welcome back to "face the nation." we continue our conversation now with ukrainian ambassador to the united states. ambassador, president zelenskyy has made clear on multiple occasions now that ukraine needs

more patriot missile systems. he says your country only has about 25% of the air defense systems it needs. is the united states going to provide that help? >> well, first of all, let me second president zelenskyy on the need. i mean, clearly i was there just for two days, but every day we hear in the news just today 27 wounded, 5 dead already, we don't know, maybe more. clearly russia is doubling down on their war crimes. they found new fronts to produce more bombs, horrible, just trying to destroy as many peaceful citizen in ukraine as soon as possible. the fastest way to stop it is to provide us more air defense. it's also the efficient way. not only will it save lives but it will save the energy generation. we will have to spend a lot of money and effort to restore and rebuild so desperately need it.

we are in very active conversations, literally pentagon and i would like to thank them as we are preparing for the new ramstein group meeting next week working day and night to find it. frankly, this is the time when everyone has to give us a little bit of theirs. so we're very grateful to those providing us systems. we're grateful to the u.s. for looking for them, locating them, finding them and now we need to take brave positions and provide them so we can seed them where we need them, kharkiv and that area, but other places need to be protected as well. >> germany was looking to provide some help on that front. >> yes. >> you mentioned an upcoming summit. c.q. brown, the chair of the joint chiefs, told reporters ukraine has asked for help to strike inside russia. the u.s. has been afraid to have u.s. weapons used in that kind

of a strike. what is it that ukraine's seeking to do? >> well, first of all, you remember we had this discussion for two years now. we have the right to defend ourselves. we are defending ourselves whether we are striking russian troops on our territory or russian troops outside of our territory. we have been trying to do that. of course there were some restrictions. i will not go publicly into discussions where we are on discussions with the u.s. or any other partners, but i want to say it's clear that russia is an aggressor here. it is clear they are preparing something so the u.n. rules, the international law and every other rules that exist in this country, which russia violated by the way, give us clear right to defend ourselves by striking an aggressor whether on our territory or where they're launching the attack from. >> do you need more training for your troops? i know there's now a new draft,

a lower age, you need more men fighting. >> and the training is ongoing. frankly, this is where we are cooperating with the u.s. and with other partners. we would like to see more training being done in ukraine so not only we're training our troops but we are also becoming institutionally more strong, building our army of the future which will be protecting not just ukraine but all of us from russia. so, yes, in training it's going to be one of the key discussions with the allies. >> ambassador, thank you for providing us that update. we'll be right back.

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was that your grandfather, leading armies to battle? was that your great aunt, keeping armies alive? drafting the plans. taking the pictures. was it your family members who flew? who fixed. who fought. who rose to the occasion. when the world needed them the most. discover, preserve, and share the stories of your family's heroes. explore all us military records on ancestry for free today. and we're joined by cbs news cybersecurity expert chris krebs. good to have you back. >> good to be back. >> so in our polling that we just carried out in arizona in particular, it was a center of election denialism back in 2020

and we're seeing this again. i mean, nearly half of trump's supporters say the 2024 presidential results in arizona should be investigated and challenged if biden wins. seven in ten from those who identify themselves as maga. is this going to be a repeat of 2020? what's going to happen? >> well, you know, all these claims are despite any credible evidence being supported in the courts to everyone else and the experts out there. we're continuing to see claims of problems with 2020 and even 2022 the mid terms. the incentive structures, the way they're aligned, it creates plenty of permissive environment despite any credible evidence and continued investments in election security, resilience, modernizing election systems. back in 2020 we talked about having 95% or so ballots cast on

paper. now that number is probably close to 98. we have made improvements in the last several years. >> it's interesting you make that point about paper because on the campaign trail donald trump claims 2020 was rigged. claims 2024 might be as well. listen to what he just said. >> our goal at election will be one day voting with paper ballots, proof of citizenship and voter i.d. very simple. if you want to save america and your second amendment, vote early, vote on election day, i don't care. >> so two things there. now he is for mail-in ballots. he was against them in 2020, but you just said there already is a paper trail. he's saying there is none. >> the vast majority of votes cast in the united states right now are with a paper trail. there is a small percentage that are recorded down on election systems, but that's for accessibility purposes, for those that may have visual

impairment or otherwise. it's important to ensure open voting processes. the one-day voting push, this drive, it's actually counter productive. it's counter to participation in the democratic system and resilience and security. that longer run up, the weeks, months in advance of the election, allows us to detect if there are any issues, get on top and fix them. if you had election on one single day, somebody might get sick, might not be able to get to the polls. if something happens early on, it could have a cascading, catastrophic impact and getting to the polls and voting. i'm much more in favor of the system we have now with early voting, mail-in and absentee ballots. >> the director of national intelligence, they testified they are so prepared. election infrastructure has

