a spartacus moment. i'm michael smerconish in philadelphia. americans first heard of ukrainian president volodymyr zelenskyy after the infamous july 25th, 2019 telephone call that led to former president donald trump's first impeachment. zelenskyy had just been elected ukrainian president in a landslide election. he was eager to receive the 400 million of u.s. security aid that had been earmarked by congress for his nation to fend off a russian threat. and to obtain a commitment to

meet the american president so as to project unity and strength toward his russian aggressors. after trump rejected a request that zelenskyy first investigate the bidens, alexander vindman who was listening to the call by his duties reported what he heard and the rest is history. we have seen why zelenskyy was so eager for u.s. assistance. now the former actor and comedian has been transformed from the american footnote to the new face of freedom and defiance. trump is gone from office. but the question of whether the u.s. is giving zelenskyy all he needs lingers on president joe biden's watch. it's fair to say the u.s. and nato acquiesced to russia's invasion. on december 8th of last year, after meeting with putin, biden told supporters that sending troops to ukraine to deter russia was not on the table. on february 10th of this year

when asked by nbc's lester holt what could prompt to send troops to rescue americans fleeing the country, biden replied. that's not. that's a world war when americans and russians begin starting to shoot at one another. january 20th, jens stoltenberg told the bbc we have no plan to deploy nato troops to ukraine, we're focusing on providing support. just a few days later on february 4th, the nato deputy secretary-general told a french outlet that nato, quote, will not get involved, we support ukraine in many ways. individual allies support ukraine. so putin knew the only thing standing between russia and kyiv was the overmaved ukrainian army. no wonder that friday president zelenskyy lamented we are defending our country alone. just like yesterday, the most powerful country in the world looked on from a distance. and just this morning, he said this, the destruction by

missiles and artillery of residential buildings is the ultimate argument for the world to be by our side in stopping the occupiers' invasion. he also appealed to volunteers from abroad. quote, all the friends who want to join us, please come. we will give you weapons. the ukrainians are certainly doing what they can do. nothing better sums up their resilience when 13 border guards on ukraine's snake island refused to surrender to russian invaders. the final words, hey, russian warship, go "f" yourself, just before all 13 then died in a bombardment defines the conflict to eye date. president zelenskyy has announced they were posthumously be awarded the nation's title of hero of ukraine. nevertheless, it's hard to believe the ukrainian resistance can hold on for much longer. nor that this will end well in the long run for russia. ukrainians are fighting for love

of country. russians are fighting out of a fear of a dictator. and there are signs of that support buckling. on tuesday, putin needed to give his own spy chief a public dressing-down at a security council meeting after recognizing the independence of two separatist-controlled regions of ukraine, his subterfuge for the war. russian cultural leaders including musicians, tv stars and comedians have been voicing resistance on social media. thursday night, something once infamiliar thomable, thousands of people, chanting no to war as passing cars honked horns. and there were similar gatherings in other russian cities including st. petersburg, despite a warning from russian authorities they would face jail time. on friday, the daughter of putin's i did not spokesperson posted on social media. she's 24 and posted no to war on

her instagram account. zelenskyy for his part is courageous and a bit fatalistic. he has thus far rebuffed u.s. offers to evacuate kyiv to avoid being captured or killed. on friday, he said, according to the information we have, the enemy has marked me as target number one. my family is target number two. later on friday, for the first time, nato activated its response force as a defensive measure. that doesn't mean that the u.s. or nato forces will enter ukraine, because ukraine is not a nato member. but it's a sign of increased nervousness on the part of neighboring nato members. but it's probably not enough. the only way to thwart russian depression probably is by offensive action by u.s. and nato. but 20 years post-9/11, americans are fatigued by war in distant lands. there's nothing funny about the situation. but it's a former comedian to whom we can all look for

inspiration. i want to know what you think. this hour go to my website at smerconish.com and answer this week's survey question, should nato go to war for ukraine? joining me now to discuss is retired army lieutenant colonel alexander vindman, former director of european affairs of the national security council. he's author of the best-selling memoir "here right matters." and wrote this peace for "the atlantic," south america could done so much more. colonel vindman, thank you for being here. >> the biden team policy is 20 years of ineffective russia policy. so that just very narrowly bounded what they were thinking about doing. with regards to the diplomatic announcement that you pointed out in december, no boots on the ground, that did not need to happen.

