WOHYN, Poland — Poland said Wednesday that several Russian drones entered its territory over the course of many hours and were shot down with help from NATO allies, describing the incursion as an act of aggression carried out during a wave of Russian strikes on Ukraine.
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 believe that the incursion amounted to an intentional escalation by Russia of its war on Ukraine - and that it must be met with a strong response.
Poland said some of the drones came from Belarus, where Russian and Belarusian troops have begun gathering for war games starting on Friday.
Polish airspace has been violated many times since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, but there has been nothing on this scale in Poland or anywhere else on NATO territory. A spokesman said it was the first time the alliance has confronted a potential threat in its airspace.
NATO met to discuss the incident, which came three days after Russia’s largest aerial attack on Ukraine since the war began.
“Russia’s war is escalating, not ending,” European Union foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said.
“What (Russian President Vladimir) Putin wants to do is to test us” she later told reporters in Brussels. “What happened in Poland is a game changer” and it should result in stronger sanctions.
The extent of the incursion was still becoming clear: Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk told parliament 19 violations were recorded over seven hours, but that information was still being gathered. Nine crash sites have been found, Polish authorities said, and some were hundreds of kilometers from the border. Dutch fighter jets came to Poland’s aid and intercepted some drones, the Netherlands’ defense minister said.
“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.”
Tusk told parliament that the first violation came at approximately 11:30 p.m. Tuesday and the last around 6:30 a.m. on Wednesday. He said that the 19 violations recorded so far were “not the final data.” 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.
Russia’s Defense Ministry said that 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 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 TVP Info. The roof was severely damaged but no one was hurt.
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 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 at a pre-planned meeting on Wednesday. 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 wasn’t yet enough evidence to say it was an attack on a NATO member.
But many European leaders, including those in the Baltic states of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia that are the NATO members most nervous about Russian aggression, expressed deep concern.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, meanwhile, 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.”
U.S. President Donald Trump has not yet made any public comments about the incursion. He is set to speak on 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 by Russia.
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.
Meanwhile, Ukraine’s 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 injured, while several homes and businesses were damaged, according to local officials.
The Russian Defense Ministry said in its morning report on 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.
Ciobanu reported from Warsaw, Poland, Novikov reported from Kyiv, Ukraine. AP 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.
Follow AP’s coverage of the war in Ukraine at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine