It was a night when the war came dangerously close to Poland again
When Russia launched a massive drone attack on Ukraine - using 450 drones, including jet ones, and four Banderol missile drones, killing at least 3 people and injuring about 40 - sirens sounded on our Polish side, and residents of the Lublin region and Podkarpacie received RCB alerts.
The worst news for us came from the area of the Dorohusk-Jagodzin border crossing. Three dangerous events took place there in the morning:
approximately 800 meters from the crossing in Dorohusk, on the Ukrainian side, in Jagodzi, the drone hit a gas station, hitting a truck. Later, spokeswoman for the Ministry of Interior and Administration, Karolina Gałecka, announced that two vehicles had caught fire.
approximately 2 kilometers from the border, a Russian unmanned aerial vehicle hit the locomotive of a train traveling from Kiev to Warsaw, which was confirmed by the head of the Ministry of Interior and Administration, Marcin Kierwiński. There were 206 people on board, but not Poles. Thanks to the crew's advance warning, no one was injured;
Deputy Prime Minister, Minister of National Defense Władysław Kosiniak-Kamysz informed that in addition to the drone strike 800 meters from our border, another drone strike was also recorded about 5 kilometers away.
Poland picked up fighters. The Operational Command of the Armed Forces reported that our airspace had not been violated, but the threat that night was real - Russian drones fell just a few minutes away from Polish towns.
Lt. Col. Korovaj: Since August 20, Russia has hit Ukrainian border crossings at least 6 times
Russia has been clearly targeting the Ukrainian borders for several days. On September 9, Russian drones attacked the Starokozacze border crossing on the Ukrainian-Moldovan border in the Odessa Oblast at night. Two people were killed and three were injured. On June 8, in another incident, an explosion occurred in Moldova. On August 1, Russian troops attacked the Orlivka ferry crossing on the border with Romania with combat drones.
Fires broke out there, but no one was hurt. On August 25, the operation of the Ukrainian-Moldovan border crossing Vynohradivka was suspended, which was also attacked from the air by Russian troops. Another time, on August 21, the Tabaky-Mirnoe border crossing, also on the border between Ukraine and Moldova, was damaged.
Since August 20, Russia has struck Ukrainian border crossings at least 6 times: Tabaki on August 21, Vynohradivka on August 25, Orlivka on the Danube on 1 and again on September 6, Starokozacze on the night of September 9, where 2 civilians were killed. All in the Odessa Oblast, all on the border with Moldova and Romania, all with drones. At the same time, on September 1, a locomotive depot of the Ukrainian Railways burned down in Kiev, and railway workers were among the dead. These are not two separate threads. This is one campaign that is worth reading through the eyes of the one who plans it, not the one who receives it, summed up after today's events Reserv. Lt. Col. Maciej Korowaj, a military analyst, former officer of the Military Intelligence Service, and security expert.
How to read it?
There is one conclusion: this is a test of the reaction of the countries neighboring Ukraine and NATO. The effect of Russia's actions, as it is intended, is also visible, for example due to the scale of disinformation, is a psychological, political and financial effect: discouraging support for Ukraine. There is no need to destroy the crossing on the Polish side of the border to achieve a specific result. Alarms and the risk of further incidents are enough to increase, for example, the costs of transport insurance, delays appear, and in the public debate there are voices that Ukraine is "dragging" neighboring countries into war.
Today's incidents may likely indicate Russia's intentions, which may be to create public pressure to close the Polish-Ukrainian border or block Ukrainian exports through Poland.
What else do such provocations give Putin? Strengthening the Russian narrative about the West's alleged responsibility for the escalation of the conflict. In this way, the Kremlin can also observe how quickly, among other things, Poland, Moldova and Romania react and how their services and allied services within NATO cooperate.
Reserve Lt. Col. Maciej Korowaj describes it as a "glazometer" - an eye assessment of the distance, terrain and enemy before moving forward. The analyst writes: "Suvorov taught that before an attack comes an assessment of how long the enemy will withstand and where he stands."
The Odessa campaign is exactly that, a measurement of NATO's response before moving north. Since August 20, the Russian headquarters has been measuring in the Odessa Oblast how long NATO can withstand when drones fall several hundred meters from its border. The question that Warsaw is asking itself is whether transitions with Poland will be next. On September 10, it ceased to be an analyst's question. Prime Minister Donald Tusk said in Bratislava that thanks to the cooperation of Polish and Ukrainian services at night, a direct threat to one of the border crossings with Ukraine was avoided, and he himself linked this event with Russian strikes in Moldova. However, the answer still requires putting aside the emotions related to this event and entering the logic of Russian thinking, i.e. the planning of the Russian headquarters within the framework of the "New War" doctrine, which I call the Balanced War. This staff has been solving one specific task for several months, which I tentatively call Operation Matryoshka (...) - writes the military officer in an extensive analysis posted on the X platform.