never been so secure. we are hearing china is experimenting things like generative ai to influence voters. how do people understand actual influence versus tinkering. >> i think that's the right distinction. there's interference which is the technical interference and as jen easterly said, the investments we're making, the continued improvements across systems, i would even suggest that, you know, when we said 2020 that it was a safe and secure election, it's even more safe and secure now because of those continued investments, because of continued improvements across the systems. your point on influence, the scope, the scale, the technology available to our adversaries, including ai and deep fakes, it is a much more precarious threat environment. the chinese are active. russians are very active. they've been using deep fakes in it europe. we've seen ai pop up in maldova,

slovakia, bangladesh. it is going to be a tool. my sense, however, is threats that are ai powered or ai enabled will be much like what happened in new hampshire with the robo call. it will be immediately detected, investigated and prosecuted. that's what's happening right now. the biggest concern is this is cumulative. it's accretive. rather than one event, it will be a steady drum beat where we the voters are going to lose confidence and trust in the over arching information ecosystem. >> we're seeing that in our polling. >> some might say that's part of the strategy. >> that's scary. >> absolutely. >> cnn was reporting both the chinese and iranian governments tried to use fake ai content back in 2020 but chose not to deploy it. is that accurate? >> i can't speak to the specific intelligence there. it should not be a surprise though. we've been talking about deep fakes and ai as a risk vector

for years, for half a decade at least. to say whether it's the russians, chinese, iranians, north koreans, whomever have been tinkering or researching this as recently as four years ago, i think that's entirely credible. we are seeing it now though. we are seeing, as i mentioned, already in europe. we're seeing it here as well and i would expect that between now and the election we will continue be to see ai created content pop up. this is where it's important for the tech platforms to ensure they're on the lookout for it. >> right. >> the ai companies are ensuring their platforms cannot be manipulated. the challenge is the open source models that can be used. >> we need to keep talking to you about this in the months to come because it sounds like it will be a persistent issue. we'll be right back.

we turn now to former defense secretary and former cia director robert gates who we spoke with on friday from the college of william & mary where he serves as chancellor. we began by asking him why national security should matter

to voters this election year. >> our leaders need to bring these issues home to the american people in a very direct way. the world isn't going to ignore us just because we think we can ignore the world. so the first thing is to make clear that if we don't deal with these problems early, they become very dangerous problems and very costly problems for the united states down the road. the other is to explain to the american people, for example, how we are economically interconnected with the rest of the world. >> well, if president trump were to win again, what could he do differently in a second term that would give him a stronger legacy? i know you've been critical of some of his behavior when he was in office. >> i think you'd probably see significantly different domestic policies in a number of areas. i think one thing he's been clear about for a long time is the need for tariffs to protect american industry and so on. i think he would also have a

different approach in many areas with respect to foreign policy, and in terms of trying to end the war in ukraine, it's never made quite clear how he's going to do that or what terms he would have to agree to or how he would handle the issues in the south china sea differently. so, you know, i think that there's an element of unpredictability in his case of not knowing what he really has in mind to deal with any of these specific issues, especially on national security. >> would you be open to voting for mr. trump? >> oh, i'm not even going to begin to go there. >> because you did write an essay in foreign affairs where you were pretty specific in criticism. you said his disdain for allies, fondness for authoritarian leaders, erratic behavior undermine u.s. credibility. you were critical of president biden in his withdrawal in

afghanis afghanistan. do you think he's been able to repair that damage. >> i think he gained a lot of credibility with the speed with which he assembled the coalition of partner countries, allies and friends before, during and after the russian invasion of ukraine, putting together that three dozen countries willing to help ukraine with money, with military assistance and so on. being able to warn the allies before the russians actually invaded so that when they did we had enormous credibility with others that we knew what we were talking about and we knew the nature of putin's threat. i think a lot of people would agree that there's been some unnecessary delays in getting necessary equipment to -- certain kinds of equipment to the ukrainians. i'm not talking about the six-month late supplemental that was just passed by the congress,

i'm talking about going back a year and a half or two years, whether it was tanks or missiles or aircraft that after long debate and deliberation, decision was finally made to provide them. >> vladimir putin was in china this past week visiting his ally, xi jinping, and he said friday russian troops are advancing daily in ukraine. what do you think it will take to stop this momentum? >> well, this is one of the places where, frankly, the six-month delay in getting the supplemental passed has been a problem because that poses a real crisis, i think. the circumstances in it ukraine right now are quite dire. the russians are moving not only around kharkiv but elsewhere along the front. putin has taken the last six months to a year to rearm, reequip, recruit. i've read numbers that he's putting as many as 30,000 new troops a month into ukraine. they have more troops in ukraine

