Essay by Eric Worrall

Greens are claiming for once it wasn’t them.

Germany: Police suspect Russia behind car vandalism

Matt Ford with AFP, dpa02/05/2025February 5, 2025

A criminal campaign which saw over 270 car exhausts stuffed with expanding construction foam is suspected to have been Russian sabotage aimed at discrediting the Green Party, according to German authorities.

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What we know about the car vandalism

Over 270 vehicles in Berlin and the surrounding state of Brandenburg, as well as in the southern states of Bavaria and Baden-Württemberg, had their exhaust pipes blocked with expanding construction foam.

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Stickers were then left on the damaged cars depicting Vice-Chancellor Robert Habeck, the Green Party’s chancellor candidate in the upcoming federal election, and bearing the message: “Be greener!”

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Prosecutors in the southern city of Ulm also have four suspects in their sights. A police spokesman said four men – a German, a Serb, a Romanian and a Bosnian aged 17, 18, 20 and 29 – were suspected of 123 counts of vandalism, with tins of construction foam found during house searches.

One of the men claimed that he and his accomplices had been contacted and commissioned to carry out the attacks by a Russian using the chat messenger Viber. He said they had received detailed instructions and had been promised €100 ($104) for every damaged vehicle.

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Read more: https://www.dw.com/en/germany-police-suspect-russia-behind-car-vandalism/a-71517942

For once I believe the greens – the vehicle sabotage wasn’t deadly enough to be an act of green activism.

Filling the exhaust with expanding foam would simply stop the vehicle from starting.

Previous green acts of sabotage have been far worse, mostly involving slow deflation of tires – a grave risk to the safety and lives of drivers who failed to notice their tires were losing pressure. Greens claimed they always left a flier explaining what they did – but even if this is true, is reading junk fliers really a priority when you are struggling to get to work, or get the kids to school? Especially if the flier was soaked by rain. It is a wonder that nobody died.

The other piece of evidence which supports the Russian theory, how many greens know what expanding foam is, and where to buy it? Only people who have ever tried to repair a hole in a wall or do honest work with their hands know what expanding foam is. I find it difficult to imagine a green activist fixing a hole in a wall with their own hands, more likely they would organise a rent strike until the landlord fixed the hole.

Interesting times we live in.

Note the type of expanding foam used by the saboteurs was probably the disposable spray can type, not the industrial scale insulation gun in the picture at the top of this article.