host: the last two hours our guestro has been author carol anderson. and have voter suppression is destroying democracy in the most recent book racing guns in a fatally unequal america thank you for your time.st

>> welcome to "washington post" live my guess today ista the founder of one of the biggest investors of russia after the fall of communism now one of the biggest critics vladimir putin he has a new book freezing order the true story of money laundering of murder and surviving vladimir putin's wrath thank you so much. >> before we talk about this

we went to ask the viewers to join in the conversation if you have questions please tweet them to us and we will try to select the questions that come in over the next half hour. second and interested in your sense of the battlefield right now as russia launches the second round, how do you assess the next phase of the war that began this week quick. >> putin doesn't do humiliation well. the last eight weeks say that the russia would roll into ukraine and take over and president zelensky would flee

and that they could raise the russian flag and claim pride and patriotism. that turned out to be a disaster by 20000 troops which is what they lost in afghanistan and more than 1000 tanks and their flagship which is one of the greatest naval losses in the last quarter century in leading up to the introduction the purpose of the homework is for vladimir putin to rallyos around the flag so he canan boost his own popularity.. the russians don't know they are losing the war but if they were then putin would be in

dire straits for him to have done something so costly for srussia in terms of lives and money and then had such a humiliation would be a very dangerous thing for vladimir putin so very serious escalation that is yet to be seen but we can say very clearly he cannot let matters lie where they are but it's based on the objective analysis right now. >> let me ask you from the response and biden was on television yesterday offering

militaries assistance there's all sorts of weapons that package but i want to ask you as you look at the order of battle what more do you think we should do? >> it's interesting because i feel the us is doing a good job but always a little bit too little too late. we should have started this huge military armament longer ago and started sanctions with oligarchs even before it began. so this overriding feeling we don't want to provoke or get

him mad every time he does something to make as shocked but is not proactive. we have helped ukraine a lot and i'm very happy with the fact the us and others are supplying military equipment in large amounts to the ukrainians because that is what they need. but one month ago the polls wanted to transfer 20 planes in the us said no so either they have been transferred so why didn't we stop that one month ago? so every time ukraine is been talking about a no-fly zone since the beginning and so right now there is a constant aerial bombardment of that part of the country.

i think we will get to a point to supply a no-fly zone and a when we get to that point will 0he will say why did we resist soe long and lose those ukrainian civilians before we got to that point is one of military bases there is more that can be done and then coming for the sanctions but we are doing a pretty good job compared to what ever has been done before that the current sanctions imposed are the most far-reaching that have ever been imposed but we are not there yet. and so the sanctions is not that we should expect the oligarchs to rise up.

and with that frenzy and hysteria but that is to cut off the flow so putin cannot find the war and we have a bunch of good things to do that and the central bank those reserves are currency that are frozen by the us and allies we cut off a number of banks from swift. we should cut off 100. because if you cannot use one bank to use dollar transfers then when i say we there is

118 of us in the oligarchs should be sanctioning all 118 of them. >> so what additional assistance us can provide so one problem with the no-fly zone is that and then to directly engage if they are nuclear weapon states and with the war criminal. >> so the president of the

united states saying we will not get involved with you because you are nuclear state and we went to engage nuclear. so what is thes message he gets? let's just say he had his fun with ukraine and polls at the estonia border that has a bunch of weapons and c then points the nuclear warhead at washington, berlin, london. are you ready to have a nuclear war with me over this country? it is the exact same question and what do we respond know we don't want a nuclear war to take lithuania and poland. >> it's not the same question because those are nato question —- countries. so that's not the same thing. >> that the budapest

memorandum that if you give up the nuclear weapons we will protect your territorial integrity. mark my words if we ever get to this point in estonia on fox and msnbc every pundit and analyst wants to risk millions of people dying that most cannot locate on a map? it is the same thing. some point he is in a position right now to challenge every rule and tradition and border we can face it now or later so i would say it's better to help the ukrainians win the war then in the situation where we are for holding to his bluff he has a nuclear

weapons and the one thing he does respect is strength he understands as they nuclear confrontation with the united states that is somethingfo he doesn't wanter to do for what he takes advantage of is all ofti us bowing our heads down because we don't want to engage with you that is an invitation to do whatever we are not challenging him on. >> coming back as a direct military conflict with russia so the strategy the biden administration and the nato allies have that they effectively shut down russia's ability to make warpp and to

cripple you know a lot about the russian economy so the basic strategy in the various aspects. how soon do you think russia. >> we are nowhere near there yet. yes it is great but every day without fail by sending the

money to putin to buy russian oil and gas and by some estimates in the european but from a business standpoint but then on the balance sheet which we have frozen but they have a lot of income and we haven't really messed with it yet. because all of the countries are so dependent on russia and the prices are.

