In The Midst Of A Nato Fighter Jet Rift, Kamala Harris Traveled To Poland

Kamala Harris, the US Vice President, has left for Poland and Romania, providing her the opportunity to personally talk with Polish leaders on the topic of fighter jet shipments to Ukraine.

The subject has revealed divisions within the Nato alliance. Poland's offer to give the US with MiG-29 fighter jets as a step toward transferring them to Ukraine was rejected by American officials on Tuesday as "not tenable."

On Wednesday afternoon, US Defense Department spokesman John Kirby went even farther, warning that such a transfer posed a "high risk" of a Russian retaliation that might result in a military escalation with Nato.

"We believe that adding aircraft to the Ukrainian inventory will have little impact on the Ukrainian Air Force's efficacy in comparison to Russian capabilities," he continued.

A German government official dismissed the Polish idea as "not currently on the table," according to the statement.

Officials from the United States have frequently stated that the decision on fighters is ultimately up to the Polish government.

Polish authorities, on the other hand, have stated that their country will only act in concert with allies.

Meetings with Polish President Andrzej Duda and Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki, as well as Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who is in Warsaw for his own visit to a crucial Nato ally, are on the vice president's agenda.

Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky has been lobbying Nato for Soviet-era jets, which its fighter pilots are familiar with, to enhance the country's defense against Russia's two-week-old incursion.

"We've been hearing promises for 13 days, 13 days we've been assured we'll be helped in the air, that there would be planes," he told British lawmakers this week.

While Nato leaders, notably US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, had indicated interest in the proposal at first, organizing the practicalities of such a transfer without jeopardizing Nato's security was difficult.