A pair of red double-decker train cars still sit proudly in the yard of a factory in Görlitz, along Germany’s eastern border. They will be gone soon.
After 175 years making train cars, the Alstom factory is changing hands and shifting to produce tank parts. It is a small but illustrative step in Germany’s abrupt turn toward rearmament, spurred by fears of Russian advancement and an American pullback of security guarantees.
That does not mean that people in town are happy about it. But they say they’d be more unhappy with having no work at all.
The town’s ambivalent embrace to the factory makeover is a reflection of Germans’ conflicting feelings about the combination of a more threatening security environment and tougher economy.
Görlitz sits in a hard-pressed region of former East Germany where antiwar sentiment runs strong, along with sympathy for Russia. In elections this year, almost half of voters backed the far-right Alternative for Germany, or AfD, which openly courts Moscow and opposes supporting Ukraine.
But the town, workers and even the local AfD leaders have grudgingly accepted the new factory. With well-paying jobs scarce and economic frustration abundant, many vocal critics of the arms industry have made peace with the business of war.
Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.
Thank you for your patience while we verify access.
Already a subscriber? Log in.
Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
The post In Germany’s Depressed East, Tanks Are the Lesser of Two Evils appeared first on New York Times.
