demanding immediate withdrawal of forces and immediate cease-fire. the russians not saying what their main goal is. brianna, it is clear that russia is not where i wants to be right now. remember, there were predictions the russians could take the capital city in 24 to 48 hours. we have strong evidence of this stiff resistance that the ukrainians are putting up. first to the east of here, and the second biggest city kharkiv near the russian border. we have seen fierce fighting in the streets. ukrainian forces literally pushing back russian troops. you can see in the video russian vehicles and troops literally going backwards. and ukrainian forces firing round after round of rpgs. and we have seen a column of russian vehicles absolutely torched by the ukrainians. matthew chance was out there. that shows the devastation that
change. do the talks change the dynamic, lead to any of these things? we ll see. the dynamic very different than just a few days ago. yeah. the ukrainians clearly emboldened. this is the border between ukraine and belarus. this is the region. woulder not giving the exact location. we are waiting for new reporting about what is actually taking place. this to increase the readiness of nuclear deterrence, what does that mean and how is the u.s. responding? reporter: let s talk bit, john, in quite careful terms. this requires amount of context. you have the russian president with the largest nuclear arsenal in the world saying over the week, and this is significant, that he put those forces on alert. as you heard and you mentioned earlier, the white house position is this is another manufactured threat. and i ve talked to multiple people in the military about
preparing for this contin citizen say. we contingency. they are not able to use their slush fund to pay down some of their debt and buy rubles on the international market. the best word or strongest word from the kremlin is they re working on what to do about the sanctions. they ve said they will respond internationally as well. what they re going to do about that isn t clear. the biggest problem seems fixing the economy at home. yeah. all right. nic, thank you so much for putting it into context. they are real ramifications putin has to contend with. now incredible footage just into cnn. matthew chance is on the front lines of the capital of kyiv. reporter: there has been a ferocious battle here on the outskirts of kyiv. and this is one of those russian soviet era vehicles which is completely burned out.
demands are simple. and let s just say right now, quite strong. they want an immediate cease-fire and all russian forces to withdraw from the country. it s notable, john, that in just a few days, ukraine is in the position to make such a demand, radio it? because, remember, as this invasion began with the odds stacked against them, are issue that frankly not listening to talks or the possibility of talks. and the u.s., nato, ukraine deciding that talks were not useful because of russia s advance but also russia s enormous advantage. with the slow progress of the russian invasion, it s a different dynamic right now. listen, the kremlin may very well reject that demand. the fact that ukraine can make that demand this morning in these talks and also refuse the original russian talks to have it in minsk because they do not view it as neutral ground given belarusian involvement is a
it is part of russia s military doctrine that the use of tactical weapons, being relatively small. still with enormous capability on a hiroshima scale to destroy cities and things. but tactical nuclear weapons are part of their military doctrine as first use in response to a conventional threat. it s different from the way the u.s. and other countries look at nuclear weapons. so when you add those injects, yes, the prevailing view may be, yes, this is a manufactured threat. but because it s nuclear and because putin s decision-making is believed to be questionable at this point and, three, because it s part of russian military doctrine, it is something that folks take seriously. to be clear, the same guy who ordered this massive invasion into ukraine, the same guy suffering setbacks that we are seeing in this invasion, that s the same guy who, no the to be