The Pentagon warned Moscow yesterday that, together with its NATO allies and as established in Article 5 of the treaty, on military solidarity among member countries, the United States will protect "every inch of the territory of the Atlantic Alliance." It was Washington's first reaction to the news about the explosion of at least one missile on Polish soil, along the border with Ukraine, resulting in two deaths.
The press secretary of the US Department of Defense, Pat Ryder, literally renewed the warning issued by President Joe Biden to his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin, at different times during the war: "Regarding our security commitments and article 5 [of the North Atlantic treaty], we have made it very clear that we will defend every inch of NATO territory,” he said. Ryder put forward that the Pentagon was still trying to confirm, hand in hand with the Polish authorities, the veracity and details about the fall of a missile in Poland. “At this time we have no corroborating information that there has been a missile attack. We are looking into this further,” he noted.
The same was stated by the spokespersons for the White House National Security Council, Adrienne Watson, and for the Secretary of State, Vedant Patel. Responding to the Kremlin's claim that his army did not fire precipitated missiles into Poland and that it was "a deliberate provocation" intended to "escalate the situation," Patel countered that Washington "certainly does not is trying to escalate” in the conflict. And he pointed out that, even if everything remains to be verified, the reports about the incident are still “incredibly worrying”.
NATO and the EU remained silent last night about the nature and implications of the missile incident that left two dead yesterday afternoon in Poland, in a town six kilometers from the border with Ukraine, reports Beatriz Navarro from Brussels.
The news immediately fueled the latent fear since the beginning of the war that an accident would cause the conflict to jump across the borders and drag more countries but, in the absence of conclusive information in this regard, both Western organizations avoided commenting.
"We are following this information and coordinating closely with our Polish ally," NATO sources limited themselves to saying to the press, while the EU's External Action Service led by Josep Borrell pointed out that it will only react "when Poland has shared its assessment of the happened". From Bali, the President of the European Council, Charles Michel, expressed his condolences to the families of the deceased and noted that he is in contact with the Polish authorities, European leaders and other allies.
As soon as the news broke, the Baltic countries evoked in unison the organization's commitment to defend all the allied territory in case of attack. Theoretically, there is a possibility that the Polish government today invokes article 4 of the North Atlantic treaty, which allows the parties to “consult each other when, in the opinion of any of them, the territorial integrity, political independence or security of any of the parties were threatened”.
