Putin Is Testing the West. Trump’s Response Is Not Comforting.

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A few mysteries remain about the Russian drones that swarmed into Poland’s skies Wednesday night, but a few things are all but certain—none of them pleasant—about Russian President Vladimir Putin’s intentions and President Donald Trump’s response.

First, it’s worth noting that the incident—involving 19 drones^[2] flying over Poland during a seven-hour span—was not an armed attack. Evidence from the debris (most of the drones were shot down) indicates they were Gerbera models^[3], designed for surveillance or as decoys. That is, they are used either to shoot aerial videos of targets on the ground or to prod Ukrainians or their allies to turn on their radar and mobilize air defenses, so Russia can track precisely how those systems operate—or gauge whether those countries’ air forces react at all.

Still, the drones could have been armed (their model types aren’t immediately distinguishable), so Poland and its allies had to respond as if they were—which could have triggered miscalculations and escalated tensions on both sides. In any event, a Russian weapon crossing into Polish territory is an inherently aggressive act, whatever the weapon’s capabilities.

Which leads to a critical question: Was this overflight deliberate? There have been occasions when a Russian drone, aimed at a target in western Ukraine, has drifted off course into Poland. But it is extremely unlikely for this to happen 19 times in one night. At least some of these drones (it is unclear from reports how many) were launched from Belarus^[4], which is much closer to both western Ukraine and eastern Poland. (Belorussian officials say the drones flew off course as a result of Ukrainian jamming—another unlikely explanation.)

A spokeswoman for Russia’s foreign ministry dismissed the whole incident as an invention of NATO propaganda, claiming^[5] that, if drones did fly over Poland on Wednesday night, none of them were Russian—which is extremely unlikely. (Nobody else in the area would have Russian-designed drones.)

Trump’s reaction was at least as disturbing in a different way. “What’s with Russia violating Poland’s airspace with drones?” he posted^[6] on his social media, adding, “Here we go!”

A better question might be, “What’s with Trump wincing in puzzlement over every act of aggression that Putin commits?”

The answers to both questions are clear. Putin thinks he can win the war, doesn’t care how many Ukrainians (or Russian conscripts or imported North Korean soldiers) get killed in the process, doesn’t think Ukraine is a legitimately independent country—and is, more than ever, testing to what extent, or whether, the West will respond if he steps up his offensives.

Trump doesn’t grasp any of this, still believes that Putin respects him—when, in fact, every Russian rejection of serious ceasefire talks, every Russian bombing of a Ukrainian hospital, school, or apartment building, and, now, Russia’s violation of Polish airspace, constitutes a sign of Putin’s blatant disrespect, even contempt, for the American president.

Last month, on the same night that it mounted one of its largest airstrikes in this 3½-year war, firing more than 570 drones and 40 missiles in a single barrage, Russia also launched two cruise missiles at an American electronics factory in western Ukraine^[7], far away from any battlefield or military supply line.

Trump said nothing and did nothing in response. Why should Putin have believed there would be any response to flying a few handfuls of unarmed drones over the eastern slice of Poland?

As it happened, there was something of a response to this incursion. Polish and Dutch fighter jets took to the sky, shooting down most of the drones. Then Poland invoked Article 4 of the North Atlantic Treaty, the founding document of the NATO alliance. Under Article 4^[8], NATO members will “consult together” whenever any of them believe that their “political independence or security … is threatened.”

An Article 4 consultation could be the prelude to invoking Article 5, under which the allies agree that an attack on any one of them is tantamount to an attack on them all. Article 4 doesn’t necessarily lead to a discussion of Article 5 (and, by the way, invoking Article 5 doesn’t necessarily mean the alliance goes to war—only that it “will assist the Party or Parties so attacked,” taking “such action as it deems necessary, including the use of armed force”).

That said, merely invoking Article 4 is far from a casual matter. Over the course of NATO’s 76-year history, it has happened just seven times^[9] before—all of them since 2003, all but one since 2012. All of the requests for consultation came from Turkey, citing concerns about attacks by Syria—until February 2022, the most recent incident until this week, when eight of NATO’s newest members, all of them former subjects of the Soviet Union’s Warsaw Pact (including Poland), raised concerns about Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. (None of these incidents sparked action under Article 5. The only time that article has been invoked was after the Sept. 11 terrorist attack^[10], when, in a reversal of what had always been expected, NATO’s allies pledged to come to the aid of the United States.)

This week’s drone crisis marks the first time that Article 4 has been invoked in response to a Russian violation of a NATO member’s sovereign space.

That is what makes the incident so serious—and why NATO must mount a serious response beyond merely invoking Article 4. The response shouldn’t be extreme; it wasn’t an armed attack, no one was killed, no hostile troops trammeled Polish land; whatever NATO does, it shouldn’t spark a spiral of escalation. But NATO should deal some sort of blow to Putin’s interests—it must send a clear, tangible message to Putin that he can’t keep ratcheting up his incursions and get away with it.

The blow probably won’t pack a punch unless Trump signs on to it—unless he finally realizes that Putin has been stringing him along, has no desire for peace, and that Trump’s hopes of a Washington–Moscow alliance are pure fantasy.

Putin has become more adventurous in his attacks since his summit with Trump last month in Alaska. Trump’s obsequiousness at that meeting—welcoming the Kremlin’s war criminal on a red carpet, smiling and letting him speak first and volubly at the press conference afterward, shaking his hand and smiling even though Putin rejected any notion of a ceasefire, which Trump had previously demanded that the summit produce or else. There was no ceasefire, no agreement of any sort. The summit was cut short—even a prepared lunch was canceled^[16]—because there was nothing more to talk about. Yet Trump imposed no consequences; he even tried to depict the meeting as a great success.

There are two ways this war could end. One is if Ukraine, in essence, surrenders. The other is if Putin calculates that he can’t win. The latter scenario probably won’t happen unless the United States steps up its assistance to Ukraine. The Europeans are doing more; the Ukrainians themselves are doing more; but the U.S. can provide unique and vital assets—real-time intelligence data and air defense weapons that can shoot down ballistic missiles.

Trump has gone back and forth in suspending, then resuming, then suspending this aid. The night of the drones makes it clearer than ever that the time has come for Trump to pick a side.

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