This is very, very bad news.

U.S., Germans Fear Imminent Terror Attack

My sister informed me of this not long after she and her husband went back to Germany after taking leave here in the States a couple of months ago. We’re to keep it quiet from my mom. But the perceived threat level is one thing when they tell the affected personnel and their dependents; it reaches a new high when it starts to appear in U.S. news reports.

U.S. and German officials fear terrorists are in the advanced planning stages of an attack on U.S. military personnel or tourists in Germany.

. . .

“The information behind the threat is very real,” a senior U.S. official told ABC News.

German Interior Minister Wolfgang Schauble told reporters, “The danger level is high. We are part of the global threat by Islamist terrorism.”

Of particular concern, according to U.S. and German law enforcement officials, is Patch Barracks, the headquarters for U.S. European Command, near Stuttgart.

Security at all U.S. military and diplomatic facilities has been increased in the last month following reports that suspected terrorists had conducted surveillance of the Patch Barracks facility.

Emphasis added because that’s where my sister and her husband, a specialist in the Army, live. The place I visited in December and January. Holy shit!

This sounds a little better, but I think it could also be a lot of obfuscation, too:

A spokesperson at Patch Barracks said they were not aware of any specific surveillance on the location, and they are not under any more specific surveillance than other U.S. facilities in Germany. “As a response to the U.S. Embassy Berlin’s recent warden message, all U.S. military installations in Germany are urged to exercise increased viligance,” they said in a statement to ABC News.

I remember while there my brother-in-law saying it was stupid that they’d just put out erected a big stone slab announcing to everyone that Patch was the headquarters of EUCOM.

What a bad week.

[Via Captain’s Quarters]