nato, are you willing to say, look, it won t be considered for ten years. are you willing to put a time stamp on that, or is that capitulating too much? there is no question of capitulation. the question is whether there are ways to advantage our collective security. as parts of our policy, we meet with meme, we talk to people, we put things in writing all the time. in this case we re doing it in full consultation of allies and partners. it s a way of being as clear as you can, putting ideas on the table. but, chuck, one thing that s important to remember as someone who engages in diplomacy. engaging in diplomacy doesn t take the word yet out of your vocabulary. i want to play something the president said in the press conference. this created a bit of a stir. this is what he said. i think you will see that russia will be held accountable if it invades and it depends on what it does.
i think that s pretty clear. i think there are also plans considerably smaller in scale, and i think right now diplomacy is still being engaged in by both sides. but there s no question that 100,000 troops with more arriving daily, russian troops to the border including now to belarus for military exercises and the revelation of this intelligence plan all shows that the russians are quite serious that if diplomacy doesn t work some level of escalation is very, very likely indeed. right, because, nic, for its part russia is pushing hard for the u.s. to guarantee that ukraine will not be allowed to join nato. obviously, if that were to happen that would be a huge power blow to moskow. is the alliance likely to give into vladimir putin to keep peace in the region in any of these demands? not on those big demands that ukraine can t join nato, that nato should roll back to its
unvaccinated. yeah, we heard from emmanuel macron previously saying he wants to piss off the unvaccinated. well, now, they re making it very difficult for the nearly 5 million people in france in that cat category. mandating the covid vaccine card. it s different than what we ve seen previously, that requires citizens to prove whether or not they have the vaccine in order to access a variety of indoor and outdoor venues, as you mentioned long-distance travel in the country. now, a negative test won t be enough. they have to prove they have the vaccine. there has been major debate across the country and many now being forced to get the vaccine. the government has made it clear, it doesn t want them to go out and get it, but they see it as the only way out of this pandemic. but in addition to this, they will be easing restrictions from the beginning, from the area,
but he also recognised that he will never again be as strong as this to take advantage of the west s weakness. i suspect an invasion is now imminent. russia sparked this diplomatic conflict. this week, the us showed it s keen to resolve it peacefully. but it remains unclear how far both sides are prepared to go to placate the other. mark lobel, bbc news. let s speak to sergei goryashko from bbc russian two. we heard a conservative mp saying he thinks a russian invasion is imminent. what is your feeling? do you expect vladimir putin wants to expect in troops soon? fits you expect vladimir putin wants to expect in troops soon? expect in troops soon? as for this situation, there expect in troops soon? as for this situation, there are expect in troops soon? as for this situation, there are different - situation, there are different points of view. on the one side putin could use the pretext that diplomacy doesn t work with all
ukraine. how helpful do you think these conversations are? is putin likely listening, or is he just checking a box that he can say to the world, look, i engaged in diplomacy and ultimately decided it was best to go in? diplomacy is always better than shooting. it s the ukrainian people that stand to suffer the most if there s an invasion. but you re right, the diplomacy doesn t seem to be leading anywhere and it seems performative on some level as my colleagues julian barnes and helene cooper wrote this morning, the white house wants to expose the possible ways russia could fabricate a pretext for invasion so that it wouldn t work. if they re exposed in advance, the theory goes, they won t have that as a credible way of justifying the use of force. for the moment, remember, this is a manufactured crisis.