Michał Sutowski: In the morning, after the drones entered Poland, the prime minister said, ‘There is no reason to panic; life will go on as normal’. Was he right?
Marcin Ogdowski: After every attack on Ukraine – always more massive and deliberate – life goes back to normal. In that sense there is nothing extraordinary in what Donald Tusk says. He’s probably also implying that this is not an act of open war, because it is not, and that is why he is advising people to return to everyday life.
Michał Sutowski: But in what sense?
Marcin Ogdowski: The scale of the threat is so small that there is really no reason to panic. The risk that a drone will fall on our heads when we step outside or when we are at home – even in Ukraine – remains negligible when seen from the individual’s perspective.
Michał Sutowski: How does what happened on Tuesday night into Wednesday (8-9 September) relate to the upcoming Zapad 2025 manoeuvres in Belarus?
Marcin Ogdowski: One hypothesis is that we may be dealing with a situation in which our defence system and the way we react to threats are being tested as part of Zapad. Such exercises have always been accompanied by provocations, although never on this scale, which is indeed unprecedented. But provocations are part and parcel of military exercises held on the border by aggressive states – Russia being a case in point.
Michał Sutowski: What do we know about NATO allied forces being used in connection with the drones over Poland?
Marcin Ogdowski: Dutch F-35s, which are stationed in Poland as part of the rotational presence, were in the air. They have been here since 1 September and will remain until 1 December. Such duties have been carried out with greater intensity since the outbreak of the full-scale war in Ukraine. Of the four Dutch aircraft in Poland, at least two were scrambled, and they scored the most hits. A tanker aircraft with an Italian crew flew alongside them to ensure that the others in the air would not have to land unnecessarily for fuel. In addition, we had our own F-16s and AWACS reconnaissance aircraft. This array of assets also includes the German Patriots stationed in eastern Poland. Although the launchers did not fire, their radar stations monitored the skies and fed information into the integrated air defence system.
Michał Sutowski: How can we assess the Ministry of Defence’s information policy? Did the Ministry draw any conclusions from the missile that fell near Przewodów?
Marcin Ogdowski: In terms of the hard, kinetic response, it worked as it should. The ‘soft’ side of things, involving information, was also basically as it should be. But we still have a lesson to learn. In Ukraine, when Russian missiles or drones appear in the air, information is relayed to civilians via electronic devices. The most common method is apps that alert people on their phones when something is approaching. We are not at war, so we don’t have this system. But perhaps it is time to introduce such solutions, so that the population is not unaware of threats in real time.
Michał Sutowski: We have alerts issued by the Government Security Centre (RCB); I got one at 8:34 in the morning.
Marcin Ogdowski: These alerts are outdated, both technologically and morally, and no one pays attention to them anymore. But there is no need to reinvent the wheel when the Ukrainians have already invented it. It is time for a government-backed app to notify people in threatened areas of risks. Not with the discreet sound of a text message notification, but with a siren that would ‘wake the dead’.
Michał Sutowski: Incidents like this, albeit not on this scale, have been happening for months. But people simply do not know what to do.
Marcin Ogdowski: This is because the entire civil defence system in Poland is in shambles. Defence education is lacking too. When people hear sirens, they don’t know what to do, so they just ignore them. Of course, awareness of the general threat has increased; we know that Russia is aggressive and that there is a war across the border which could end in various ways. But we have no solid institutional solutions that would enable us to say that Poles are prepared for crisis scenarios.
Michał Sutowski: OK, alerts and apps are one thing. But, at the same time, we can see how quickly so-called ‘interpretations’ inspired by the Russian side spread across the Internet. So clearly, this was a perfectly prepared operation in every respect…
Marcin Ogdowski: Only I would not conclude from the speed of these messages appearing that the operation was prepared in advance. The Russians run a complex disinformation campaign; they have the know-how, and they know how to quickly exploit something that emerges quite suddenly.
Michał Sutowski: But isn’t that even worse? Because if that’s the case, there’s no need to prepare for a specific event. Drones fall, and we immediately go online to write that this is ‘dragging Poland into the war’, speculating that ‘perhaps it was a Ukrainian drone after all’, and of course, that ‘nothing seems to fall on the Hungarians or Slovaks’.
