Ukrainian officials are pushing NATO countries to impose a no-fly zone over western Ukraine using air defense systems in eastern Europe, a step that would mean direct NATO involvement in the war with Russia.
“I don’t understand why NATO doesn’t deploy Patriot systems along the Polish border,” Oleksiy Goncharenko, a Ukrainian lawmaker, told AFP. “After all, Russian missiles have already entered Polish and Romanian airspace. This would protect the borders of Poland and Romania, and this would create a safe zone in the west and south of Ukraine.”
The idea is for NATO to protect Ukrainian industry and energy infrastructure in the western portion of the country. But a no-fly zone would require NATO to shoot down Russian missiles and potentially Russian aircraft, and the direct NATO involvement would make nuclear war much more likely.
Despite the huge risk of escalation, Ukraine’s Western backers appear to be entertaining the idea of a no-fly zone. A European diplomatic source told AFP that talks about the issue were “in progress,” adding that it was “not a simple decision.”
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky pushed for a US and NATO-imposed no-fly zone over all of Ukraine in the early days of the war but backed off the demand as it received little support. In May, he began calling for NATO to shoot down Russian missiles and downplayed the risk of nuclear escalation.
“So my question is, what’s the problem? Why can’t we shoot them down? Is it defense? Yes. Is it an attack on Russia? No. Are you shooting down Russian planes and killing Russian pilots? No. So, what’s the issue with involving NATO countries in the war? There is no such issue,” Zelensky said in an interview with The New York Times.
The world is full of idiots.
Yes, the only thing stopping them is the assurance that for each Russian missile they hit they'll lose that battery system.
I’m not even certain that anything is stopping them. First, they make so called red lines and then they blow right past them.
Zelensky wants to end the world and prove that Voltaire was right all along.
What could go wrong https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/38de74b6c34ab9f17a21a841fcbdb30eb232809ca610d6e26957a8ef7d062b03.jpg eh kiddies?
Ukraine will have a no-fly zone. But it will be enforced by Russia.
"… So, what’s the issue with involving NATO countries in the war? There is no such issue,” Zelensky said in an interview with The New York Times. "
Of course to Zelensky there's no issue- he just wants to drag Western Europe into his little cesspool of a country to save his hide. I daresay if he keeps running his mouth like this and inching the EU/NATO into a hot war with Russia, Zelensky may very well find himself falling to a mysterious illness that leaves two 9mm holes in the back of the head- and it won't be a Russian who infected him, but a Western agent.
Yes … a la Diem … the thing the empire truly can't stand is an inconvenient satrap.
Push all you want… Not gonna happen…!
Has antiwar stopped posting new material?
“So my question is, what’s the problem? Why can’t we shoot them down? Is it defense? Yes. Is it an attack on Russia? No. Are you shooting down Russian planes and killing Russian pilots? No. So, what’s the issue with involving NATO countries in the war? There is no such issue,” Zelensky said in an interview with The New York Times.
Is this guy really that stupid? Is he the same guy that said this?
“Security guarantees and neutrality, the non-nuclear status of our state — we’re ready to do that. That’s the most important point … they started the war because of it.”
He says whatever the CIA wants him to say. Or whatever drug he's currently taking makes him say.
Imagine being an idiot and interviewing Zelensky. But, I repeat myself.
It seems like only yesterday that the Russian government was warning US authorities that Chechen refugee Tamerlan Tsarnaev was a violent radical Islamist more than a year and a half before the 2013 Boston marathon bombing.
It seems like only yesterday that Russia was successfully fighting the ISIS terrorists in Syria.
How did we screw this up?
By not applying much harder sanctions on Russia for annexing Crimea.
Good luck with that, Ukraine and NATO.
First, the Patriot system is garbage and easily destroyed by Russian hypersonic missiles.
Second, if missile systems across the border are used against Russian assets, Russia will destroy them. Russia does not fear NATO's Article 5 (or Article 4 which is the more dangerous one).
Third, the entire point of the SMO is Russia's need to counter the Aegis Ashore installations in Poland and Romania, precisely because of the threat such systems pose for Russia's security. To do that, Ukraine has to be taken off the board permanently.
You may be right that this is the excuse Putin would use, but as the Agis system has neither the range nor the payload capacity to serve as a first decapitation strike system it is obviously just wrong.
Agis warhead maximum 64 Kg or 141 lbs Max range for warhead versions 370 Km. So unable to reach Moscow from any part of Poland Romania (or Ukraine).
It is an anti missile system not a stand alone first strike weapon – only a nation without better would use the Agis for ground to ground strikes.
That's the neocons, always double down.
Of course, the result is the same as in Vegas with that same strategy.
Yes, it is Munich 1938, but the West now is the 1938 Germans.
Any promise is a lie. No matter what they say, they will attack, and escalate. They can only be stopped with extreme violence.
Ukraine Pushing Russia To Create No-Fly Zone Over Ukraine