President Donald Trump reacted Wednesday with a degree of bemusement toward Russia’s drone incursion into Poland, a NATO member that Trump has previously vowed to defend amid heightened tensions with Moscow.
“What’s with Russia violating Poland’s airspace with drones?” Trump asked in a short post on Truth Social. “Here we go!”
The brief mention of the incident — and the vague suggestion of continued fallout — came as US officials were digesting the overnight events, when more than a dozen Russian drones entered Polish airspace, spurring a response from NATO to scramble fighter jets to shoot them down.
The incident amounted to a striking escalation of Russia’s conflict in neighboring Ukraine, which Trump has sought unsuccessfully to end. Twenty-six days after his high-profile meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Alaska, there appears to be little progress toward ending the war.
Amid growing frustration with Putin, Trump has said he’s ready to apply new sanctions on Moscow, but hasn’t detailed what measures he’s considering. And, so far, he hasn’t applied any new punishments beyond an additional trade penalty on India over its transactions with Russia.
Trump spoke Wednesday afternoon with Poland President Karol Nawrocki, according to a statement the Polish leader posted on social media. “Today’s talks confirmed allied unity,” he said.
Nawrocki was expected to discuss faster and additional deployment of assets with Trump, a Polish official told CNN ahead of the call.
Among the assets Poland could specifically request is a US Patriot battery to be deployed on the Polish-Ukrainian border. The US redeployed the battery that had been at Rzeszów, and the one currently operating there is German, the official noted.
Poland is also waiting for its purchase of F-35s. The initial four are due to arrive in January, but there is a hope that their delivery could possibly be expedited.
Poland would like to see deployment combined with some sort of economic tools, the official said, adding that they are eagerly waiting to find out what Trump’s “here we go” post means. The official noted the EU is ready to go with an additional sanctions package.
Trump last week hosted Nawrocki in the Oval Office, where the US leader pledged his continued support for Poland, and even said he’d be open to sending additional US troops to the country amid questions of his commitment to an American military presence along NATO’s eastern flank.
“We’ll put more there if they want,” Trump said during that meeting. “But they’ve long wanted to have a larger presence. We have some countries that have more — not too many. But no, they’ll be staying in Poland. We’re very much aligned with Poland.”
Later, Trump said the US was “with Poland all the way, and we will help Poland protect itself.”
What that means after Russia’s drone incursion, however, remains unclear.
Notably, Gen. Keith Kellogg, Trump’s special envoy for Ukraine, was enroute to Poland when the Russian drone incursion occurred, according to a source familiar with his travel. He is expected to continue traveling on to Ukraine in the coming days, another source said.
The operation overnight marked the first time that shots were fired by NATO since the start of the war in Ukraine. Polish and Dutch jets intercepted the drones, with assistance from Italian, German and NATO’s multinational forces, officials said.
Poland has invoked Article 4 of NATO, meaning the alliance’s main political decision-making body will now meet to discuss the situation and its next steps. The Polish official noted that Article 4 invocation has only been effective when backed up immediately by deployment.
Prime Minister Donald Tusk spoke with the leaders of France and the UK on Wednesday, both of whom said their countries are ready to supply additional help to Poland, the Polish official said. It’s unclear if this would be provided individually or as part of a broader framework with the US.
Before Russia’s drone incursion in Poland, Trump on Tuesday discussed potential new sanctions on Moscow with European officials, who were visiting Washington to discuss ways to increase economic pressure on Putin to end the war.
In the meeting, Trump called on Europe to increase tariffs on purchasers of Russian energy — namely, China and India — to up to 100%, according to people familiar with the conversation. The meetings included officials from the White House, State Department and the office of the US Trade Representative, the people said.
Europe’s top sanctions envoy, David O’Sullivan, was among those in Washington, and he discussed potential additional measures on Moscow with officials at the US Treasury Department.
Trump said Sunday he was prepared to apply new sanctions on Russia, adding that he expected to speak soon with Putin.
On Tuesday, he said that conversation may occur “this week or early next week.”
This story has been updated with new reporting.
CNN’s Zachary Cohen and Kylie Atwood contributed to this report.
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