The project to transform the hub into a military production site immediately encountered robust opposition
Pula – The Scoglio Olivi (Uljanik) shipyard in Pula, Croatia, is close to a strategic conversion of its production cycle, marking a potential turning point after about seven years of industrial paralysis and bankrupt management. The rumors were recently confirmed by sources close to the management and relaunched by major national media: the historic industrial facility is set to radically change its century-old vocation, shifting from traditional civilian shipbuilding to the specialized production of war materiel. The reconfiguration directly responds to the changed European geopolitical scenario, which has triggered a growing and systematic demand for armaments and military equipment among member states and NATO partners. In recent weeks, in fact, the port has hosted technical visits by delegations from the Croatian Ministry of Defense, accompanied by representatives of potential foreign industrial partners. The goal of the assessments was to ascertain the feasibility of starting, at the Pula site, the construction of light-tonnage warships, the assembly of complex logistical equipment, and the supply of other specific materials intended to support the continent’s war industry. Pula’s advanced geographical position, combined with the presence of pre-existing port infrastructure and large industrial sheds, make the Scoglio Olivi site particularly interesting and ready for a use of high strategic value.
The project to transform the hub into a military production site immediately encountered robust opposition. The mayor of Pula, Pedja Grbin, expressed a firm and articulated opposition. While acknowledging the priority need to ensure a stable employment future for the hundreds of workers historically linked to the shipyard, Grbin categorically rejected arms production as a sustainable solution for long-term economic revival. The mayor emphasized that Pula is a “city of peace” with a rooted maritime and tourist tradition, not a military one, and warned that such a conversion will distort the international image built by the city, founded on pillars of culture, dialogue, and hospitality. According to Grbin’s statements, transforming the main production center into a potential strategic target for purely short-term economic reasons would be tantamount to making a “historical error” and would nullify the multi-year efforts aimed at the tourist and environmental revival of the port area. To these institutional reservations are added the widespread concerns raised by civil society and numerous pacifist associations active in the area. These organizations explicitly fear that the establishment of a strategically relevant arms production facility could make the city a primary target in potential crisis or conflict scenarios, definitively compromising any other prospect for economic development not directly related to the defense sector. The groups have already formalized the announcement of public demonstrations and large-scale signature collections to attempt to block the project’s implementation. Despite the decided local opposition, the conversion proposal enjoys solid political support from the government majority.
Prominent figures, such as the Istrian deputy Anton Kliman, affiliated with the HDZ party of Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic, strenuously defend the initiative as the only concrete opportunity for the reindustrialization of the area, foreseeing the creation of hundreds of new skilled jobs and significant investments aimed at modernizing the infrastructure. Their position is centered on a political and industrial realism: “Better a live shipyard, even if its activity is military, than a condition of abandoned ruins and chronic unemployment”. The official status of these strategic moves is expected in the short term: the shareholders’ meeting of Scoglio Olivi, convened extraordinarily for October 17, has in fact on its agenda the discussion on the expansion of its corporate purpose and production towards the military sector. The outcome of this meeting will be decisive for definitively sealing the future of the major industrial symbol of the city of Pula.
