Russia plans to strike Ukraine's NATO allies, Poland says - National Post

Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk looks on during a joint press conference with the Austrian Chancellor in Warsaw on September 17, 2026. Photo by ROLAND SCHLAGER /APA/AFP via Getty ImagesArticle contentPolish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said Russia plans to launch “hybrid-style” drone and missile strikes against nations supporting Ukraine, including NATO-member Poland, as the war enters its most crucial phase.

The Kremlin’s main goal now, as supported by evidence gathered by intelligence services, is to destroy Ukraine’s economy and logistics and weaken NATO’s resolve by attacks on its member states, Tusk said in parliament on Thursday. This is the “most likely scenario,” the premier told lawmakers ahead of his planned visit to Ukraine on Friday.

Poland, as a key transit route for aid to Ukraine, has suffered a spate of suspicious incidents, with multiple cyberattacks on public utilities like water, energy infrastructure and hospitals, and damage to the rail line between Warsaw and the Ukrainian border attributed to Russian sabotage. A Russian missile crashed in eastern Poland in late July.

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“There is a real risk that drones or other types of missiles may fly into the territory of one or more NATO countries on the eastern flank, even cause destruction,” Tusk said. Russia’s “official narrative will be that this is an accident and that there is no reason for anyone to think about any response from NATO.”

The comments were made hours before Tusk met Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Moscow has intensified attacks against Ukraine, including at targets close to the Polish border, while NATO jets shot down a drone of Russian origin over Lithuania earlier this week.

Tusk’s warnings were echoed by Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico, who said on Thursday that the security situation had never been “so serious and so tense.” He stressed that Slovakia takes its NATO commitments seriously, but that he’d do everything in his power to avoid his country being dragged into a conflict.

Fico’s position has long diverged from the NATO mainstream, as he doesn’t regard Russia as a security threat and instead advocates rapprochement with Moscow. He warned of the consequences of invoking NATO’s Article 5, which requires members to defend each other from attack, in the event of a direct conflict between NATO and Russia.