In addition to more ammunition and more effective air defenses, Ukraine should attack military targets on Russian territory, Estonian Defense Minister Hanno Pevkur said on his social media page.
“In addition to ammunition and air defense, two things can help Ukraine reach the tipping point to win the war: increase training for Ukrainian fighters (and) allow Ukraine to strike military targets in Russia,” Pevkur wrote on X.
Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas also said earlier that “Russia is provoked by weakness, not strength.” She is urging more Western troops to be sent into Ukraine for training purposes, while her country and others are also urging Western troops to partake in direct combat with Russian forces on Ukrainian territory if Russia makes a major breakthrough.
The Baltic country has also previously said that helping train Ukrainian forces “on (Ukraine’s) territory, unlike in other parts of Europe, would not be an escalation.” She added that “there are already countries training Ukrainian forces locally at their own risk.”
The Estonian leader is making these claims despite the fact that Vladimir Putin and the Russian General Staff repeatedly warning that if Western troops were to appear in Ukraine in the Russo-Ukrainian war, it would be tantamount to starting a world war.
Several articles have appeared in the international press in recent days about the possibility of Estonia sending troops to Ukraine. The EU member state, and with it NATO, could thus become embroiled in the Russian-Ukrainian war. Tallinn is planning to take over non-combat activities to replace Ukrainian forces, which could then go to the front.
While Russian and Western forces have routinely partaken in proxy wars in the past, such as Vietnam and Afghanistan, there have never been strikes conducted on the homeland territories waging these proxy conflicts. Major strikes on Russian soil involving Western weapons therefore represents a massive escalation in the war, with Russia threatening in the past to use nuclear weapons if its territory is threatened.
During a meeting with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz earlier this week, French President Emmanuel Macron also reportedly called for strikes against Russian targets using Western weapons.
