points used to gather troops preparing to push back the Ukrainian incursion in the region.

Targeting these sites could cripple Russian logistics, command, and combat support, significantly reducing Moscow’s offensive capabilities in occupied Ukrainian territory​ and harming efforts to retake territory in Kursk.

However, the overall supply of ATACMS missiles to Ukraine is short, so US officials and analysts have questioned whether allowing Ukraine to use the weapons systems is really worth it given the potential consequences that could ensue.

Jennifer Kavanagh, director of military analysis at the Defense Priorities think tank, was critical of the Biden administration’s decision to approve the use of ATACMS on targets in Russia.

‘Expanding Ukraine’s ability to launch offensive strikes with Western weapons inside Russia will not alter the trajectory of the war or help Kyiv gain an advantage against a better equipped and more resilient adversary.

‘Any escalation could reverberate on Ukraine itself. With the Biden administration on its way out and the incoming Trump administration indicating an intention to end the war, Putin has little incentive to act with restraint in his retaliation toward Kyiv.’

But proponents of the policy say that even a few strikes deeper inside Russia would force its military to change deployments and expend more of its resources.

George Barros, leader of the Russia team and GEOINT team at ISW that compiled the list of targets, sought to highlight the way in which ATACMS could impact Putin’s troops and campaigned for the Biden administration to allow strikes beyond Kursk as a result.

‘Reminder that there are hundreds of valid, legal, legitimate, and operationally consequential military targets in range of Ukrainian ATACMS,’ he wrote.

‘The Biden Administration’s shift to allow ATACMS use in Russia is a good thing.’

Matthew Savill, the director of military sciences at the Royal United Services Institute, said of Ukraine’s ATACMS attacks: ‘Many of the best targets – helicopters and glide-bomb armed aircraft attacking Ukrainian cities and troops in the north or in Kursk have largely moved to airbases outside the range of ATACMS.

‘This still leaves plenty of opportunities to strike military headquarters and ammunition or supply locations supporting Russian and North Korean troops, but this would be a reduced impact from when the Ukrainians first requested these weapons.’