NATO allies issue chilling warning about ‘war’ in Europe

Prime Minister Donald Tusk of Poland, a key U.S. ally in NATO, issued a chilling warning Friday about war in Europe.

Tusk spoke about the Russia-Ukraine war in comments to several European news organizations. “I don’t want to scare anyone, but war is no longer a concept of the past. It is a reality and it started more than two years ago,” he said in his remarks, reported by the BBC.

Tusk’s remarks came days after a Russian cruise missile fired toward western Ukraine entered Polish airspace, Warsaw’s military said.

Tusk warned that the next two years of the Russia-Ukraine war will be crucial for Europe’s future, describing the current era as “the most critical since the end of World War II.”

“I know this sounds devastating, especially for the younger generation, but we have to mentally get used to the arrival of a new era, the pre-war era,” he said. Told.

newsweek NATO was contacted for comment via email.

The war against Ukraine, launched by Russian President Vladimir Putin in February 2022, has sparked fears that a broader conflict could erupt in Europe. The Russo-Ukrainian war has significantly increased tensions between Moscow and other European countries, with most EU member states taking Kiev’s side. Western countries have provided significant military and humanitarian aid to the Ukrainian people, but this has prevented the Russian military from reaping any real benefits.

The war is largely confined to eastern Ukraine, including Donbass. Although President Putin has said that the purpose of the invasion was to “liberate” some of these areas from the Ukrainian government, many observers see the war as an attempt to control all of Ukraine. There is. In 2014, Russia captured Crimea from the Ukrainians, a prelude to its 2022 invasion.

The missile’s entry into Polish airspace is just the latest incident to raise fears of a wider conflict. “Among other things, Polish and allied aviation has been activated,” the Polish military said in a statement posted on social media. This “could lead to an increase in noise levels, especially in the southeast of the country,” Warsaw said in a separate post on X (formerly Twitter).

Concerns about the spillover of the conflict in Ukraine to neighboring countries are drawing attention to Article 5 of NATO, which states that an attack on one NATO member state, such as Poland, “will be considered an attack on all allies.”

This means that an attack on a NATO member state is expected to provoke a response from other countries, including military action.

Similar concerns arose in early March after a Russian missile landed just 500 feet from a convoy transporting the Greek prime minister and the Ukrainian president.

On Thursday, Elbridge Colby, a former assistant secretary of defense for strategy and force development in the Trump administration, said Russia poses a “serious threat” to NATO members in Eastern Europe.