there's a fear of a spiraling of bilateral confrontation that drove president biden to say that. instead, we could have maintained the strategic ambiguity policy that we could have continued to maintain in regards to taiwan. it may have been on the table that could have been a huge deterrent, it kind of gave a blinking yellow light. it's not just joe biden's fault. it's bigger than that. we could have provisioned ukrainians with more lethal aid. they're sorely looking in air defense capabilities. they're sorely lacking in the ships off the coast of odesa off of ukraine. and we were too narrow in thinks in the consequences about the fact we seem to recognize that something like this might come but we were fatalistic and elitist in fighting ukraine. now ukraine is leading the world. president zelenskyy is deeply inspiring. he's a world leader now.

he's leading the charge of democracy against authoritarian. we need to provision him. there are still things we can do. it's amazing what's unfolding on the battlefield. the ukrainian armed forces have basically stopped russian forces in most of the country in their tracks. the biggest gains are in the south. that's also a huge distance between there and kyiv. with additional armor and air defense they could start to equalize. they're not going to be sufficient against russia, high flyers, the aircraft flying above these stingers but it's going to be something. and we should think about more capable systems like thad that we could show them how to push the right buttons for ukrainians to defend themselves. those are high altitude systems. and really at this critical moment, they should be getting

unmanned aerial vehicles. push them across to ukraine. let them start to hit targets. probably not the targets that are right in their faces but the deep targets to support them. those cruise missiles and intercontinental ballistic missile platforms that are firing from across the border, start to take those out and degra degrade russia's operations. then logistic. central. right now the bulk received are front line units that's shocking. those are the units that should be achieving penetration. instead, they've moving too fast. they've outrun the logistics tail. those are going to be vulnerable. the ukrainians can start targeting those and completely freeze armed forced. still a hard slog, but there's a glimmer of light here we need to continue to nurture that. >> i share your assessment of

the inspiration that i feel from zelenskyy. it puts, i think in a totally different light, maybe not for you, but for me as an outsider, that telephone call. i wept back and i re-read the transcript and read your assessment from your memoir. this guy was coming to us hat in hand. he wanted the 400 million released. they wanted the grin and grip. he wanted the photo op and wanted to reflect unity and strength on the sides of the united states, to prevent exactly what's unfolding. give me your final thought on that? >> that's exactly right. we lost a major opportunity to harden ukraine in the enin intervening year. after that moment, we put the relationship on pause. certainly from the trump a administration. but biden administration. the huge pressure on russia.

the turks have ceased permitting russian warships to transit the straits into and out of the black sea. that has never happened before. that is going to be critical with protests, with s.w.i.f.t. sanctions because of the pressure that the ukrainians are applying, diplomatic engagement to get countries to buy into that. we're seeing a coalescence of upper. we just need the u.s. to come in with the programs to give ukraine what they need. >> final question, long ball question. do you see the signs that i referenced of buckling support, support that heretofore, maybe for putin maybe it didn't really exist, but people would have been silent? but now there's this increasing comfort level of people speaking out? what's the long-term prospect relative to ukraine, but you've got to do it in 30 seconds. >> sure. this is the biggest fear of russians. it's not the internal threat.

it's the palace coups. this is may be undoing of vladimir putin and his regime. and it's no longer a far-fetched notion. >> thank you, colonel. i appreciate your insight. you're uniquely qualified to be here today and i appreciate it. what are your thoughts? tweet me @smerconish. go to my facebook page. kathryn, from the world of twitter -- after his pevt rfect call from zelenskyy who the world now realizes is a hero and his attempt to dismantle nato, who cares. bless your heart it matters until so far as as relative to 2024. i'm not raising it let's blame trump or let's blame biden. there's plenty of blame to go around. my god, reread that transcript. it's embarrassing as an american to appreciate who this guy zelenskyy is. since you raised trump i'm going to say one other thing about it,

tonight at cpac will he condemn the russian invasion? that's my question. not enough to say would it have happened on my watch. will he condemn it. and relative to biden, as colonel vindman just said, never out loud should have said we're not going to commit troops and neither should nato. all that did is green light that for putin. they're not going to get in my way, i can march all the way to kyiv. make sure you go to my website at smerconish.com and answer this week's survey question, should nato go to war for ukraine? i cannot wait to see how the cnn audience votes on that. up ahead, the u.s. could be superattacked which could spread from here to europe. and cyber attacks can be rue viewed as major attacks.

