Russia's Vladimir Putin should be afraid of engaging in a war with NATO because it would result in Moscow's "inevitable defeat," a high-ranking Polish official has warned.
"It is not we, the West, who should fear a clash with Putin, but the other way around," Poland's Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski said during a speech to Poland's parliament, Politico reported.
"It is worth reminding about this, not to increase the sense of threat in the Russians, because NATO is a defensive pact, but to show that an attack by Russia on any of the members of the Alliance would end in its [Russia's] inevitable defeat," he said.
Sikorski said Russia's military and economic capability "pales in comparison to that of the West," noting that NATO has three times the personnel and aerial resources, and four times as many ships.
"Putin's only hope is our lack of determination," he warned.
Western officials have repeatedly expressed concern the fighting in Ukraine after Putin invaded in February 2022 could expand to neighboring NATO countries, pulling members of the alliance into the conflict.
