The story that follows is based on dozens of interviews with #neo-Nazis, eyewitnesses, and former spies, and hundreds of pages of #Stasi files and court records. It is the story of how, more than thirty years before #Putin ordered the invasion of #Ukraine, under the disingenuous banner of “de-Nazifying” the country, he and some of his closest intelligence associates helped nourish a neo-Nazi movement across #Germany. Their preferred tool for sowing hate and discord was Rainer Sonntag.

https://magazine.atavist.com/follow-the-leader-nazi-putin-sonntag-cold-war/ #farright #history #violence #dresden #bautzen #prison #poland #kgb #syria #giessen #kühnen #hamburg #berlin #worch #racism #leipzig #hoyerswerda #afd #pegida

Follow the Leader

In the waning days of the Cold War, Rainer Sonntag helped fuel a neo-Nazi movement that still plagues Germany today. He was also a Communist spy—and worked for Vladimir Putin.