Repeated violations of the airspace of the North Atlantic Alliance countries by Russia should not be tolerated indefinitely, according to Czech President Petr Pavlo. He pointed out that Russia only respects strength and considers restraint a weakness, therefore, according to him, it is necessary to show it the strength of its allies. He once again admitted that, as a last resort, NATO countries should shoot down Russian fighter jets. He said this on Tuesday at a discussion with students during a visit to the Karlovy Vary region. Based on information from the ČT24 station and the Novinky.cz server, the TASR correspondent in Prague writes about it.
- Czech President Pavel condemned Russia’s violation of NATO airspace.
- He stressed the importance of a show of force to gain Russia’s respect.
- Russia is testing air defense and the determination of NATO countries.
- Pavel expressed that the downing of Russian planes may be necessary.
- Russia denies incidents of violation of NATO allies’ airspace.
The Czech president recalled that when he was chairman of the NATO Military Committee, Russia repeatedly violated Turkey’s airspace. “They provoked, tested how far they could go. When the Turks got angry at about the tenth violation, they shot down one of the two or three planes and there was peace.” said Pavel. He added that even then the West feared that this would cause a confrontation between NATO and Russia, but it did not.
According to him, Russia is currently trying it with other NATO countries. It tests not only how the air defense of individual states and the integrated NATO air defense system workbut also how these countries are actually determined to defend themselves, he pointed out. According to him, if the situation were the other way around, Russia would shoot down the plane violating its airspace without hesitation. “They expect that we won’t do it because we don’t want to escalate the situation. But they’re not afraid of escalation,” he emphasized.
According to Pavle, if Russia continues to violate the airspace, it will probably be necessary to shoot down their planes. “Russia shows in everything it does that it respects only strength. If someone shows it, it will earn their respect.” he added.
In September, according to Estonia, three Russian fighter jets entered its airspace along its maritime border near the uninhabited island of Vaindloo for 12 minutes before being driven away by NATO fighters. Russia has denied the intrusion of its warplanes into Estonian airspace. In October, two Russian military planes – a fighter and a refueling plane – flew into Lithuanian airspace for 18 seconds from the Russian Kaliningrad region.
In recent weeks, the airspace of several NATO member states has also been violated by drones. About two dozen Russian drones penetrated into Poland, some of them were shot down by air defense. Unknown drones were also spotted in Denmark, Norway, Estonia and Germany. The most recent incident took place on the night of Tuesday, when the remains of a Russian drone probably fell on the territory of Romania near the border with Ukraine, the Romanian Ministry of Defense announced.
