That doesn't make any sense because Russian companies are significant suppliers within the nuclear power production logistics footprint.

edit: eg. https://www.wired.com/story/the-nuclear-reactors-of-the-futu...

Money Russia gets from nuclear poewr production are miniscule comparing to money from gas/oil export. _any_ expansion of nuclear energy in Europe is against Russian agenda to be major gas/oil provider. Geramany suppose to be broker of that.

For Germany cheap Nuclear energy on central/east Europe is dangerous because cheap energy = more competitive market. Add cheaper workforce and you have very dangerous mix. Read why Bulgaria was forced to shut down majority of their reactors before joining EU. Offically it was about "security". Bulgaria with cheap nuclear energy from already built power plants and cheap workforce was too "dangerous" for old EU countries. Politics is very important when discussing energy market.

Exactly! Plus the majority of customers for Russias nuclear tech are not in the West - they are in places like Iran, Turkey, China and some smaller countries.

I would love to read more about this. Can you provide sources?

Check the sources here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_influence_on_the_peace_...

It has been claimed many times by Soviet defectors. Every defector from GRU or and high-profile officers from the KGB claimed so. It is very hard to prove, but it is so extremely serving to the USSR.

Peace meant unilateral disarmament and abandonment of nuclear technology - how convenient. Today the claims by some politicians in Europe that "aiding Ukraine prolongs the war" are a similar trope of Russian origin.

Back in the Cold War one of the policies the "Peace movement" advocated was "nuclear-free zones" in Western countries. The USSR encouraged organisations by providing funds and used its propaganda arms to aid the movement (conveniently keeping quit on its own arrangements).

> Anti-nuclear sentiment (both environmentalist and anti-nuclear weapons) was generously sponsored by the Soviet Union.

Can you back that up?

> What a surprise than nowadays the same groups are serving the interests of Russia.

It's actually the reactionary right that is supporting Russia these days.

There is barely a speech by Putin and Lavrov where they don't literally say something like "beginning of a radical breakdown of the US-style world order. This is the beginning of the transition from liberal-globalist American egocentrism"

So this is why Russia supports and is supported by all radical groups that want to change the current order - left or right.

The state it self is right-wing but you can see even anarchist organisations parroting its agenda.

Russian trolls also just stir up trouble - the same people will post extreme fake claims supposedly by BLM protesters and then right-wing conspiracy theories. They see stirring up racial and class tensions as useful because it destroys the "hypocritical liberal order" - it paralyses countries and governments so they can't do effective foreign policy.