450,000 to 500,000 troops from the ukrainian side and at least 250,000 in forward positions on the russian side backed up by hundreds of thousands more, i m sure. so this is what with 700,000 human lives on the line, and political assassinations in the works for vladimir putin, this is what mike pompeo who would like to run for president some day thinks of vladimir putin. very shrewd, very capable, i have enormous respect for him. i ve been criticized for saying that. i have enormous respect for him. he was also an interlocutor that was always well informed, and deeply clear about what russian interests were. i appreciated that. it required the same from us, from me, from my team, we had to be equally prepared, and equally protective of the interests that mattered to the united states. he s very savvy, very shrewd. i wish john mccain were alive to call mike pompeo what he is.
him. jeremy, you understand this better than i do, but one of putin s tools for uniting his own country is playing an endless loop of republicans like mike pompeo and tucker carlson cheering him on. taking his side over the side of the american president. are we at the point now where you can offer any analysis of the impact in terms of how that strengthens putin s hand in this conflict? well, general mccaffrey knows this as well as anybody. one of the ways that the united states prevailed during the cold war era is that for the most part, partisanship ended at the water s edge. not to say there aren t debates about how to pursue this capability or that diplomatic effort. when it came to showcasing american resolve on the global change, we didn t have one democratic position and one republican position. we had just team usa. i think that helped us defeat
donetsk asking for recognition and the night ended with now i would say the infamous speech, where putin essentially laid out a deeply paranoid and grievance filled view about the west. about addressing what he saw as a laundry list of wrongs committed against russia that need to be addressed. and he really kind of whittled away methodically at the idea of the concept of ukrainian state hood and left it at saying russia created ukrainian. this is russian territory. and ukraine is now a threat to russia. it points to a man who has a very specific read of russian history, ukrainian history. i brought up the security council meeting because it also paints a picture of a man who s very isolated. it s historically not a great mixture. matthew, let me ask you about this protection of the show. the stage craft and everything s
150,000 troops, air, land, sea capability looks as if putin is proceeding deliberately. you were the second person since we ve been on the air to anticipate that combat is imminent. can you say more about that? well, one of the things i noticed richard engel was reporting, there was light armor moving through the streets of these two separatist provinces last night with the markings painted out. really incredible the hybrid warfare that putin has learned in his multiple invasions of other countries. the bulk of the troops now, i m reading reporting, some 80% of them, have moved into their attack positions. they re within five, 15 kilometers of the border. i m sure they ve all got their
they kept him in it. his party now clearly was where trump was. and i want to read kinzinger s tweet to you, tim. he writes, still technically a member with house republicans, let me with all my might condemn this awful tweet during this crisis. you can criticize policy this is insane and feeds into putin s narrative, but, hey, retweets, am i right? what do we do with, like, adam kinzinger and liz cheney as the only people left with a pulse of moral clarity in terms of u.s. foreign policy? the tweet, the trolling, the unseriousness, the hatefulness that i thought the earlier tweet was right to the point about targeting our fellow man, targeting domestic political foes like biden or whatever teachers who are treating teaching them that racism is bad