Poland just adopted wartime rules to shoot down Russian drones

Poland just changed the rule its fighter pilots use to decide when to shoot something down.

So what changed? Until today, a pilot had to actually see a target before firing. Now radar alone is enough.

Cezary Tomczyk, Poland's Deputy Defence Minister, announced it today. A pilot, or the operational commander, can now order a plane or drone shot down based on radar readings alone. No visual check needed first.

The call to change this was made by General Ireneusz Nowak, the man who runs Poland's armed forces day to day.

And here's the thing Tomczyk himself pointed out. This kind of rule is normally a wartime rule.

He says quote "reserved for a state of war or martial law".

That's Poland's own government saying it out loud. Peacetime Poland is now running on a wartime playbook.

Why? Because Tomczyk says Russian drones could cross into Polish territory any day now. Every day is a live possibility.

So what's been happening? A lot, and fast.

11 days ago, a Russian jet-powered drone came near the Polish border during a Russian attack on western Ukraine. Poland put its air-defence units on alert in two regions, Lublin and Subcarpathian.

Then five days ago, a Russian military helicopter crossed straight into Polish airspace from Kaliningrad, near a town called Braniewo. It stayed inside for 42 seconds and got about 300 metres in. Poland scrambled fighter jets. It called the whole thing a test of how ready its air defences actually are.

And two days before that one, on the 19th, Poland scrambled jets again and put its air defences on high readiness during a huge Russian drone and missile attack on Ukraine.

Three incidents. Under three weeks. That's the run-up to today's decision.

Now here's why the old rule existed in the first place. Visually confirming a target takes time. A small, fast drone doesn't give you much of that. So the old system was slower, but safer — it catches mistakes before anyone pulls the trigger.