A Love Letter To Kharkiv, As Russian Troops Advance
This article is part of TPM Cafe, TPM’s home for opinion and news analysis. It was first published by the author as a thread on Twitter.
On Wednesday, the intelligence community warned that Putin’s war plans could include a major attack on Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second largest city. By Thursday morning, multiple media outlets captured video of explosions near the city as Russian President Vladimir Putin declared war on Ukraine.
The city appears to be one of the primary targets of Putin’s renewed invasion — and it’s a city I love and am deeply worried about, having spent a year working in its archives for my doctoral research. So I wanted to share some thoughts on the Kharkiv I know: a dynamic, multi-ethnic metropolis of 1.4 million, located just 40 kilometers from the Ukraine-Russia border.