confrontation between nato and a nuclear-armed russia. >> i would say what our assessment is based on is how to prevent a world war here, peter, which is a significant weight that the intelligence community, the defense department, and the president of the united states weighs at every moment in time. >> american officials were working with poland to try to figure out a way to get these planes to ukraine and also provide other fighters to poland to make up for the transfer. poland surprised officials announcing it would make the soviet-built planes effort and the entire effort fell apart. the administration says it is avoiding a war in ukraine the u.s. and nato will defend every inch of nato territory. nato is bolstering its eastern flak. their mission has changed from deterrence to defense. more soldiers are leaving for the eastern flank of nat owe from the third infantry