that retired air force intelligence officer colonel cedric leighton, former deputy director of national intelligence beth sander and the director of the threats national project at the center for strategic and international studies. a lot to unpack. beth, you most recently were in the room with presidents talking about world events and crises. what did you make of the substance of what the president said and the approach that he took? well, i think that the white house has been just immaculately focused on making sure that everyone knows we had nothing to do with this. there s actually been a little chatter in russia today suggesting that they were going to be blaming the united states and the west. the messages that have gone out to moscow all throughout the weekend, so two messages, this wasn t us, and the second message is we remain firmly focused on ukraine. and it wasn t just chatter,
avid student of russian history. he knows that the real threat from within is from a military force, not from the civil society, which he s basically extinguished. so you know, i m sure he is extremely worried. a lot of us are wondering, beth, what all of this means, what is unfolding in russia right now, what all of this means ultimately for the people of ukraine. yes, well, i mean it could be a point that we look back and say that was it, that was the watershed moment that led to ukraine prevailing. at this point, i d say, you know, that s kind of getting ahead of ourselves a little bit. i don t think that we ve seen any signs of movements on the battlefield, but this obviously will have long-term implications, no matter what happens here, even if in the next hour, putin is able to take
bolshevik party which is the communist party of today. putin understands this history very well, he knows it is an existential threat to him. it certainly is. putin, beth, as you know, has stayed in power over these past what 23 years or so by playing rival factions against each other in russia. is what we are seeing the result of putin failing to keep one of his underlings in check, namely prigozhin? i think so. i think that this is just another example of putin making, you know, a colossal error in judgment, and misunderstanding what was going on. now, i do think that he was afraid to muzzle prigozhin, and that s why he did that, and you know, this idea of maybe prigozhin letting off steam, those kinds of things, but i mean really, a month ago, it should have been obvious to putin that he needed to put some
closely, as i m sure they are. i m sure they are indeed. beth, peter, thanks to both of you. countries around the world right now are urging calm amid these escalating tensions inside russia. the diplomatic implications of this dramatic escalation inside russia, we ll have more on that just ahead. i could live to be 100. we work with empower, even if we do live to 100 we don t have to w worry. eh, , not worried. takeke control of your financial future to empower whahat s next. when the davises bookedd their vrbo vacation home, they didn t know about this view. or the 200-year-old tree in the backyard. or their nghbors down the hill. because vrbo is different. you see the total price up front. of course, it s good to leave room for some surprises. boo!
united states is very cognizant of. and you know, we don t know what putin might do if his back is completely against the wall. there have been multiple occasions where he has hinted we use these weapons. so to me, ha would be the main concern here. yeah, i agree. and beth, you want to give me a final thought on that? yeah, i mean you know, i think that the prospects of use of a nuclear weapon is very low, but not zero. and so again, as things unfold in unpredictable ways, a week ago, impossible really for us to imagine that we are here today. war, as one of the great military and historians says, is full of friction and fog and very hard to predict. so i think that everybody in the intelligence community and the white house and our allies have good reason to be watching this