After 19 drones from the territory of Ukraine and Belarus entered Polish airspace in early September, Polish, Swedish and Dutch fighter jets were scrambled, which shot down three drones.
Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk invoked Article 4 of the NATO treaty, which led to formal consultations on mutual defense, writes The Times, quoted by Focus.
The publication notes that despite the start of Operation "Eastern Guard" After this incident, which was intended to strengthen NATO's capabilities along the Russian border, there are still isolated cases of violations of other countries' airspace by unmanned aerial vehicles.
The article states that 54 suspicious or provocative cases of surveillance of aircraft have been registered in at least 13 NATO countries, most often in Germany.
It is noted that in Germany almost half of these cases were near airports, and about a quarter - over military sites, training grounds and ammunition depots.
The publication also states that European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen has described this wave as a “consistent and escalating campaign” of hybrid warfare, and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz has directly accused Moscow of this.
Former Russian diplomat Boris Bondarev suggests that Vladimir Putin hoped to divert support from Ukraine in this way. Others draw parallels with how China tests Taiwan's resolve, and there is also a hypothesis that this was a classic intelligence gathering exercise.
The publication cites data according to which most of the 54 registered cases of surveillance using drones are under investigation, with only seven of them leading to arrests.
It should be noted that since Poland invoked NATO's Article 4, at least 24 incidents have been registered near airports, 13 near military facilities, and four near other critical infrastructure facilities.
At the same time, some of these cases may be misunderstandings. For example, the publication recalls a situation in which an amateur from Croatia decided to launch a drone near Frankfurt Airport and was fined a huge sum for this.
At the same time, as reported by the state broadcaster NRK, there was a case in which two Chinese citizens were found to have photos of important infrastructure sites after a drone was spotted near the Norwegian air base of Bardufoss.
For this reason, airports are increasingly investing in radars, radio scanners and acoustic sensors, but still rely to a large extent on visual confirmation for small aircraft.
European governments have responded to these incidents by increasing military readiness. Specifically, NATO has moved its surveillance assets to the Baltic states, Germany has relaxed rules on the use of drones, and Swedish and Polish soldiers have held joint defense exercises.
In addition, UK counter-drone experts have been sent to train Moldovan security services. It has also been proposed to create an EU-funded "Drone Wall" of radar and interceptors.