NEW YORK — Czech President Petr Pavel insists that NATO needs to outright demonstrate its willingness to respond to Russian aggression or else Moscow will continue to push the alliance and its European boundaries. "There might be the time when we will have to shoot down some of these planes or unmanned vehicles that are testing our readiness," Pavel, a retired general and former chair of MATO's Military Committee, predicted in a conversation with Fox News Digital on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly in New York City this week.
Pavel said alliance members understandably want to avoid escalation, but risk sending the wrong signal as he warned Moscow views restraint as weakness and is testing allied defenses with its continued aggression. "What I am afraid of is that they see a lack of will on our side to take decisive action," Pavel said. "Within Russian perceptions it demonstrates weakness.
And they respect power." The warning followed fresh incidents along NATO’s eastern flank where a Russian Mi-8 military helicopter crossed from Kaliningrad into Polish airspace Wednesday, prompting Poland to scramble fighter jets. Romania scrambled F-16s Thursday after another unidentified aerial target crossed its border from Ukraine. Denmark’s military intelligence service also warned Thursday that Russia is likely to intensify hybrid attacks against NATO in the coming months and assessed a "low but growing" risk of a limited Russian military attack against one or more NATO countries bordering Russia.
ROMANIAN F-16 SHOOTS DOWN DRONE AFTER AIRSPACE BREACH, MARKING FIRST FOR NATO ALLY Pavel's said in a speech before the U.N. General Assembly Wednesday that Russia's "aggressive posture poses a direct threat to European security" and warned that the risk is growing. He told Fox News Digital that the pattern of recent escalation was familiar from his years at NATO, recalling Russian aircraft testing U.S. pilots over Syria and repeatedly violating Turkish airspace before Turkey shot down a Russian warplane in 2015.
"They are, on one hand, provoking. On the other, testing what will our reaction be," Pavel detailed. NATO already has procedures for accidental airspace violations, Pavel said, including warning aircraft and attempting to establish contact.
But he drew a distinction between mistakes and aircraft that deliberately enter allied airspace and refuse to respond. "If it is deliberate and the violator doesn’t respond to our measures, then we will have to act, because otherwise Russia simply would push further on," the Czech president added. RUSSIA'S NEIGHBOR REVEALS PERSONAL APPEALS TO TRUMP AS US WEIGHS NATO TROOP PULLBACK IN EUROPE The comments come amid recent drone incursions involving NATO members along the alliance’s eastern flank, including incidents in Poland, Romania and Lithuania.
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