could this force the u.s. to get more involved. i will ask america's fires cyber security czar richard clark. >> president biden has been struggling in the polls. given the situation in ukraine will americans rally around the flag? what does history teach us about presidents involved in foreign conflict? a hunter. because you didn't settle for ordinary. same goes for your equipment. versatile, powerful, durable kubota equipment. more goes into it. so you get more out of it. okay everyone, our mission is to provide complete balanced nutrition for strength and energy. woo hoo! ensure, complete balanced nutrition with 27 vitamins and minerals. and ensure complete with 30 grams of protein. ♪ ♪ check out this vrbo.

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is the russian invasion of ukraine necessarily bad political news for president biden? or might it be an opportunity

for the american people to unite and rally around a common enemy, russia? just before russia attacked ukraine, president biden warned america. >> defending freedom will have cost for us as well. and here at home. >> indeed, the escalating russian conflict and sanctions have desablized the stock market and raise already soaring gas prices for americans experiencing the highest inflation in 40 years. worried about difficult to solve domestic issues like crime and invasion. and with the messy pullout of afghanistan, and a new marist poll 50% of americans called it a failure. 39% called it a success. sometimes, presidents get a boost upping our military presence overseas. bill clinton defused his impeachment with the 1990 nato

involvement ending the war in kosovo. and carter's 1980, iran hostage crisis. lbj's decision not to run for re-election continuing the vietnam war. what impact could it have on biden's presidency? joining my a cornell professor, he's written about the battlefield casualties on the ballot box. professor, thanks for being here. we live in such a polarized era. do we still rally around the flag? >> thanks so much for having me, michael. the short answer is, yes, we do but it's a contingent one. one of the most important things that affects how we rally is how other political leads respond. political leads rally and when democrats and republicans come together as they did an 9/11, one of the examples you gave,

then we see popular rallies as well. but essentially when the opposition sits on the sideline and snipe, and then the rally fails to materialize and you can see political detriment from overseas policies. >> i fully recognize we're not directly in this. we may never be directly in this. with that caveat, when you look at modern history is there anything analogous. i think of papa bush, because i served that in administration, sky high inflation but it didn't help against bill clinton. >> yeah, the boost can be transient, right? i think it gets to how sal yent a sal lee yent a war going to be. george bush in the poll in 1991 and loses in '92.

with the golf war it might have been ten years ago. what about midterm elections? is foreign policy ever powerful in these situations? it can be. some of our research we looked at the 2006 midterms we looks at places in parts of the country that have suffered particularly high rates in iraq and afghanistan, with a whole bunch of things those parts of the country turned against republicans at the time more so than other parts of the country. you can get this sort of political retribution when american soldiers are committed to a fight that's turning out to be more costly than expected. what can we expect in this particular case, as you said, we're not engaged. but we're going to be judging the president judged on the severity of the response and whether or not he's threaded that political needle. >> research that you did with a colleague, in other words, we don't share equally the military burden in this country. some communities participating far more than others. and you saw, what, a

relationship between casualties on the battlefield and a result at the ballot box in those communities most affected? >> yes. absolutely. so if you're from a part of a country that had a lot of your sons, relatives, friends, neighbors, children fighting and dieing in the war you tended to vote more against the war in 2006. or more against republicans most affiliated with the iraq war and punish them for the policies. it doesn't mean that those communities were rabidly anti-war, but just more in the country than others controlling other factors. the flip side in 2016, we saw then candidate trump reap ig gains. his america first rhetoric, calling the iraq war a total disaster, calling bush a terrible president, this resonated with voters there, eye despite prognosticators who

thought this might be his death knell. >> professor krinor, thank you for your analysis. >> thank you. >> more social media action from twitter i think. what do we have? considering this as another biden failure. do not see how this helps his presidency. our energy independence kept putin in check and biden destroyed that. also as expected his response is slow and weak. i'm not thinking you can lay this off on joe biden. i think colonel vindman had a good assessment and much more informed than mine. there's a lot of blame to go around here for the reasons that i've stated. what most frustrates me, it used to be -- again, we're not directly in this vis-a-vis russia and ukraine, obviously, our sentiments are on the side of ukraine, right? i hope. will it present a rally around the flag, in this era of

