we had an incident on wednesday where the russian air force was in the airspace of the swedish island of gotland, the swedish flew up, and there was a bit of a confrontation, and it ended peacefully. but perhaps it was a sign that there were lots of ways of tweaking the tail, as it were, of your neighbours, without actually invading them or using aggression. perhaps the biggest change, though, has been in germany s approach. they have almost kind of abandoned decades of policy over this? it s an astonishing about turn. almost overnight, within days, virtually, we threw away all our sacred cows of political prudence and so forth. we stopped this nord stream 2 gas pipeline, first of all, which was to be our main source for our energy supply from russia, that s now gone. it cost tens of billions to build, it isn t going to happen, it isn t going to go into operation. we are sending military hardware, an unconscionable
has suspended its nord stream 2 gas pipeline, announced plans to build two new terminals to convert lng into gas and acknowledged that it might have to use more coal and to extend the life of its nuclear plants that were scheduled to be shuttered. these policies are coming from a coalition government whose second most important partner is the green party, which historically has been tenacious in its environmental goals. the biden administration has said that the stakes could not be higher, and that s right. if putin s aggression succeeds, we will live in a different world, so let us make sure that he does not. when adolf hitler attacked the soviet union winston churchill explained that if hitler invaded hell, he, churchill, would have found something nice to say about the devil. all we must do is take some steps to support all non-russian
we are expecting president biden to address the sanctions and announce them any moment now. nato allies are doing the same. germany took steps to halt the nord stream 2 gas pipeline from russia, something only a few weeks ago the country seemed hesitant to do. germany s new chancellor olaf scholz called vladimir putin s actions a serious break of international law. now there are also real concerns the unmarked military vehicles that began arriving in the streets of eastern ukraine overnight may only be the beginning after declaring the regions of luhansk and donetsk as independent states, vladimir putin announced he would recognize the breakaway regions, a much larger piece of territory than russian-backed separatists currently hold. adding to all of that tension putin received approval from his parliament today for use of military force. so far, though, he has stopped short of announcing an immediate
change the security architecture of europe and they are worried about disinformation campaigns at cyber attacks. the baltic states have already raised the alarm and they will be looking to fellow eu members tomorrow to they have their backs. 0k, tomorrow to they have their backs. ok, and to sarah in washington. the pentagon has been holding a briefing in the last few minutes. what have they been saying? they been saying? they have been warmin: they been saying? they have been warming they they been saying? they have been warming they believe they been saying? they have been warming they believe russia - they been saying? they have been warming they believe russia is - they been saying? they have been warming they believe russia is in l they been saying? they have been | warming they believe russia is in a position to be able to attack and so, while in the us they have been talking up the economic measures they have been taking and threatening further, they don t appear to believe
reservists and seek ac diplomatic position. how optimistic is president zelenskyy? well, look. first off, president zelenskyy or other ukrainian officials have been really welcoming the sanctions imposed by the united states and by other western powers like britain, particularly germany, which went ahead and put a hold on the nord stream 2 gas pipeline from russia to germany, a big strategic project that was causing a lot of concern and the germans have gone out there and they ve put a hold on it balls of what russia has done and recognized these two flagrant republics. that s one thing they have been dock. that s given the ukrainians some confidence. they are also stressing and volodymyr zelenskyy the president said stressing the diplomatic path, they are using every opportunity they have good to bring this crisis to an end through diplomatic means.