Kaczyński made the statement in an interview with public broadcaster Polish Radio on Wednesday.
The leader of Poland's ruling Law and Justice (PiS) party said that Russia “is using its armed forces to at least destabilise Ukraine and make its life difficult.”
Russia has been massing troops and military hardware around Ukraine for weeks, fueling concerns among Western leaders that an invasion could be imminent.
Moscow has denied any such plans, but has demanded security guarantees from the United States and NATO. These include a ban on the alliance’s eastern expansion and a withdrawal of infrastructure from NATO’s eastern flank, Poland's PAP news agency has reported.
Kaczyński, who is also deputy prime minister in charge of security, said that "Russia’s actions around Ukraine are unacceptable from the point of view of international law and good manners.”
"But this doesn’t mean that everything must end in armed aggression,” he told Polish Radio.
“I am not convinced that Russia, President Vladimir Putin and his associates, were really planning an attack,” Kaczyński said, adding that maybe it was “one of the options, depending on the response of the West.”
He also suggested that “maybe it was the preferred option, but turned out to be more difficult than expected, and so has been discarded, at least for now.”
‘Russian attack on Ukraine still can’t be ruled out’
According to Kaczyński, the standoff has already caused economic losses to Ukraine, with investors as well as many diplomats and their families leaving the country.
“The question now is whether the Russians will continue this game or … whether they have decided that this phase has ended,” he said.
Kaczyński added: “I am not overly optimistic on that score, although the worst option, war, with people dying and cities being destroyed, seems relatively less likely today, yet it still can’t be ruled out."
A senior US administration official said on Wednesday that the United States did not believe Russia's claim to be withdrawing troops from the Ukrainian border and suspected Moscow had increased its presence by about 7,000 troops, the Reuters news agency reported.
(pm/gs)
Source: IAR, PAP, Reuters