The famous American historian Timothy Snyder has published another note about the war in Ukraine. This time, Snyder talked about the workers of the pipe rolling plant in the Ukrainian front-line city of Nikopol, who, despite constant attacks from Russia, continue to work.
Snyder reports this on Substack.
As reported, Snyder recently visited the Nikopol pipe plant in the southeast, and, according to him, the enterprise is impressive in its scale of production. About three thousand people work here, the plant produces pipes for export and continues to work even despite daily shelling. The Russians have been trying to destroy it for three years, shelling it with artillery and drones. The damage is visible on the territory, but at the same time, repairs and new security measures have been carried out.
“The situation in Nikopol is even worse, as the city is also within the artillery range. The time from the launch of an artillery shell to the impact is about seven seconds. I was constantly reminded not to fasten your seat belt - you lose those seven seconds,” Snyder writes.
He emphasizes that the civilian population remains defenseless against Russian strikes. In June 2023, after the Kakhovka Dam was blown up, the city was left without water supply, but the plant and the community have adapted and continue to work. The plant operates underground Cold War-era storage facilities and new shelters for personnel. Now a forest grows on the site of the former water reservoir. On the opposite bank, on the occupied side, you can see the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, which the Russians regularly threaten to damage. There is no Ukrainian military presence.
Old Cold War-era bomb shelters are used to protect workers, as well as new concrete shelters on the surface. In the underground rooms there are beds, chairs, bathrooms, and even a woman waiting to make tea.
The factory has a tragic record: 92 of its workers died on the front lines, and another 50 are missing. Three died directly on the factory premises as a result of Russian attacks. One of them was a crane operator who died from shrapnel wounds three weeks after the shelling.
In the factory cafeteria, Snyder chatted with the workers. They shared stories of war crimes they had witnessed and of their connections with colleagues on the front lines.
“When I asked who was attacking them – Putin? Russia? – the answer was immediate, from A.: “Fascists,” Snyder summarized.
Background
Timothy Snyder is an American historian, professor at Yale University, a specialist in the history of Central and Eastern Europe, the USSR and the Holocaust. He is a permanent fellow at the Institute for Human Sciences in Vienna. He is the author of Bloodlands: Europe Between Hitler and Stalin and On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century.
Author: Danylo Pievchev