Russian missile flew over Polish territory for 39 seconds

Today, following a nighttime Russian missile attack on Ukraine, the Polish Army's operational command reported that one of the missiles had entered Polish airspace. Polish and NATO military aircraft were taking off.

“The object entered Polish airspace near the city of Osierdów (Lublin Voivodeship) and stayed there for 39 seconds. It was monitored by military radars throughout the flight,” the report says.

In the end, the Russian missile was never shot down.

Polish Defense Minister Wladyslaw Kosyniak-Kamysz held a press conference regarding the airspace violation.

"Each such situation is considered individually. But if there were any signs that this object was heading towards some target located on the territory of Poland, it would obviously have been shot down," the politician stressed.

The Polish Foreign Ministry summoned the Russian ambassador in connection with the third violation of Polish airspace by a Russian missile during the full-scale war.

Among a number of Ukrainian social media users, the lack of the desired reaction from NATO – shooting down the missile – led to the emergence of memes, outright mockery, and accusations of cowardice against the alliance's leaders.

“So a missile flew into the airspace and what’s happening? Nothing. A missile is flying, which could fall somewhere, kill someone, but it’s nothing serious, it’s in transit – what’s that? What kind of, excuse me, “tolerance” is this?” writes MP Oleksiy Honcharenko in a telegram.

According to the politician, Putin, seeing the lack of reaction, will provoke the alliance countries even more.

“It's time to show your teeth and not be afraid. Such attacks should become another signal that your own security depends on Ukraine's support. If you don't want to shoot down yourself, then give us more air defense and weapons, we will do it for you,” urges Honcharenko.

However, experts have differing opinions on this situation.

Lack of political will, time or unwillingness to spend money?

Polish military analyst Jarosław Wolski explains on the social network X that Poland does not shoot down Russian missiles for several reasons.

First, airspace would have to be closed during such a response, which would have severe economic consequences for 66 civilian Polish airports.

“The airspace should be closed to avoid tragic mistakes. Let’s leave the shooting down of passenger planes to the Russians and Iranians,” he explains.

Secondly, debris from a downed missile can kill someone.

“This is a significant factor that poses a threat to the civilian population on the ground. Both in Poland and in Ukraine,” writes Wolsky.

In addition, according to him, there is no desire to reveal to the Russians and Belarusians the operating modes of air defense and fighter radars in Poland, because they will immediately begin to look for ways to reduce their effectiveness.

Ultimately, there is always the question of where the missile is going and whether it is worth spending money to shoot it down.

“There is no air defense that covers 100% of the country's territory. It is always difficult to choose objects to cover and objects that will not be protected. Military airports, command centers, the largest settlements in the country, the most important critical infrastructure facilities (mainly energy), military mobilization areas, etc. These are objects that will be protected. So if the X-101 got lost and flew towards Warsaw or Rzeszów, it would probably be shot down,” Wolskyi assures.

In his opinion, it is not worth spending money on shooting down a rocket just to prove that "you can't mess around in my sky.".

“This is military nonsense and a waste of resources, and something that only politicians can come up with,” the Polish expert believes.

In Ukraine, experts differed in their assessments.

Former advisor to the Ukrainian Defense Minister Oleksiy Kopytko wrote on Facebook that the alliance countries, and Poland in particular, lacked the political will to shoot down the missile. He cites the example of Turkey's reaction in a similar situation in 2015.

In his opinion, NATO assumes that Russia does not intentionally fire at alliance states, but that random episodes and provocations may occur.

"That is, it is not a technical inability/inability to shoot down Russian missiles, but a political decision to evade. Russia sees this and periodically generates such incidents, causing a flurry of criticism against NATO structures. This is a mild form of discrediting," he believes.

Kopytko notes that de facto the Russians used the alliance's airspace to strike against Ukraine, while the Ukrainians want friendly countries to cover at least part of Ukraine's western regions with their air defenses.

Kopytko recalled that in November 2015, Turkey shot down a Russian military plane that had entered Turkish airspace. According to the Turkish version, the Russian plane was in Turkish airspace for 17.5 seconds, according to the Russian version, for 6 seconds.

The crew of the plane then ejected, but the pilot-sniper was shot from the ground by Syrian rebels. Relations between Turkey and Russia have been tense for several months, with Russia temporarily imposing anti-Turkish sanctions.

“Turkey decided to shoot down. NATO and the Poles (because they can act independently), like the Romanians before, decided to dodge until the last. This is a clear demonstration that the countries of Eastern Europe do not believe in receiving help from the Alliance in general and senior comrades in particular, if a crisis begins. What could be worse for the military-political bloc?”, writes Kopytko.

Instead, aviation expert and leading researcher at the State Aviation Museum Valeriy Romanenko, in a comment to BBC Ukraine, stated that it is possible that the Russians directed the missile at the territory of Poland with the aim of provocation, but there was no time to shoot it down so quickly.

“Anti-aircraft missile systems do not cover the entire territory, they have a limited range, and they are not located like a fence on the border of Ukraine and Poland. SAMs are deployed, but mainly near large settlements, they do not completely cover the border, and only they are able to react instantly. They are not placed near the border at all, they are at least 15 km away,” explains Romanenko.

He reminds that NATO air defense is designed for AWACS aircraft (flying radars) and fighters, and while they were aiming, the missile had already left Polish territory. Even if the planes were already in the air, they would have had to fly to the area at high speed, but the missile flew only a few kilometers into Polish territory and quickly returned to Ukraine.

"It takes a lucky coincidence for this missile to be shot down. If it had flown further into Poland, no one would have bothered - it would have been shot down - by an air defense system or a fighter jet. No political will is needed for this, this is an attack, the military does not ask the minister in such a situation. If the AWACS operator or the commander of the anti-aircraft unit had given the command to destroy it - they would have destroyed it, the decision is made at their level, not by politicians," Romanenko believes.