russia had paid for his political rise and for his political party. they had worked to install him in power. they totally controlled him. he was their guy. that was how russia controlled ukraine. they controlled the ukrainian president. they installed him in power and told him what to do and he did it. and russia, of course, didn t want ukraine to have better economic ties to the west. they didn t want ukraine to have any ties to the west. they wanted ukraine to only be tied to russia. and so when ukraine had the opportunity to sign on to this pro-european trade deal, russia didn t want him to do it and russia s guy in ukraine, this very corrupt, very compromised pro-russian president said he wouldn t sign that trade deal with europe. he said instead he would sign a knew one with russia. people in ukraine did not want that. they wanted to stop looking east. they wanted to look west instead. so in response they started protesting. in november of 2013. and a few months into it,
here. it is presidents day today, february 20th. presidential historian gonna be with us tonight. she s gonna be with us here live very very much looking forward to that conversation. but it was on this date, which won february 20th in 2014 when the group they call the heavenly hundred was killed. it was actually 118 people, call them the heavenly hundred. the youngest of them was just 16 years old. the oldest of them was 83 years old. it all happened as the culmination of protests that had started the previous november, people were protesting in ukraine. because the government of that country had had the chance to sign on to a big trade deal with europe. a deal that was expected to have big economic benefits for ukraine, it was definitely something that would bring ukraine closer to europe. closer to the west. people in ukraine frothy war, really looking forward to. it this is a popular thing they very much wanted it. but the president of ukraine at the time decided he was
confidence, how this will end. as bad as russia s military has performed in traditional combat thus far, russian infrastructure attacks, punishing ukrainian civilians have been quite effective. they re finding that shooting power plants, shooting water infrastructure is easier than fighting on posing forces. and they re focusing on that to an intensifying degree. and that of course imposes immense costs on the civilians of ukraine. also today, another international factor in play. today while president biden was in kyiv, the top foreign policy official in the chinese government traveled to moscow amid warnings from the u.s. government that china is ramping up its help to the russian side in this war. china materially propping up russia in this war would, of course, change the arithmetic about how long it would take for russia to exhaust its efforts and resources and its will in fighting all these losing
compared to expectations for what the russian military was capable of these things. on the other side of the ledger, ukraine s resilience and their military performance has been shockingly good compared to the world s expectations for how they would stand up against such insult. but even so, it is not like anyone can clearly say that ukraine is winning. or indeed, it is not at all clear that anyone can say with any real clarity of war any confidence of this is going to end. i mean, as mad as russia s military has performed in traditional combat, thus far, russian infrastructure attacks punishing ukrainian civilians have been quite effective. i mean, they are finding that shooting power plants and shooting water infrastructure is easier than fighting opposing forces. and they are focusing on that to an intensifying degree. and that of course imposes the manse costs on the civilians of ukraine. also today, another international factor at play, today while president biden was