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WOHYN, Poland (AP) — Multiple Russian drones crossed into Poland in what European officials described Wednesday as an deliberate provocation, causing NATO to send fighter jets to shoot them down. A NATO spokesman said it was the first time the alliance confronted a potential threat in its airspace.
The incursion, which occurred during a wave of strikes by the Kremlin on Ukraine, and the NATO response swiftly raised fears that the war could spill over — a fear that has been growing in Europe as Russia steps up its attacks and peace efforts go nowhere.
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Russia’s Defense Ministry said it did not target Poland, while Belarus, a close ally of Moscow, said it tracked some drones that “lost their course” because they were jammed.
However, several European leaders said they believed the incursion amounted to an intentional expansion of Russia’s assault against Ukraine.
“Russia’s war is escalating, not ending,” European Union foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas told reporters in Brussels. “What (Russian President Vladimir) Putin wants to do is to test us. What happened in Poland is a game changer,” and it should result in stronger sanctions.
Polish airspace has been violated many times since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, but never on this scale in Poland or anywhere else in NATO territory.
Poland said some of the drones came from Belarus, where Russian and Belarusian troops have begun gathering for war games scheduled to start Friday.
It was not immediately clear how many drones were involved. Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk told parliament 19 violations were recorded over seven hours, but he said information was still being gathered. Polish authorities said nine crash sites were found, with some of them hundreds of kilometers from the border.
“There are definitely no grounds to suspect that this was a course correction mistake or the like,” German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius told parliament. “These drones were very clearly put on this course deliberately.”
Dutch fighter jets came to Poland’s aid and intercepted some drones. Polish Foreign Minister Radek Sikorski later thanked the Dutch government “for the magnificent performance of Dutch pilots in neutralizing” the drones.
NATO met to discuss the incident, which came three days after Russia’s largest aerial attack on Ukraine since the war began.
Poland says some drones came from Belarus
Tusk told parliament that the first violation came at approximately 11:30 p.m. Tuesday and the last around 6:30 a.m. Wednesday. Earlier, Defense Minister Władysław Kosiniak-Kamysz wrote on X that more than 10 objects crossed into Polish airspace.
“What is new, in the worst sense of the word, is the direction from which the drones came. This is the first time in this war that they did not come from Ukraine as a result of errors or minor Russian provocations. For the first time, a significant portion of the drones came directly from Belarus,” Tusk said in parliament.
The Russian Defense Ministry said its overnight strikes targeted Ukraine’s military-industrial complex in the western regions of the country — which border Poland — with no planned targets on Polish territory.
In an unusual message of outreach, the ministry said it was ready to hold consultations with Poland’s Defense Ministry.
Belarusian Maj. Gen. Pavel Muraveiko, the chief of the country’s general staff and first deputy defense minister, appeared to try to put some distance between his country and the incursion.
In an online statement, he said that as Russia and Ukraine traded drone strikes overnight, Belarusian air defense forces tracked “drones that lost their course” after they were jammed, adding that Belarusian forces warned their Polish and Lithuanian counterparts about “unidentified aircraft” approaching their territory.
Drones or parts of drones were found in eight locations in Poland, according to Polish officials. At a ninth site, objects of unknown origin were found.
A house was hit in the village of Wyryki in the Lublin region near the Ukrainian border, Mayor Bernard Blaszczuk told the TVP Info television news channel. The roof was severely damaged, but no one was hurt.
Rattled NATO members vow support
NATO air defenses supported Poland in what spokesman Col. Martin O’Donnell called “the first time NATO planes have engaged potential threats in Allied airspace.” That included the Dutch F-35 fighter jets that intercepted drones, according to Defense Minister Ruben Brekelmans.
The alliance “is committed to defending every kilometer of NATO territory, including our airspace,” O’Donnell said.
Tusk told parliament consultations took place under Article 4 of the NATO treaty — a clause that allows countries to call for urgent discussions with their allies. The consultations happened Wednesday at a previously planned meeting. They do not automatically lead to any action under Article 5, which is NATO’s collective security guarantee.
Mark Lyall Grant, U.K. national security adviser from 2015 to 2017, said the incursion was obviously an escalation of Russia’s war in Ukraine, but there was not yet enough evidence to say it was an attack on a NATO member.
But many European leaders expressed deep concern, including those in the Baltic states of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia that are the NATO members most nervous about Russian aggression.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called it an “extremely dangerous precedent for Europe” and called for Russia to “feel the consequences.”
“Moscow always tests the limits of what is possible and, if it does not encounter a strong response, remains at a new level of escalation,” he said. “Not just one Shahed (drone), which could be dismissed as an accident, but at least eight attack drones that were aimed in the direction of Poland.”
By midday in Washington, U.S. President Donald Trump’s only public comments about the incursion was a short post on social media: “What’s with Russia violating Poland’s airspace with drones? Here we go!”
Trump was set to speak later Wednesday to Polish President Karol Nawrocki, according to a White House official who was not authorized to speak publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.
Phillips O’Brien, professor of strategic studies at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland, said the incident underscored the failure of NATO member states to accurately assess the threat posed by Russia and properly prepare for war.
“NATO states, even front line ones, have clearly not prepared for war of the type that is happening now,” he said in his Substack newsletter.
Poland has complained about Russian objects entering its airspace during attacks on Ukraine before.
In August, Poland’s defense minister said that a flying object that crashed and exploded in a cornfield in eastern Poland was identified as a Russian drone, and called it a provocation.
In March, Poland scrambled jets after a Russian missile briefly passed through Polish airspace on its way to a target in western Ukraine. And in 2022, a missile that was likely fired by Ukraine to intercept a Russian attack landed in Poland, killing two people.
Russian attacks hit central and western Ukraine
Meanwhile, the Ukrainian air force said Russia fired 415 strike and decoy drones, as well as 42 cruise missiles and one ballistic missile overnight.
Ukrainian air defenses intercepted or jammed 386 drones and 27 cruise missiles, according to the report.
One person was killed and at least five wounded, while several homes and businesses were damaged, according to local officials.
The Russian Defense Ministry said in its morning report Wednesday that it had destroyed 122 Ukrainian drones over various Russian regions overnight, including over the illegally annexed Crimea and areas of the Black Sea.
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Ciobanu reported from Warsaw, Poland. Novikov reported from Kyiv, Ukraine. Associated Press writers Vanessa Gera in Milan, Lorne Cook in Brussels, Mike Corder in The Hague, Netherlands, Geir Moulson in Berlin, Danica Kirka in London and Michelle L. Price in Washington contributed to this report.
