There are fears that the Russian Federation may officially regard the supply of Western battle tanks and combat aircraft as entry into the war and take military measures in response.

NATO countries have informal agreements to refrain from supplying certain types of weapons to Ukraine.

According to the German news agency dpa, this is due to the risk of a direct military confrontation with Russia, which the Alliance wants to minimize, writes  ZEIT ONLINE .

There are fears that the Russian Federation may officially regard the supply of Western battle tanks and combat aircraft as entry into the war and take military measures in response. Weapons systems of this type have not yet been delivered to Ukraine.

According to the parliamentary group of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD), this informal agreement is known in Berlin.

“The defense committee was fully informed of this in mid-May,” Wolfgang Helmich, spokesman for defense policy of the SPD parliamentary group, told DPA.

According to a NATO official, all supply decisions are ultimately up to individual member countries, writes DPA. So far, they have adhered to informal agreements, partly because of the fear that they will not receive the full support of their NATO partners in the event of a Russian attack.

For this reason, Poland, for example, refrained from supplying Soviet MiG-29 fighters to Ukraine more than two months ago, the agency notes.

Commander-in-Chief of the US Armed Forces in Europe, Todd Daniel Walters, said back in March that MiG-29 deliveries are a “high-risk scenario” because they could be misjudged by Moscow and lead to an escalation between Russia and NATO.

(c)UNIAN 2022