>> I wonder how much of the green movement of that era was supported by the Soviets, who had obvious motives for undermining nuclear research in the West. I could be that even long after the USSR has been wiped away that its influence remains.
> Don't think so. Taking Germany as an example, many people joined these movements after the country was in large parts affected (to this day actually) by the nuclear fallout of the disaster in Chernobyl.
I don't think those things are mutually exclusive. It's quite conceivable the Soviets supported a seed, which sprouted once Chernobyl created the right conditions for it to take off. It looks like the German Green party opposed nuclear power before Chernobyl and it was also infiltrated to a degree by the East German Stasi.
> In 1982 ... Those who remained in the Green party were more strongly pacifist and ... tended to identify more closely with a culture of protest and civil disobedience, frequently clashing with police at demonstrations against nuclear weapons, nuclear energy, and the construction of a new runway (Startbahn West) at Frankfurt Airport...
> Among the important political issues at the time was the deployment of Pershing II IRBMs and nuclear-tipped cruise missiles by the U.S. and NATO on West German soil, generating strong opposition in the general population that found an outlet in mass demonstrations. The newly formed party was able to draw on this popular movement to recruit support. Partly due to the impact of the Chernobyl disaster in 1986, and to growing awareness of the threat of air pollution and acid rain to German forests (Waldsterben), the Greens increased their share of the vote to 8.3% in the 1987 federal election....
> The Greens were the target of attempts by the East German secret police to enlist the cooperation of members who were willing to align the party with the agenda of the German Democratic Republic. The party ranks included several politicians who were later discovered to have been Stasi agents, including Bundestag representative Dirk Schneider, European Parliament representative Brigitte Heinrich, and Red Army Faction defense lawyer Klaus Croissant. Greens politician and Bundestag representative Gert Bastian was also a founding member of Generals for Peace [de], a pacifist group created and funded by the Stasi, the revelation of which may have contributed to the murder-suicide in which he killed his partner and Greens founder Petra Kelly.[11] A study commissioned by the Greens determined that 15 to 20 members intimately cooperated with the Stasi and another 450 to 500 had been informants.[12][13]
> Don't think so. Taking Germany as an example, many people joined these movements after the country was in large parts affected (to this day actually) by the nuclear fallout of the disaster in Chernobyl.
I don't think those things are mutually exclusive. It's quite conceivable the Soviets supported a seed, which sprouted once Chernobyl created the right conditions for it to take off. It looks like the German Green party opposed nuclear power before Chernobyl and it was also infiltrated to a degree by the East German Stasi.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alliance_90/The_Greens#1980s:_...:
> In 1982 ... Those who remained in the Green party were more strongly pacifist and ... tended to identify more closely with a culture of protest and civil disobedience, frequently clashing with police at demonstrations against nuclear weapons, nuclear energy, and the construction of a new runway (Startbahn West) at Frankfurt Airport...
> Among the important political issues at the time was the deployment of Pershing II IRBMs and nuclear-tipped cruise missiles by the U.S. and NATO on West German soil, generating strong opposition in the general population that found an outlet in mass demonstrations. The newly formed party was able to draw on this popular movement to recruit support. Partly due to the impact of the Chernobyl disaster in 1986, and to growing awareness of the threat of air pollution and acid rain to German forests (Waldsterben), the Greens increased their share of the vote to 8.3% in the 1987 federal election....
> The Greens were the target of attempts by the East German secret police to enlist the cooperation of members who were willing to align the party with the agenda of the German Democratic Republic. The party ranks included several politicians who were later discovered to have been Stasi agents, including Bundestag representative Dirk Schneider, European Parliament representative Brigitte Heinrich, and Red Army Faction defense lawyer Klaus Croissant. Greens politician and Bundestag representative Gert Bastian was also a founding member of Generals for Peace [de], a pacifist group created and funded by the Stasi, the revelation of which may have contributed to the murder-suicide in which he killed his partner and Greens founder Petra Kelly.[11] A study commissioned by the Greens determined that 15 to 20 members intimately cooperated with the Stasi and another 450 to 500 had been informants.[12][13]