Consulate General of the United States, Frankfurt

U.S. Consulate General Frankfurt in 2008, at which the memorial ceremony of September 11 attacks was taking place.

The Consulate General of the United States in Frankfurt am Main represents the interests of the United States government in Frankfurt, Germany and nearby surrounding areas. It is the United States' largest Consulate General, and is larger, in terms of both personnel and facilities, than many U.S. Embassies. Technically a part of Mission Germany, and reporting through the Embassy of the United States in Berlin, The Frankfurt CG operates with a significant degree of autonomy when compared to other U.S. Consulates. This is due in part to several large U.S. government regional centers housed within the Consulate, which provide support in the areas of security, construction, and financial matters to a number of other U.S Diplomatic posts located throughout Europe, the Middle East and Africa.

In 2006 The Frankfurt CG relocated most all of its operations to a single facility - a former hospital, once operated by the U.S military, and before that by the German military during World War II. The refurbished and now modified building is quite large and expansive. The Frankfurt Consular district covers the German states of Hesse, Rhineland-Palatinate, Baden-Württemberg, and Saarland.

Use by intelligence agencies

In March 2017 a series of documents, referred to as Vault 7, released by WikiLeaks revealed that the US government uses the consulate as a base for cyber operations. This diplomatic representation was known to be the largest US consulate worldwide, in terms of both personnel and facilities, and has played a prominent role in the US government's intelligence architecture for years. The intelligence personnel including CIA agents, NSA spies, military secret service personnel, the US Department of Homeland Security employees and the Secret Service employees are working in the building complex with high walls and barbed wire in the north of the city. In a radius of about 40 kilometers around Frankfurt, the Americans had also established a dense network of outposts and shell companies in Frankfurt. WikiLeaks documents reveal the Frankfurt hackers, part of the Center for Cyber Intelligence Europe (CCIE), were given cover identities and diplomatic passports to obfuscate customs officers to gain entry to Germany.[1][2] The CIA station, in the consulate, is said to also collect Iranian intelligence in Europe, surveil on Iranian officials and target possible defectors who work in Iran’s nuclear weapons program.[3]

References

  1. ↑ Cody Derespina (7 March 2017). "WikiLeaks releases 'entire hacking capacity of the CIA'". Fox News. Retrieved 7 March 2017.
  2. ↑ John Goetz, Frederik Obermaier: (8)Frankfurter US-Konsulat soll Spionagezentrale sein - Politik, Süddeutsche Zeitung, 7 March 2017
  3. ↑ Walcott, John; Shalal, Andrea (Mar 8, 2017). "U.S. officials aware of CIA security breach in 2016, say WikiLeaks papers authentic". Reuters. Retrieved 8 March 2017.

Coordinates: 50°08′29″N 8°41′37″E / 50.14139°N 8.69361°E / 50.14139; 8.69361


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