polarization, where in the end, the division we had in this country stopped at the water's edge. that no longer seems to be the case. turn on cable television pundits, you can see some who are outright rooting for vladimir putin. i'd like to think there's things to unite us and that is the common enemy and the common enemy in this case is clearly russia and vladimir putin. answer my question, should nato go to war for ukraine? article 5 holds if one of the 30 nations is attacked the others can help defend it. that can also pertain to cyberwarfare. what if the ground war remains contained but cyber attacks go to nations. is america prepared to respond? richard clarke is the authority. and he is here. plus, has putin lost it?

when france's president met with vladimir putin, kremlin covid protocol forced them to sit miles apart. it could be a deeper story, something troubling about the russian leader's isolalation an state of mind. i'll explain. lly designing our bottles to be 100% recyclable, inincluding the cap theyey're collected and separated from other plastics, so they can be turned back into material that we use to make new bottles. that completes the circle and reduces plastic waste. please help us get every bottle back. ♪ ♪ (johnny cash) ♪ i've traveled every road in this here land! ♪

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can help you switch and save. switch to xfinity mobile and get connected to the most reliable 5g network. talk with our helpful switch squad at your local xfinity store today. russia's invasion of ukraine isn't just a physical war with troops on the ground and conventional weaponry. it also includes the virtual battlefield of coordinated cyber attacks which could quickly spread and become a problem for the rest of the world, including the united states. it's not just theoretical.

on friday a russian ransomware gang issue add eye statement threatening to rack the critical infrastructure of any nation or organization retaliating against moscow for the invasion of ukraine. nato's announcement last year that it could consider cyber attacks equal to armed attacks means member countries could find themselves drawn into the conflict. ukraine is not a member of nato though it has long hoped to join the alliance. still, what if the nato country is a victim of cyber attack by russia. a key tenet of the nation's 1949 founding treaty is article 5 of the principle of collectible defense. that's among its member countries that now include 30 nations and article 5 reads as follows, the party as agree that an armed attack in europe or north america shall be considered an attack against them all and consequently, they agree that if such an armed attack occurs each of them will

assist the party or parties so attacked. article 5 has invoked only once follows the 9/11 trer attack. in brussels a joint statement, we've reaffirms the decision as to when a seiber attack leading to the invocation of article 5 would be taken by the north atlantic council on a case by case basis. allies recognize that the impact of significant cumulative activities might be considered as amounting to an armed attack. president biden met in geneva, afterwards he said this -- >> another area we spent a great time of time is cyber. and cyber security. i talked that critical infrastructure should be off limits to attack, period, by cyber, or any other means. i gave them a list. if i'm not mistaken, i don't have it in front of me, 16

specific entities. 16 defined as critical infrastructure under u.s. policy from the energy sector to the water systems. >> so if putin responds to new sanctions by ordering direct cyber attacks to destabilize the infrastructure of the u.s. and its nato allies are we obligated to go to war cyberor otherwise? joining me now is richard clarke who served three u.s. presidents on the national security council. he was the first world's counterterrorism czar. and director of cyberspace under george bush. the author of the book, "the fifth domain." mr. clarke, thanks for coming back. what worries you the most? >> michael, the russians have said, if we do sanctions against them they will retaliate for our retaliation. the two ways they have of doing that, number one, cyberwar

against us. and number two, disinformation war, lifting up their dukes to stage violent protests in the united states for masks and vaccines and other excuses. they can attack us in the united states using cybertools. they already have in the past. that list of 16 areas that biden gave them is their target list. you remember when russians allegedly, not the government, russians shut down the colonial gas pipeline, just a few months ago. that's just afore taste of what could happen. >> would it, should it, trigger article 5? >> well, nato has said as recently as this week, the head of nato, mr. stoltenberg has said that it would. the attack on one using cyberwar techniques would be an attack on

