Witold Waszczykowski: Putin's goals are countries of Central and Eastern Europe

Russia wants to annex other countries in addition to Ukraine.

Vladimir Putin has a goal to restore the Soviet Union, Witold Waszczykowski, a former deputy chief of the Polish National Security Bureau and ex-deputy foreign minister, said to Espresso TV.

“Putin has extraordinary plans and ambitions. He said in public many times that the decline and collapse of the Soviet Union was a big tragedy for him and his generation. In his policy, he wants to restore Russia and bring it to the position occupied by the Soviet Union earlier,” he said.

The politician thinks Russia needs to annex territories of the former Soviet Union to gain this position, so Ukraine is not the only target.

“I was in Sarajevo in Bosnia and Herzegovina a couple of days ago. I know that the Bosnians are also shocked as they watch the Russians trying to escalate the situation to make the Bosnians Serbs rebel, tore Bosnia's part away and join it to Serbia. Putin has plans not only for Ukraine, but also for other countries of Central and Eastern Europe,” Waszczykowski said.

The former deputy chief of the National Security Bureau thinks military action is unlikely, because guns don't win wars in the 21st century.

“The aggression in Crimea resembles the Anschluss of Austria in 1938. Many politicians say so. It's clear that in the 1930s, six years was enough for Hitler to start the world war in 1939. It was a period without computers, missiles and technologies, the things we have today. It looks like if a rich decisive state wanted to take aggressive actions and start a war, it would take it less than six years. Today's missile technologies or cyberwars allow to destabilise the world in a few weeks,” he summed up.