>> they are the largest oil producer of the world and are still inpr an ally but for them to push down the oil price by 30 percent.

i am not holding my breath but then from europe and united states primarily to do the banking and the legal transactions and those who are really a part of prudence russia network how would the united states and the west really go after that network of facilitators are there specific things that you recommend that would make a difference? >> there is an easy one. i was invited to testify

before congress about this topic a few weeks ago but then they were working for the russian government and this takes no effort but if you have a bunch of british enablers and those who are known to be money-laundering on —- launderers and when they say we want to come to the night state said no longer have a visa just to come here. so that is. if these people are not

conducive they could be banned from the. so now everybody not the legal profession that rely on to move money and coordinated tax naon journalist and whistleblowers. he jumped onto it then wrote to the secretary of state so talking to the politicians about weim were talking the blood type. >> in their much other things if the lawyers are taking many from sanctioned individuals than they should be punished

for violating sanctions that is the proceed of crime and tell our viewers the basic but

those that were subsequently arrested for those and then were killed for doing that. but his murder really change my life forever the most heartbreaking awful thing i had ever experienced andt was killed becauseve he is i made a decision after he was killed to devote all of my time and resources and energy to make sure they face justice.

but the second part of the campaign for justice. >> that the process to get the laws passed in other countries and following the money but believable things that but

then the largest lawmaking body in the world and then he testifies that his protégé and chest ten days ago he went to moscow and was arrested but then to pass a law to save cannot mention the world war

but for brief period of time the president said yes. so we go from. but it is a remarkable story

how russia and its preview - - the but then to embrace the campaign. but tell folks about that meeting and what it shows us but then he banned the adoption by american families. he wrote in the first major policy paper after being elected he wanted to repeal the magnet on —- the activated it everything possible. if you are looking for an

openingt it did show was two

things one one how desperate putin was get rid of the magnitsky act and and the second thing it showed was was how crafty he was about approaching the trump campaign which which i thought was both ominous and interesting. in the in the time that we have left, mr. spreader. i want to return to the war in ukraine, which is the really the showdown for putin and putin's russia. and the outcome will obviously have lasting impact on the world and i want to ask you what i think of as the as the dave petraeus question famously on his way into iraq general petraeus turned to a journalist from the washington post rick axton who's traveling with him and said tell me how this ends. and i'm curious but not simply the war in ukraine, but but the

larger story of of putin's russia this corrupt system ridden with inefficiency and and criminal activity. tell me how this ends. where does where does it go? do you see putin's falling from power? you see a russia stabilizing after that? some people think it'll be even more unstable and dangerous after putin. what what do you think? how does this story end? well, so i'm a sort of scenario analyzer. i don't have a one ending scenario. i i there's three scenarios that i see in how this could end. there's the good scenario which is i would put as a low probability scenario, probably 15% and that is that you crane defeats russia militarily that we supply enough equipment military equipment that they're fighting for their homeland. they're fighting better than the russians. the russians are are inefficient corrupt into moralized and that they win and they decisively win and they drive russia out of ukraine.

as i say it's a low probability scenario, but if that were to happen. um is my opinion that the russian people would no longer allow vladimir putin to be in charge how he gets changed from that is anyone's guess it could either be a palace coup in which case you end up with some other kgb general doing the same thing or it can be a a massive uprising a violent uprising. and and in which case i can imagine a scenario where someone like alexa navalny would become the next president of russia and then we probably have a very good scenario. but as i say that that is low probability 15% um the more likely scenario and i this at 70% is that this thing carries on and carries on and carries on?

that putin can't decisively beat ukraine and ukraine can't decisively beat putin and neither side has any interest in giving up the ukrainians are not going to give up their territory and putin can't back down and look weak from a conflict that he started. in that case this just goes on and on and on and i should point out that. you know, we say that this war started on february 24th, but in reality this war started in 2014 that that's when russia took crimea illegally. and that's when the russia sent in various people. they called them russian-backed separatists, but i think that that that term is really been

very unhelpful and defining how this whole thing has been playing out because they're effectively russians or russian proxies for all intents and purposes and been fighting a russian war for the last eight years. so this thing in my opinion has been going on for eight years. and and there's no reason why it wouldn't go on for another eight years and with our all sorts of unbelievable heartbreaking tragedies along the way and that and i i dread to say this, but i think that's a more likely scenario with the 70% probability. and then there's the really terrible bad case scenario, which is when i alluded to before when we're talking about the no-fly zone, which is the and this is another i put 15% on this. this is the rolling up tanks on the estonian or lithuanian border. and then having this big showdown with us and and saying are you ready to go to war with us over this country that most americans couldn't locate on a map. and he's hoping that we will fold that we'll say, you know, actually we don't want to go to war with you. that's what he's hoping and everybody is interesting when i talk to people everyone says, well, you know with that that's impossible article 5 of nato but what does that mean article 5 of nato is just is just a sort of concept. it's it's not you know, no one's

legally required to do anything. we break treaties all the time if it's in our national interest to do so and putin's hope is that we'll all reflect on that and say, you know what you can just go. we you can have ev everything past 1945 poland and that czech republic that is the. >> we need to and it there. it is a grim forecast from somebody who knows putin's russia extremely well thank you so much for joining us to talk about your book and the issues. thank you. we will be back with future programming if you want to see what we have, register for our programs and thank you for joining us today and we look forward to seeing you in the future. i'll come everyone today.

we have a json riley as a guest who's written a phenomenal new book on the progress of african americans during the trump administration and welcome jason. thank you for having me.