on previous visits they would have pictures visited in the protests in 2014. that death toll, those pictures numbering in the dozens. of course now a year into this war, the number of ukrainian dead numbering in the thousands. all those faces. clarissa ward in kyiv, thank you so much. joining me now to discuss, alexander vinman, former european affairs director for the national security council, i should note born in kyiv, ukraine, himself before immigrating here, becoming a u.s. citizen and joining the u.s. military. lieutenant colonel, good to have you on this morning. the president walked wartime, air raid sirens signaling behind him. what is the significance of this in your view to ukraine? i m proud of the president for visiting. this is probably the most important visit that a president has paid to ukraine the fifth visit of a president since the independence 1991, bill clinton visited three times, george bush visited once, actually days
different. the u.s. is not at war there. u.s. does not have full control over the security on the ground. quite a risk, i m sure the security measures put in place notable. kaitlan, thank you so much. clarissa, you were able to see in the capital, kyiv, boyden meet with zelenskyy this morning. i wonder what is the reception in ukraine to this? boost to moral? how significant for ukrainians? reporter: i think it s definitely significant. there has been a lot of excitement across the city. the city was brought to a standstill in terms of traffic this morning. large parts of the center cut off to vehicles entirely. but the only thing you saw on social media were essentially messages of excitement that president biden was finally making this trip. we heard president zelenskyy come out and say with this visit or with this conversation with president biden, ukraine is now one step closer to victory. and as you just heard there, with kaitlan, this is something
everything since then has been a setback. so now within a contest of ukraine supported by the u.s., he s bound to lose. yeah. let me ask you this, secretary blinken over the weekend while in munich said in a number of interviews that the u.s. is now concerned that china is considering sending lethal aid to russia to help in its war against ukraine. they have not done so in the first year of the war. this would be a notable change. how significant would it be if china were to provide such lethal aid, and would that make an impact? might it lengthen the war in your view? absolutely. i think the fact is that this is going to steadily slide into a proxy war, supported by the largest economies in the world. and that could make ukraine a perpetual land of war with battles on going for years. i don t know if china is going to make this step, public step, then it would make this bilateral relationship between
also seen him punish visits for their vaccination in mask policies. seen him put restrictions how businesses can train their employees around issues of race schism. we have seen him now say he wants to go after banks that lend in ways that he doesn t agree with. so, there s that part of it, but there s also republicans, including his supporters, who are worried that he might be flying too close to the sun with his war on wokeness. this most recent spat with the college board over this ap african-american studies class, i mean, he is now talking about potentially pulling ap classes out of florida entirely. finding alternatives to the s.a.t., these are things that parents around the country use to help their students get into good colleges, save money on their higher education and there are concerns that they don t know how this is going to play out nationally when he starts campaigning in a national campaign. and what we re seeing is republican candidates starting to seize on this a bit
will surely be seen and will surely have a reflection on the battlefield and in liberating our territories. we ve also talked about long-range weapons and the weapons that may still be supplied to ukraine, even though it wasn t supplied before. cnn s alex marquardt is in kyiv, ukraine, this morning. alex, we frequently seen this phenomenon going back to the start of the war a year ago, the u.s. sends category of weapons and the focus goes to what s the next category. now that kind of shiny object are f16s. were there substantive discussions about this visit to ukraine increasing the range of weapons that the u.s. and nato will send there? reporter: i think this is one of the more interesting points or parts of this visit, jim. zelenskyy spoke today about negotiations. we heard a lot of niceties between the two men. there s clearly genuine respect and admiration and thanks for