all. the united states has said, we will consider a cyber attack based on the magnitude of its effects. and we will not necessarily respond to a cyber attack with a cyber attack. our policy, our declared policy is, if it's a big enough attack on us and it hurts us, we will use the conventional weapons response. so, we could very easily find ourselves in a shooting war with russia if they try devastating -- it would have to be devastating cyber attacks like turning out the power grid. and that's something that i think they might be able to do. >> does it matter whether the target is public or private? what if it's private industry, as compared to, say, the public power grid? >> i don't think it makes any difference. if they take down the financial sector. if they do a denial of service attack on the american banks the way the iranians did many years ago. if they attack important things like the amazon cloud or the

google cloud or the microsoft cloud. no one knows, by the way, what the effect of that will be. the government doesn't even have a list of what is in each of those clouds. but i can tell you if those clouds go down, the united states stops working. our economy stops working. the phones stop working. we will find ourselves pretty soon in the dark ages if the internet goes down. >> i know that such is richard clarke's level of concern about this subject that you have turned to writing fiction just so as to spark people's imagination and get them more concerned about this issue. the question for you is, how prepared are we? >> no nation is well prepared on the defense, michael. the thing about cyberwar i've been trying to tell people for the last ten years is there's something called offense preference. the offense is much easier than the defense. the defense is almost impossible

against a very sophisticated enemy like the united states, or like russia. >> take my final 30 seconds and tell me if you share my concern. i didn't like it when president biden said there are 16 areas because he seemed to green light everything that wasn't on that list. what was your reaction? >> well, if you look at the 16 areas, it's pretty much the entire economy. the 16 areas of the economy and critical infrastructure. i think the key for us right now is for american companies to go shields up. the american companies and corporations throughout the united states and state and local governments, to start asking what more can i do to protect my networks? and if i news the sunsetnetwork have a fplan to get back as som resilience to have interim capability. everybody should be doing that right now, everybody. >> richard clarke, thank you so

much. you're uniquely qualified to address this. and i really appreciate your time. >> thank you, michael. still to come, is putin's invasion of ukraine the act of a rational person? one french official described the president's speech as rigid and paranoid. a look in putin's mind someone who studied him is next. and please answer my survey question. cannot wait to see how this goes -- to smerconish.com and vote, should nato go to war for ukraine? (laughs) anything else you wanna know? isis the hype too much? am i ready? i can't tell you everything. but if you want to make history, you gotta call your own shots. we going to the league! if you have type 2 diabetes or high blood pressure

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russian president vladimir putin's rash invasion of ukraine has caused many to wonder what's going on with putin, meaning

what might this attack suggest about this state of mind. as david von drele put it in "the washington post" is vladimir putin a great and daring leader or out of control. recent images from moscow are anything but reassuring. putin looks how do we put this nicely completely bonkers. and completely appears to have reached the phase in a tyrant's career. and we see putin and emmanuel macron sitting at this biz bizarrishly long table. mr. macron was told if he wanted to shake mr. putin's hand or sit next to him, he needed to arrive nearly seven hours before the meeting. he would be required to take a pcr test administered by a russian doctor and without the french president's doctor being present. macron declined, deciding it

wasn't worth all that to get a photo op of a handshake. but the journal also quoted sources saying the french leader had noted a change in putin's demeanor over the course of the phone conversation during the pandemic. quote, he tended to talk in circles, rewriting history a close aide to mr. macron had said. and one official said that macron found that putin was more rigid, more isolated and basically gone into an ideological and security-minded drift. here's what petro poroshenko told cnn's john berman on friday on "new day" as he took to the street with a rifle to defend kyiv. >> we see putin as the man of the lost treason. he's just simply mad. he's just simply crazy. he's just simply arrogant to come here to kill ukrainians. >> joining me now to discuss is

andrea taylor on the national intelligence council. she's currently season fellow at the transplantic security program at the center of new america security. andrea, you've watched him for a long time. do you notice changes? >> yeah, i think we do notice changes and there's speculation about his health and state of his mental health. it's hard to note from a distance exactly what's going on, but there are a few things we do know. as you talked about in your segment, putin has been very isolated recently and that's been amplified by the covid-19 crisis. the other thing that we know, it doesn't appear that there's really anyone in his inner circle and work that can consc constrain him. we saw him dress down his adviser in a very theatrical performance. that's a dangerous thing. there is a large body of