Marcin Ogdowski: Unfortunately, we’re simply losing the cognitive war. The ease with which these disinformation messages take hold in our society is alarming. No special planning is needed, because we’ll lap it up anyway.
Michał Sutowski: Let me ask about the drones themselves. I get the impression that we are wavering a bit here: from the stance that ‘this is a game-changer’ and that this is now the most important weapon on the modern battlefield, rendering tanks obsolete, to the view that drones are just another weapon and nothing to get excited about. Where do you stand on this issue?
Marcin Ogdowski: The drone is a substitute tool and an adaptation to the situation on the battlefield due to the lack of artillery and real air power. This is why such ersatz weapons as drones have been developed. This does not mean that we can dismiss them, but rather that we should treat them as just another type of weapon that we are prepared to face. And I have the impression that this is indeed how the Polish army approaches them.
Michał Sutowski: What does that mean?
Marcin Ogdowski: Fortunately, we are not succumbing to ‘drone craze’ and the belief that drones will solve everything. We are trying to take a broader view: drones do not eliminate the need for traditional air power, armoured forces or precision artillery. All branches of the armed forces must simply be prepared for the threats that drones pose.
Michał Sutowski: What about the argument that a tank costs millions, whereas a drone costs only thousands, and that a few drones could easily disable such a machine?
Marcin Ogdowski: To hit the tank, those few drones would have to reach its location. People seem to think that the war in Ukraine is representative of the kind of war that would be fought between any NATO army and Russia, but that’s impossible. To use drones effectively in the way Russians do – not including Shaheds, which are a different matter – you need close contact with the enemy, since these drones have a very limited range of 10-15 kilometres. The Russians will not get that close to us.
Michał Sutowski: How do we know that?
Marcin Ogdowski: Because NATO has far stronger air power and artillery with a longer range, not to mention far greater precision. We will force the Russians to fight from a distance of 40-50 kilometres. And they cannot strike accurately at that distance, because their artillery is not capable of it. Their air force is too weak and, as mentioned, their drones will not get that far.
Michał Sutowski: And what about those Shaheds? They fly far…
Marcin Ogdowski: That’s true. And here, things don’t look rosy. The Russians have the capacity to mass-produce these systems. If they were to launch a thousand drones at Poland, for example, then we could indeed have a problem. Poland is smaller than Ukraine, our infrastructure is more concentrated and our defence reaction time shorter.
Michał Sutowski: That doesn’t look very promising.
Marcin Ogdowski: But let us not go to extremes and assume that large numbers of Shaheds would go unchallenged. Bear in mind that we have air power, ground-based air defence systems and radio-electronic warfare systems. Moreover, we are on the verge of a significant revolution in air defence weapons, because laser systems that can bring down drones en masse will soon be available. As such, the Shahed is not a game-changer that will permanently alter the rules of the battlefield. Still, I admit that, in large numbers, it could cause us considerable damage today.
Michał Sutowski: Are these laser systems being developed anywhere in the world, or do we already have them, or will we have them soon?
Marcin Ogdowski: The most advanced systems are currently in the possession of Israel and the United Kingdom. The latter are our NATO allies.
Michał Sutowski: We are hearing various hypotheses about the purpose of the Russian drone raid. We suspect it was a test of our defence systems. But how will we know when another 20 or 50 drones enter our airspace whether it is another ‘test’ or the prelude to something bigger?
Marcin Ogdowski: In my view, another attack involving dozens of drones would escalate to the level of a hybrid attack. We would then have to respond accordingly – as an Alliance and as a country, we have the technical means to hit back at the Russians on their own territory.
Michał Sutowski: Meaning?
Marcin Ogdowski: For example, ‘losing’ a number of drones over the Kaliningrad Oblast or ‘accidentally’ launching a missile towards Saint Petersburg. I am being somewhat ironic, of course, but only to emphasize the existence of these technical possibilities. But the best course of action, even now after today’s attack, is to support Ukraine more. It is there that the Russian war machine is being worn down. Poland should also care about establishing a more robust air defence system with the help of allied forces and resources. This shield, though deployed here, should also cover western Ukraine. Put plainly, we should shoot down Russian drones and missiles before they enter Polish airspace.