Now we hear from Irene Mihalic, who played Germany's interior minister.

At what point should we as the blue team have acted differently to prevent the corridor from being established in the first place? That's the key question.

But she also raises a broader question: How realistic would such a surprise attack be outside a war game? In the real world, she argues, NATO would almost certainly have detected the movement of 12,000 Russian troops long before they crossed the border.

My sense is that in the real world, someone would have noticed.

We would have had the full machinery of government behind us, the foreign office, the interior ministry, the chancellory, all with their agencies, advisors, and analysts.

They would have given us a much clearer picture of what was happening, and probably put us in a very different position to respond.

The interior minister is worried that the Kremlin's narrative is beginning to take hold.

If you look at how this appears from the outside, Russia agreed to a ceasefire in Ukraine.

It presents its military operation as a humanitarian corridor.

It talks about NATO aggression and claims it has no choice but to protect civilian ships with military escorts.

It spreads stories about so-called Russophobic actions by the West, and the United States, NATO, and the European Union appear extremely restrained.

If something goes wrong now, we end up looking like the aggressor.

I don't, I don't think we're doing enough in the information space.

When push comes to shove, the state will be there for you with firm, concrete, reliable measures that ensure people get through this crisis."

The discussion then turns to another question: Would additional sanctions have any impact on Russia? The interior minister raises the issue with the chancellor.

We urgently need to discuss measures that could actually put pressure on Russia, and that brings me back to the question of frozen assets.

What do we do about them, and what additional sanctions should we impose?

I'm somewhat lacking the imagination as to what further sanctions we should come up with, given that the ones that we have put in place so far haven't yielded the desired effect.

That's exactly why I brought up the frozen Russian assets.

I know this isn't without controversy within our own coalition.

No, it really isn't.

Perhaps you should ask your own party about that.

In the simulation, the role is played by Irene Mihalic, a member of parliament from the Green Party.

Thank you, Mr.

Chancellor.

I would like to point out that we are currently under attack.

The cyber attack on the central IT provider of Germany's saving banks targets critical infrastructure.

In my view, we need to determine whether the server outage is affecting not only the online banking of millions of customers and roughly a third of ATMs, but also potentially our broader economic capacity.

Because when people stand in front of an empty ATM, it unsettles them.

Securing cash reserves also falls under police powers to prevent and divert danger, and that is not something the federal government can simply order on its own.

And in many areas, Berlin cannot act alone.

I also want to point out the limits of what we can actually do at the federal level.

All of this requires coordination with the federal states.

Yes, if the legal conditions are met, then we are talking about civil protection measures.

And in that case, the federal government can issue orders.

But at this point, we do not have full authority over the states.

And that is a problem because it requires coordination.

Thank you, Mr.

Chancellor.

I would like to point out that we are currently under attack.

The cyber attack on the central IT provider of Germany's saving banks targets critical infrastructure.

In my view, we need to determine whether the server outage is affecting not only the online banking of millions of customers and roughly a third of ATMs, but also potentially our broader economic capacity.

Because when people stand in front of an empty ATM, it unsettles them.

Securing cash reserves also falls under police powers to prevent and avert danger.

And that is not something the federal government can simply order on its own.