World War 3: Russia May Try to Seize More of Ukraine, Then Invade Poland, Latvia, Lithuania

As fears of a World War 3 increase, a Pro-Russian rebel guards damaged shop and cars after shelling in the town of Donetsk, eastern Ukraine, Tuesday, Sept. 16, 2014. The city council in Donetsk says three people have been killed and five wounded in shelling overnight in the city in eastern Ukraine. The casualties come as Ukraine's parliament plans to review a bill that would give greater autonomy to the eastern regions of Donetsk and Luhansk, where fighting between separatists and Kiev's forces has claimed at least 3,000 civilian lives. AP Photo/Darko Vojinovic

Officials in Poland, Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia say a Russian invasion could happen if pro-Russian forces end up seizing more of Ukraine.

Russia seized Crimea early in the conflict and pro-Russian separatists have gained other ground since then. 

Officials in Poland, among other countries in Eastern Europe, fear that Russia, having swallowed Crimea, will be tempted to grab more of Ukraine. 

That could turn out to be southern Ukraine, which Putin and Russians now refer to as Novorossiya, or “New Russia.”

If that land grab happened, Poles fear Poland and the Baltic states would be next, with Putin arguing that he was defending the interests of oppressed Russian minorities, as in Ukraine.

“Putin has worked the West out,” a Polish official told Financial Times. “He knows we won’t use force.”

In this photo taken Monday, Sept. 15, 2014, Konrad Wierzbicki, 23, stands in front of a memorial to Poles killed by the Soviet Union in the 1940s in Otwock near Warsaw,Poland. As Poland commemorates the 75th anniversary of the Soviet invasion of Poland at the start of World War II, Wierzbicki reflected on his feelings of Russian aggression in Ukraine. Many Poles fear that war could eventually spread to their country, though Wierzbicki is more optimistic given Poland’s membership in NATO. But “if something happens in the Baltics and NATO doesn’t react, then we know we will be alone,” he said. AP Photo/Czarek Sokolowski