If Russia decides to attack Poland or any NATO member state, the Alliance will respond as a coalition, U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin assured on Wednesday during a session of House Appropriations Committee. He added that the United States were prepared to such scenarios and would be ready to respond.
The United States does not believe that Russian President Vladimir Putin wants to militarily take on the NATO alliance, U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said on Wednesday (May 11), as Moscow struggles to achieve its goals in Ukraine three months into its invasion.
"As you look at Putin's calculus, my view - and I'm sure the chairman has his own view - but my view is that Russia doesn't want to take on the NATO alliance," Austin said during a congressional hearing.
He added that "it's always dangerous to go down the road of hypotheticals, but this is an issue that is very, very important". "If Russia decides to attack any nation that is a NATO member, then that’s a gamechanger. With respect to the Article 5 commitments, certainly NATO would most likely respond as a coalition in some shape, form or fashion," Austin assured.
"He's got, you know, a number of troops arrayed in the in the region right now on the Ukrainian border. And you had some in Belarus and still has some there. But there are 1.9 million forces in NATO's. NATO's has the most advanced capabilities of of any alliance in the world in terms of aircraft, ships, you know, types of weaponry that the ground forces use," U.S. Defense Secretary said.
"So that is a fight that he really doesn’t want to have. And that would really escalate into another type of competition that no one wants to see," Austin underscored.
Źródło: TVN24 News in English, TVN24, Reuters