now, the russians do, than they did at the beginning of the war. >> during that time russia has also built up more support for its effort with iran, with north korea supplying it weapons, with china now, u.s. intelligence says, helping to reconstitute the military industrial base, even jointly producing drones. what consequence should there be for a country like china for helping this war to continue? >> there are a variety of other sanctions that are available to the administration and to the europeans that could bring additional pressure on the chinese at a time when the economy is not doing very well. >> would they make a difference? >> they could. they could. the chinese have very large stakes in other problems, in other relationships around the world in addition to russia, and, you know, until a year or so ago they were being pretty

careful about what they were providing to the russians. they still have not, as best we know, have not provided actual weapons to the russians. the that's been a red line for the united states. and putin, frankly, if you look at the cabinet changes that putin has just made, they're all focused on militarizing the russian economy to sustain a huge military for a long time going forward. this is not a one-time problem with just ukraine. putin has decided to take russia in a different -- in a different direction that poses a real threat to all of its neighbors and the chinese by helping them are enabling that. the. >> the chinese president was just touring through europe and he was in france. i wonder what you think about the french president's statement that nothing should be ruled out when it comes to sending western troops to ukraine. i know some other european countries have also leaned into that idea. should it be taken off the table by both biden and trump? >> i think the notion of

deploying nato troops into ukraine causes a lot of domestic concern, not just in this -- in the united states but in europe as well. i don't think you take things off the table, but i also don't think you put them on the table in an explicit way. part of my problem is that our government talks too much and some other governments talk too much as well. sometimes it's better just to do things and not tell people you're doing them, but maybe that's the old cia guy. >> is that suggesting more training then of ukrainian troops? >> i think -- i think we are clearly -- there's going to have to be more training of ukrainians, particularly with their new conscription law and the number of new people coming into the ukrainian military. training can take place in western europe or it conceivably could take place in ukraine as

well. >> one of the guests on our program, j.d. vance, has likened u.s. support for ukraine to the u.s. invasion of iraq making that argument that there's like a creeping u.s. role potentially. he also went to the munich security conference but skipped meetings with president zelenskyy and the head of nato saying he wouldn't learn anything new. what do you say to a leading republican like him? >> rather than get into specific personalities, i just think that people need to open their eyes and be willing to listen to other points of view and be willing to learn, particularly from people who have been around like senator mcconnell and others who can help him and others understand that this is a different kind of aggression by far than be what happened in

iraq in 2003, and there is no assurance that putin will stop with ukraine. and to not understand that potential threat and also the degree to which it encourages other aggressors around the world i think -- i think some additional information, briefings and education may be required. >> i want to ask you about the middle east where there already are multiple shooting wars on multiple fronts involving u.s. ally israel. do you agree with president biden's decision to withhold some specific armaments from the netanyahu government while surging others? >> one of the things that has struck me is the degree to which the netanyahu government has essentially ignored the views and requests of his closest ally beginning with more humanitarian

assistance and taking care of the civilians in gaza. i think that there are ways that we can pressure israel. the truth of the matter is 2,000 pound bombs that are not precision guided inevitably lead to a lot of collateral damage. they basically collapse buildings. i'm all for providing all other kinds of weapons to israel, including precision guided bombs and other equipment that they may need, but i think when our allies ignore us, and particularly on issues that are of huge importance to us and to the region, then i think it's reasonable to take actions that try to get their attention. >> there were extraordinary statements from israel's defense minister this past week where he publicly criticized his own prime minister saying he can't get an answer to some key questions like what happens at the end of this war.

he called on netanyahu to make a decision, declare israel will not establish civilian control or military control over the gaza strip and start talking to international actors about who is going to govern. what do you think about such a public split like this in the midst of the war? >> well, it's pretty extraordinary, but i think not unexpected. you know, the united states government has been asking prime minister netanyahu for months, what's your plan? what happens after the shooting stops? where are you going with this? what's the solution politically? what's the solution economically and in humanitarian terms? neither we nor the israelis, including his own defense minister, get any answers to those questions. >> i know you said you've never been a friend of beebe netanyahu. you said you met him back in 1989. are your concerns in regard to

u.s. national security that he could draw the u.s. into a wider conflict? >> my biggest concern, and we need to back up and have a little perspective here. there are, in fact, four wars going on in the middle east right now. not only the war in gaza, but the war on israel's northern border with hezbollah. the houthis in yemen and the disruption of the global supply chains through their attacks in the red sea and then the militias in syria and in iraq. there is one power behind all four of these conflicts, and that's iran. what we're not talking about, we've become so preoccupied with gaza, what we've failed to talk sufficiently about is how do we deal with an iran that is basically the one providing the arms, the planning, and the intelligence in all four of these conflicts and that iran is the source of the problem. >> we'll be right back.

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thanks for watching. for"face the nation," i'm margaret brennan. news, new

york. >> announcer: this is the "cbs overnight news." good evening. thank you for joining us. i'm nancy chen in for jericka. the helicopter carrying iran's president has apparently crashed in bad weather near the border with