WOHYN, Poland— Multiple Russian drones crossed into Poland in what European officials described Wednesday as a 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.
Poland requested an emergency meeting of the U.N. Security Council on the drone incursion. South Korea’s U.N. Mission, which holds the council presidency this month, said the time was being discussed.
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.
