NATO is studying the possibility of shooting down Russian missiles that come too close to its borders

A radical solution to avoid airspace violations. NATO is considering the possibility of shooting down Russian missiles that come too close to the borders of the Atlantic Alliance, said Polish Deputy Foreign Minister Andrzej Szejna on Tuesday March 26.

“Various concepts are being analyzed within NATO” since a Russian cruise missile fired towards towns in western Ukraine penetrated Polish airspace for 39 seconds on Sunday (March 24), Andrzej Szejna said. “Including shooting down these missiles when they are very close to NATO borders”of which Poland is a member, the deputy minister told local radio RMF24.

Several precedents

“But this could only be done with the agreement of the Ukrainian side and taking into account the international consequences”, added Andrzej Szejna. The Polish Minister of Defense, Wladyslaw Kosiniak-Kamysz, said Poland had activated all its anti-aircraft systems and that the missile would have been shot down if there had been any indication that it was heading towards a target on Polish territory.

Poland had already reported at the end of December that a Russian missile had entered its airspace before leaving it a few minutes later, in the direction of Ukraine. A year earlier, in December 2022, another Russian KH-55 cruise missile, capable of carrying nuclear warheads, fell in Poland, but its remains were not found until April 2023. And in November 2022, two people were killed when a Ukrainian anti-aircraft missile fell on the Polish village of Przewodow, close to the Ukrainian border.