He noted similar warnings from NATO’s Supreme Allied Commander Europe, General Alexus Hrynkevich. According to Tusk, the threat targets not only the EU as a whole but Poland in particular.
“Today, NATO’s Supreme Allied Commander Europe and the Supreme Allied Commander of U.S. Forces Europe, General Alexus Hrynkevich, confirmed to me in a conversation that Russia will be ready for confrontation with Europe, and therefore with us, as early as 2027,” Tusk said.
He added that he had heard similar assessments from both the former and current heads of Britain’s MI6 intelligence agency.
On June 24, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Vladimir Putin could attack a NATO country within five years “to test the alliance.” When asked if an attack could come within months, Zelenskyy said he did not “believe that [Putin] is ready.”
On June 11, Germany’s Federal Intelligence Service chief, Bruno Kahl, said intelligence showed “concrete evidence” Russia was planning an attack on NATO territory, aiming to test Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty on collective self-defense.
Kahl said the Kremlin no longer believes in NATO’s mutual defense guarantees and may try to test them.
In December 2024, Finnish newspaper Iltalehti reported NATO believed Russia had rehearsed an attack on Finland and the Baltic states, including Estonia and Norway, and had not abandoned those plans.