literature that talks about the regimes and they send to produce the most belligerent foreign policies, they're the most likely to initiate wars, and they are the most powaranoid as you were talking in the segment so i think we are in a really risky place with president putin. >> do the oligarchs have his ear? is there anyone that we know to whom he turns for counsel? >> it's increasingly so. as i was mentioned with that national security meeting those people around putin were fearful. there's no one who can constrain him or no one who can present to him information that would contradict his world view. we also saw him bring together the economics in an effort to reassure them. but it wasn't really reassurance, but the way i saw it, he was reminding the numbers

of his elite that their states are directly tethered to president putin, such that they dare not move against him. so, i think he's really trying to take steps to inoculate himself from elite defection. because i think he senses this par is not popular with his elite. and certainly doesn't look to be popular with the russians and russian population. >> i know you're not going to give me anything classified nor would i ask for it but from your days at cia, i want to ask a generic question, how well do we know his profile? >> you know, there are analysts who followed him for his entire career. people who monitor his every moves. i think folks in the intelligence community have very good insight into this thinking, into his world view. but it's important to understand that's evolved.

we've seen his points about ukraine evolve over time. he didn't always view ukraine as this way. but i think as you mentioned, this isolation, he's been doing bizarre archival research in combing down deep history so he's clearly a moving target and folks are watching him very closely. >> to the uninitiated and uninformed that would be me. he's like captain kweeg and keeping track of the strawberries. that's how it looks to someone who is presumably irrational. final thought is yours. >> yeah. i think the thing you have to underscore also when you're that paranoid and that isolated, that's when leaders make mistakes. personal leaders that i referred are the most prone that make mistakes because they surround themselves with mad men.

i think that's what is playing out here. we're seeing it on the battlefield. i think he underestimated how ukrainians would fight back. and his miscalculating domestically, this could trigger backlash that causes him problems domestically. >> i talked about that at the outset of the program. that was excellent. thank you so much for your time. i appreciate it. from the world of social media, kathryn, what do we have, twitter i think -- no, he's a psychopath acting like a thug and the international community is leaving him because he has access to nukes. only someone in his own entourage can stop him. rita, and andrea has the informed language, i'll put it in words i can understand, the emperor has no clothes. nobody is telling him so. the dressing down that he gave to a spy chief on a hot mic. hot mic implies we weren't supposed to hear it, no, putin wanted us to hear it.

he wanted the whole world to hear it. and you look at the wall street reporting on what went on, the back story meeting with macron. you're going to tell a visiting president, get her seven hours in advance, leave your own doctor out of the room and trust ours for a photo op? that's irrational. still of your best tweets and facebook comments have you voted on the vehweek's survey question -- should n nato go to war for ukraine? back in a moment.

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this will be interesting. let's see how you responded to this week's survey question. should nato go to war for ukraine? hit me with it. wow. holy smokes! is that the most voting we have ever had? that is the most voting, right? 36,000 people and that only started when i hit -- now it's 38,000. so i'm shocked by the number of votes. i'm also shocked by -- that a cnn audience is that decided, more than three quarters, 77%. if i had shown you my prediction, it was nowhere near that. that's really interesting. i wonder if they're watching at the white house. here's some of the other social media reaction that came in during the course of the program. i cannot believe people want nato to go to war with russia. do they understand the consequences? the survey is crazy!

david, i think there's been a change in sentiment in the last three days of people looking at these poor ukrainians and saying, my god, what are we doing to help them? and the sentiment you should glean from that unscientific number, is that the consensus is, not enough. here's another social media reaction. america press partially responsible for low poll numbers. thank god biden is president and not the previous madman who was normalized by you and others. i don't think you can layoff on the media. the president's poll numbers right now. i mean, are you blaming the media for inflation? are you blaming the media for porous borders in mexico, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. it is what it is. i hope that he's successful and i hope that the situation in ukraine ends with ukraine still in control. all right. keep voting at smerconish.com. see you next week.

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or maybe not in their own emotions. so show up, however you can, for the foster kids who need it most— at helpfosterchildren.com ♪ hello, everyone. thank you so much for joining me for this special cnn coverage. welcome to our viewers in the u.s. and around the world. i'm frederica whitfield in atlanta. fierce battles between ukrainian and russian troops in and near the capital of kyiv continuing overnight both on the ground and in the air. a security camera caught the moment a rocket or missile struck an apartment building just hours ago, leaving several wounded.

that blast jus