Poland “does not envisage” sending fighter jets to Ukraine despite Blinken remarks

Two senior Polish officials have today denied that Poland is planning to provide fighter jets to Ukraine. Their remarks come after US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said yesterday that talks over such an arrangement were ongoing and that Washington had given Poland the “green light”.

“Our government has already stated that we do not envisage a handover [of the fighters],” Paweł Soloch, head of Poland’s National Security Bureau (BBN), told TVN24.

He added that any such decisions should be made among NATO allies, and that Poland would not “expose the alliance to any risk” by making decisions independently.

“We are primarily thinking about the security of Ukraine and stopping this terrible war, but we must also see the potential escalation of the conflict towards a world conflict, and hence the NATO declarations that were made after discussions among the allies,” said Soloch.

A number of NATO countries – including Poland and the US – have sent military equipment to Ukraine. However, the alliance has pledged not to send troops, as it fears this could provoke “an even bigger crisis in Europe”. Early indications that some countries would send fighter jets have also not materialised.

Soloch’s words were echoed by deputy interior minister Maciej Wąsik, who told Polskie Radio this morning that “our position has not changed” regarding the fighter jets.

“The decision on this type of aid should be taken at the NATO level and should be uniform for all NATO countries,” said Wąsik. “It should not be the case that one or another country helps on its own.”

NATO has also so far rejected Ukraine’s appeals to create a no-fly zone over its territory. Speaking yesterday, Soloch warned that doing so would result in “a direct conflict with Russia and [NATO] has decided not to do so”.

The Polish official emphasised, however, that “we are well aware of how tragic the situation is in Ukraine at the moment and…we are committed to the greatest possible extent [to supply] military materials and humanitarian aid”. But there is “no allied decision when it comes to weapons”.

Yesterday, Blinken announced that the US had given the “green light” for NATO countries to provide fighter jets to Ukraine and that they were “talking with our Polish friends right now about what we might be able to do to backfill their needs if they choose to provide these fighter jets”.

The latter is a reference to the idea, widely reported in Polish and international media, that if Poland gave Ukraine MiG-29 fighters – which Ukrainian pilots are trained to fly – the US could then supply Poland with F-16s to replace them.

Speaking to state broadcaster TVP today, government spokesman Piotr Müller said that any decision over transferring fighters to Ukraine would be made by NATO as a whole, and that currently “many countries have objections to this type of action”.

Main image credit: Airwolfhound/Flickr (under CC BY-SA 2.0)

Daniel Tilles

Daniel Tilles is editor-in-chief of Notes from Poland. He has written on Polish affairs for a wide range of publications, including Foreign Policy, POLITICO Europe, EUobserver and Dziennik Gazeta Prawna.