German Frigate Fires and Misses on American Drone

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The German frigate Hessen, which was deployed to the Red Sea as part of an EU mission, mistakenly fired on an American drone earlier this week, the German Defense Ministry said on Wednesday.

Berlin had previously disclosed the Hessen's first successful engagement, in which the vessel shot down two Houthi drones within 15 minutes of one another on Tuesday.

On Monday evening, however, the frigate used two SM-2 missiles to target an unidentified drone, but both failed to hit the target, according to German Defense Ministry spokesman Michael Stempfle.

"The case was resolved in the sense that it was not a hostile drone, which only became clear afterwards," Stempfle said.

Defense Minister Boris Pistorius confirmed Stempfle's statement while visiting a military base in Bavaria on Wednesday evening, telling reporters that there had been an incident "in which shots were fired, but no one was hit."

According to the German military blog Augen geradeaus, the US-made missiles failed for "technical reasons," which prompted the Hessen to use its 76mm main gun to engage the Houthi drones on Tuesday. The German warship then used short-range RAM missiles to shoot down another Houthi drone on Wednesday morning.

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