After the Obama administration accused the Russian government of hacking Democratic Party e-mails during the US presidential campaign, serious political observers are now worried that Germany will become the next focus of Moscow’s campaign to destabilise western democracies during the national elections scheduled to take placein September.

US intelligence and other western officials have now been able to trace a murky route back to Vladimir Putin’s government. The Kremlin’s aim is to undercut Putin’s liberal opponents, destabilise political systems and undermine democratic processes across the European Union and Nato. Intelligence officers stressed this was behind the hacking of the US Democratic national committee and the leaking of e-mails that embarrassed Hillary Clinton - who, for quite a while, had an antagonistic relationship with Putin - during her campaign.

The Germans have not been immune to such cowardly tactics, either. As for Putin’s reasons to infiltrate the German Parliament’s computer network last May, a renowned professor of political science in Germany, who has studied Russia’s propaganda tactics, said Putin has a very strong incentive to undermine Angela Merkel, one of the strongest supporters of the sanctions against Russia for its annexation of Crimea and the savage war in Eastern Ukraine.

Putin knows well enough that Germany is the most important power in the EU and if he can harm Germany and prevent Merkel from being successful in September’s elections by meddling in Germany’s computer networks ( as he did in the US presidential campaign to favour Donald Trump), then he would be able to triumph yet again.

Cyber attacks have no other purpose than to bring about political uncertainty. They are bullying tactics, no more and no less and that’s what is dark and disturbing.