a city of nearly 3 million in the coming days. russia can still choose diplomacy. it is not too late to deescalate and return to the negotiating table. reporter: there are no signs russia is backing away, defense officials say russia has moved half of its forces into attack position. u.s. intelligence suggests russia has up to 190,000 forces near and in ukraine. for weeks, biden has predicted russia could use addition information, false flag operations and cyber attacks to goad ukraine into war. the white house says that s exactly what s happening. we believe the russia government is responsible for wide scale cyber attacks on ukraine this week. reporter: russia is accusing ukraine genocide against russian speakers, allegations mr. biden called phony and fabricated. and when it comes to that assertion from the president that putin has made a decision. we heard from the defense
perspective, anastasia, on the false flag operations that president biden and other western allies have accused russia s vladimir putin in trying to corrupt. how do you believe that is to justify the war in ukraine? you know, there are russian people and there are russian people. it s a big country with millions of people, so there are definitely there is a contingency that watches the russian tv and the propaganda that s been pumped in them 24/7, now several years ever since anti-ukrainians with propaganda and the annex of crimea. that segment is really buying into what they re being fed but i also believe that there is a large group of russians that
interest in retaking. yes, and we have heard within the last hour. interest in retaking. yes, and we l have heard within the last hour or two of this apparent separatist appeal to russia which could be the pretext that obviously i wonder if these from pages will actually change because this is clearly moving at the moment, but honestly we also had to be very careful about the information that s coming out. yeah, and if you say is difficult to know yeah, and if you say is difficult to know exactly what s going on on the ground know exactly what s going on on the ground when we are clearly not there ground when we are clearly not there but ground when we are clearly not there. but very concerning reports about there. but very concerning reports about the there. but very concerning reports about the letters that had been sent to president putin asking for help to president putin asking for help to deal to president putin asking for help to deal with ukrainian aggression and t
a few months later the soviets shelled their own people as a reason or a cause to attack finland. so there is a long tradition of this. you shoot your own and say the other side did it and therefore we have to start a war. i think that s a big worry right now. all right. thank you so much, mr. president. we greatly appreciate you being with us. obviously much to be concerned about regarding these false flag operations that we ve been warned about by the cia. thank you so much. julia yoffe, i m just curious. let me ask you the $64,000 question. what does vladimir putin want? what has he wanted from the beginning? is he getting what he has wanted or has it backfired against him? yes and no. yes, that is the $64,000, although with inflation it is
the white house? the white house? white house officials have the white house? white house officials have essentially - officials have essentially accused russian officials of lying when they said that troops were being moved back from the border although white house officials say that those claims are false. indeed, they say that when the last few days, as many as 7000 additional troops have been added along the ukrainian border and some of them as recently as today. now, those claims echo allegations made by the nato secretary general earlier today who made the point that instead of actively withdrawing troops, russia was accumulating them along the border with ukraine and white house officials have also said they are increasingly concerned about the possibility of so called false flag operations by russia, whereby russian troops would carry out some sort of attack against their