now, that he set himself up for this by mounting forces so aggressively. i ve certainly heard a lot of pessimism from democratic and republican lawmakers, also military officials about rur yeah s plans. do you share that pessimism? do you believe that russia can still be deterred from a further invasion? yes. i ve been pessimistic since i wrote a piece on january 11th in defense one saying that there was 50% or more chance that vladimir putin was going to do something. why? because we can t the fundamental thing that he wants is control over ukraine s sovereignty and actually sphere of influence in the international system, one where the rules that we have in place right now to protect the sovereignty of states doesn t exist. wet can t compromise on that. i m not really sure what we can give vladimir putin. the other reason is, of course, every day, jim, he s escalated. every day he s moved more forces.