President Trump put out a cryptic response Wednesday to news overnight that Russian drones have been shot down over Polish territory.
“What’s with Russia violating Poland’s airspace with drones?” the president wrote on Truth Social before adding: “Here we go!”
Trump spoke to Polish President Karol Nawrocki about the drone incursion on Wednesday, per a European source.
The president did not immediately say how the US would react to the strikes and whether he thought NATO’s Article 5 should be invoked.
Poland was waiting to gather intelligence from allies, including the US, and was set to hold a national security council meeting on Thursday.
Several Republicans came out in support of Warsaw, including Rep. Joe Wilson (R-SC), who called it “an act of war.”
“[W]e are grateful to NATO allies for their swift response to war criminal [Vladimir] Putin’s continued unprovoked aggression against free and productive nations,” Wilson wrote on X. “I urge President Trump to respond with mandatory sanctions that will bankrupt the Russian war machine and arm Ukraine with weapons capable of striking Russia.”
Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), who has been leading an effort to pass a bill boosting sanctions on Russia, called the attack “beyond unacceptable.”
The Russian drones flew into Polish airspace Wednesday morning and were mostly intercepted with the aid of NATO assets — the first time that the transatlantic alliance had confronted Moscow since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
One drone struck a Polish house in Lublin, destroying the roof and leaving its residents in despair, but not injured.
Polish airspace has been violated other times over the course of the war, but never to the scale of Tuesday evening.
The attack brought US and European leaders together in conversations about how NATO would react to Russia hitting a member country — as Poland sounded the alarm over the implications of the strike.
“This is the first time NATO aircrafts have engaged potential threats in Allied airspace,” the Spokesman for NATO’s Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe, Col. Martin L. O’Donnell, said.
Forces from Poland and the Netherlands responded to the attack, German Patriot missile batteries in Poland were placed on alert, and an Italian airborne early warning aircraft was launched, along with an aerial refueler from NATO’s Multinational Multi-Role Tanker Transport fleet, he added.
Other leaders warned an escalation of the European war may be imminent.
“Russia’s war is escalating, not ending,” European Union foreign policy head Kaja Kallas said in Brussels. “What [Russian President Vladimir] Putin wants to do is to test us. What happened in Poland is a game changer.”
Poland invoked Article 4 of the NATO Charter, which requests official consultations with allies on how to proceed.
Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk warned that Tuesday’s incident puts Warsaw closer to open conflict than at any point since World War II.
Tusk addressed parliament on Wednesday about the incursion, stating that 19 objects entered the country’s airspace overnight — with several already shot down — in what the military called an “unprecedented” threat.
Tusk also pointed out that some of the drones came from Belarus as the Russia-allied country has been getting ready for war games with the Kremlin.
Tusk then said he spoke to European leaders, including Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, French President Emmanuel Macron, NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte, Italian Prime Minister Georgia Meloni and UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer about the attack, in which there were proposals to protect Polish “air defense.”
Russia, meanwhile, said they were not planning to hit Poland and Moscow’s Ministry of Defense — in an unusual move — said it was willing to engage in conversation with its Polish couterparts.
The White House did not respond to inquiries from The Post.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.