• Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk secured €43.7 billion under the EU’s Security Action for Europe (SAFE) programme, the largest allocation of any member state, and announced a drone production partnership with Ukraine.
• President Karol Nawrocki vetoed the implementing law, forcing Tusk to route the funds through a costlier, military-only channel.
• Funding and contracts are in place, but no drones or anti-drone systems have yet been delivered.

Why is Tusk MILD?

Answer: Tusk won the largest SAFE loan and a drone partnership, but his standoff with Nawrocki raised costs and narrowed the funds’ use, leaving him MILD.

On 8 May 2026, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s government signed a €43.7 billion Security Action for Europe (SAFE) loan, almost a third of the programme’s €150 billion cap and the largest allocation of any member state. On 29 May, Poland became the first member state to receive SAFE funds, with an initial payment of €6.6 billion.

For Tusk, the loan is part of a wider defence strategy to modernise Poland’s armed forces. Poland already spends 4.8% of its GDP on defence, the highest share in NATO. Tusk announced that part of the allocation would fund unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) for the “East Shield”, a programme of fortifications and surveillance along Poland’s borders with Russia and Belarus.

On 27 April 2026 in Rzeszów, Tusk and Ukrainian Prime Minister Yuliia Svyrydenko announced a partnership to build a “drone armada”, a large domestically built drone fleet to protect Polish airspace, pairing Polish and European funding with Ukraine’s battlefield-tested drone expertise. No production site, timeline, or volumes have yet been announced. 

The main setback came on 12 March, when President Karol Nawrocki vetoed the national law implementing SAFE, though not SAFE itself, forcing the government to reroute the funds. Tusk kept the money and his drone agenda on course, but at a higher cost and with narrower use, leaving him MILD.

What is changing Tusk’s heat level?

Answer: Nawrocki’s veto altered the conduct and cost of Tusk’s policy, but did not stop the funds.

Nawrocki’s veto is the main force holding Tusk back. In February 2026, the Sejm (Poland’s lower house) passed a bill allowing Bank Gospodarstwa Krajowego (BGK), Poland’s state development bank, to receive and disburse SAFE money. Nawrocki vetoed it with the backing of the Law and Justice (PiS) opposition, arguing that the loan would allow Brussels to “arbitrarily withhold funding” and make Poland’s security “depend on foreign decisions”.

Lacking the three-fifths Sejm majority needed to override the veto, Tusk rerouted the funds through the Armed Forces Support Fund (FWSZ), an existing military fund created in 2022. This carried two costs. The loan money lost its Value Added Tax (VAT) exemption, and its scope shrank: funds can now go only to the army, excluding the Border Guard and police from the PLN 7.1 billion (about €1.7 billion) set aside for non-military agencies. 

The policy substance was nonetheless preserved. The government still plans €3.5 billion of SAFE funds for SAN, an anti-drone system developed by a Polish-Norwegian consortium, due for delivery in 2027. These are budgetary decisions, not deployed capabilities, while drone incursions into Polish airspace continue. Nor could the veto reach the drone armada. Under Article 146 of Poland’s Constitution, the Council of Ministers conducts foreign policy. The president represents the state abroad (Article 133), but cannot block a bilateral pact that requires no legislation.

Voters backed SAFE but not its architect. In an IBRIS poll on 16 March 2026, 56.9% of Poles opposed the veto, and 33.8% supported it. Views of Tusk himself remain divided. In a United Surveys poll conducted in early September 2026, 54% of Poles viewed him negatively. CBOS polling from 7 to 17 May 2026, the month of the first SAFE payment, put government support at 33%, down from 35% in April.

Ahead of the 2027 parliamentary elections, Tusk’s foreign policy stance is divisive at home, with Nawrocki casting it as favouring Brussels over Polish interests, thus limiting the prime minister’s gains. Although the veto weakened the delivery of his policy, it did not stall Tusk’s agenda, holding him at MILD. 

What is driving Tusk?

Answer: Tusk is driven by the pursuit of domestic recognition and the ambition to lead Europe’s defence policy response against Russia.

Tusk seeks credit for securing SAFE despite Nawrocki’s opposition. He called the programme a “watershed moment”, accusing the president of acting against Poland’s interests. Analysts at GLOBSEC, a Bratislava-based think tank, read the veto as an attempt to deny him this achievement before the 2027 elections.

Beyond domestic approval, Tusk seeks to be perceived as Europe’s leading voice against Russia. In September 2026, he warned that Russia planned “accidental” strikes on Ukraine’s allies. The drone partnership agreed in April gives that rhetoric an industrial counterpart on Polish soil.

Tusk concurrently aims to build “the strongest army in Europe” within allied defence arrangements. In May 2026, the government declared that almost 90% of SAFE contracts would go to Polish firms.

In March 2026, Polska Grupa Zbrojeniowa (PGZ), the largest state-owned defence group, agreed with the Estonian firm Frankenburg Technologies to set up a facility producing up to 10,000 anti-drone missiles a year. 

The project may be funded through SAFE, but no start date has been set. With production yet to begin, Tusk’s credibility at home rests on turning contracts into equipment in service before the 2027 vote.

What does this mean for you?

Answer: Poland’s case shows how far a domestic veto can bend EU defence funding, and where it leaves gaps in national protection.

In the short term, Poland remains exposed: the European Drone Defence Initiative, the EU’s “drone wall” for the eastern flank, will not be functional before the end of 2027.  The rerouted funds exclude the Border Guard, which still faces grey-zone threats such as instrumentalised migration. For the European Union, Tusk’s workaround shows that a national veto can reroute defence funding but not stop it, a precedent for other governments facing domestic dissent. For NATO, the strategy would strengthen deterrence around the Suwałki Gap once the equipment is fielded. 

The broader test for Tusk is whether SAFE money and planned production move from contracts to equipment in service, and whether his partnership helps Ukraine complete its shift from aid recipient to major defence-industrial partner. On that outcome rests Europe’s larger question: whether EU-funded rearmament can outpace Russia’s evolving tactics.