starving people, cutting them off from one another. it s the latest example of the outrageous atrocities that the russian forces are committing against innocent ukrainian civilians, children and their families. the united states is working together to provide critical equipment to make emergency repairs to their power transmission systems and strengthen the stability of ukrainian s grid in the phase of russia s targeted attacks. we re working to hold russia accountable to make it easier to seek justice for russia s war crimes in ukraine. let me close with this. tonight is the fourth night of hanukkah. a time when jewish people around the world president zelensky and many families among them honor the timelessmer call, the small band of warriors fighting for their values and freedom against a much larger foe and how they
than for than 2.5 million ukrainians. the united states and our allies and partners have delivered a broad range of assistance at historic speed and haas been critical. ukraine has won the battle of kyiv, won the battle of kherson, won the battle of kharkiv. ukraine has defied russia at every single turn. president zelensky, you have made it clear that he is open to pursuing let me put it that way. he s not open but you re pursuing peace. you re open to pursuing a just peace. we also know that putin has no intention of stopping this cruel war. the united states has committed to ensuring that the brave ukrainian people can continue to defend their country against russian aggressions as long as it takes.
apart if the clock runs out, the inpatience of the american people kick in and the united states withdraws its hand from the security of ukraine and from the leadership role we played to the european continent. europe is not a monolith as we talked about before. germany does not have the spine necessary to hold a coalition together. and good and determined allies that have contributed a lot. po poland, the british have been very good on supporting ukraine. all of those countries, none of them are able to hold the coalition together. it s only the united states. if we withdraw our hands, it all falls apart. zelensky understand that. neil: you know, we re in it as long as it takes the president says. but its been taking upwards of a year now. we re patient about it. obviously zelensky himself is very grateful for the fact that we are and keep forwarding the money and the weapon systems.
helping equip our friends in eastern europe to win this war is a direct investment to reducing putin s future capabilities to menace americans. it s not unusual to have a war-time leader speak to congress against the holidays. winston churchill did so on december 26th 1941, just after the u.s. entered world war ii. now, zelensky requested aid when he spoke virtually to a joint meeting of congress in march and former ukrainian leader poroshenko asked for aid in a similar meeting in 2014. neil? neil: amazing. thanks, chad. president zelensky will be on capitol hill addressing that congress at 7:30 p.m. eastern time. let s get a read meanwhile on how russians are responding to this. for that we go to nate foy in kyiv. nate? hey, neil. russia sent multiple messages
today. first at noon. a russian fighter jet took off capable of launches a hypersonic missile and few close to ukrainian airspace. they were testing the ukrainian air defense. so that was one thing. the other putin made another nuclear threat today. that s president putin. president zelensky of course is waiting on the joint press conference with president biden at the white house. let s show you how he got to the states. this was at a train station in poland. you can see him get off the train. he s accompanied by security. just hours before that yesterday, take a look at this. if you remember, we reported about a gift that ukrainian soldiers gave to zelensky for the u.s. congress. it was a signed flag with letters of appreciation to u.s. lawmakers for all of the military aid throughout the war.