c-span now is a free mobile app featuring your unfiltered view of what is happening in washington live in on demand. keep up with events with live streams of floor proceedings of hearings from congress, the courts, and more from the world of politics all at your fingertips. also stay current with the latest episodes of "washington journal." c-span now is available at the apple store and google play. download it for free today. c-span now, your front-row seat to washington anytime, anywhere. host: a story taking a look at the white house efforts regarding ukraine. headline, "white house swept over growing entanglement." the biden administration is facing pressure to get more involved in the war in ukraine but with every move that lawmakers and ukrainians demand,

officials worry that the risk of becoming a direct participant in the war grows. this week, a spat with an ally burst into the open, underscoring how the white house is trying to strike a cautious balance between supporting weapons while keeping out of the line of fire. pressure is coming from an array of parties from lawmakers demand united states share more intelligence with ukraine to ukrainian leaders calling for a no-fly zone over the country to poland trying to hand over its fighter jets. there is more to that story. here is what we are thinking for the first hour. tell us if you think there is too much effort, not enough effort, or if it is just about right. if you say it is too much, (202) 748-8000 is the number. if you say we need more, (202) 748-8001. if you say it is just about right, (202) 748-8002.

you can text us at (202) 748-8003 and you can also post on our social media sites. president zelensky posting on his twitter feed after the bombing you heard about on the maternity award, "the direct strike of russian troops at the maternity hospital, people and children are under the wreckage and atrocity. how much longer will the world be an accomplice to ignore terror and stop the killing. you seem to be losing humanity." that is from the twitter feed of the ukranian president. it was yesterday during a joint news conference between antony blinken and the united kingdom's foreign secretary. the topic was about the call for a low -- a no-fly zone. here is a portion from that press conference. [video clip] >> our governments have tremendous admiration for

president zelensky, for his entire team, for the ukrainian people. i would be asking for everything possible to help ukrainian people. both of our countries and so many others have done extraordinary things to make sure that the ukrainians have in their hands, the means to effectively defend themselves against this war from russia as well as to care for ukrainian people to the best of our ability inside ukraine, those who have been forced to flee outside of ukraine, to meet

their humanitarian needs. the goal is the same, to end this aggression, to save lives, and to prevent more senseless bloodshed. as part of that, we also have to see to it that this war does not expand. our goal is to end the war, not to expand it, including potentially expand it to nato territory. we want to make sure that it is not prolonged. otherwise, it is going to turn even deadlier, involve more people, and potentially even make things harder to resolve in ukraine. >> for those of you posting on social media, "russia is testing us and we have to push back." "our grandparents made great sacrifices and it is time we do the same. these people are being murdered to test our resolve."

dustin says, "the u.s. needs to withdraw sanctions. the ukraine needs to surrender without condition and nato needs to be criminalized as the warmongering military machine that caused all of this in the first place." again some of your thoughts. melissa, thanks for calling. go ahead. caller: the problem is we live in a society that wants immediate gratification and immediate results and these economic sanctions take time. you are not just going to immediately cut everything off and then the rest of the people are suddenly going to say we need to overthrow the sky --

overthrow this guy and get rid of them. we are on the right track for it to keep us out of direct intervention and direct confrontation with russia. unfortunately what happened yesterday with the hospital is one of the things they are trying to pull us into a direct confrontation and the longer we are out of it, they will keep doing more and more things. but we have to be patient and we have to wait for the sanctions to actually work. host: that is melissa in tennessee. she mentioned the bombing of that maternity hospital. the front pages of both of the major newspapers today all showing some of that fallout from that bombing. it is an associated press photo. "the washington post", "the wall street journal", and paper for showing you the bombing from

today. sarah is in michigan and says the u.s. involvement is too much. hello. caller: good morning, how are you? america, the massive spending bill, they are using ukraine and russia to push this through. they are putting in so much money, digital assets, billions of dollars. this is incredible what is happening to america. they are keeping your head turned with ukraine. this has been perpetrated since this pandemic. this is incredible. what your government is doing, this is ridiculous. host: when it comes to russia, why do you think it is too much? caller: it is too much because they are spending our money like it is an open checkbook. where is all this money going to? why do we keep doing this. they are kids dying in africa.

they are people dying all over the world. but they had your head with this. we need to stick with this country. this president is a traitor to this country. host: sarah in michigan. an omnibus bill passed by the house yesterday to keep the government funded past the friday deadline. the stopgap measure also passed yesterday just in case the senate cannot vote on the omnibus bill. ukraine a part of that package. the associated press reporting $13.6 billion, $6.8 billion going to refugee aid, economic allies, enforcing sanctions, and equipping allied forces. more reporting on the specific ukraine aid piece of that as part of that funding bill passed yesterday. steve in virginia says the efforts of the u.s. are not enough. hello. caller: yes. i have been up all night thinking about these fighter jets and i am going to just ask a simple question.

why can't these fighter jets be placed on flatbed trucks and driven to the border with ukraine? to be picked up by ukrainian personnel, military personnel, driven across the border to whatever bases they still have? host: do you think that wouldn't increase the conflict as we are seeing it already? caller: i believe that it would not. host: can you tell us why? caller: because russia is concerned about escalating an air war over ukraine. and apparently, the west is reticent to fly these jets in. well, why not just leave them at

the border? and let the ukrainians come, pick up the jets, and transport them on the ground to their bases? host: ok, steve in virginia. the topic of that offer from poland was part of the press conference from the pentagon. the press secretary john kirby talking about the offer to supply those jets. here is part of that response from yesterday. [video clip] >> we believe the best way to support ukrainian defense is by providing them the weapons they need most, to defeat russian aggression. in particular, anti-armor and air defense. we along with other nations, continue to send them these weapons, and we know they are being used with great effect. slow russian advance in the north and contested airspace over ukraine is evidence alone of that. although russian air capabilities are significant, their effectiveness has been

limited due to ukrainian strategic operational and tactical ground-based air defense systems, surface-to-air missiles. secondly, the ukrainian air force currently has several squadrons of fully mission capable aircraft. we assessed that adding aircraft to the ukrainian inventory isn't likely to significantly change the effectiveness of the ukrainian air force, relative to russian capabilities. therefore, we believe that the gain from transferring those is low. finally, the intelligence community has assessed that the transfer of those planes maybe mistaken as escalatory and could result in significant russian reaction that could increase the prospects of a military escalation with nato. we also assess the transfer of the mig-29's to ukraine to be of high-risk.

they are welcoming more than one million ukrainian refugees. polish generosity is clearly on display for the whole world to see. but at this time, we believe that the provision of additional fighter aircraft provides little increased capability at high risk. host: again, go to our website and our app if you want to see more of that. lynn off of twitter says, none of them want us in a nuclear war with russia. i believe joe biden is doing everything he can." another viewer saying, "not enough is being to end the war despite with the secretary of state tony blinken said." caller: good morning. i guess i chose too much, because it was the most acceptable choice. it proposes the illusion that escalation can be measured at all.

i am a big believer in the man who demystified the barrier between conventional and nuclear war, the idea that we would use all of our conventional weapons and stop everyone from using nuclear weapons because somehow that would be immoral. seems in with economic sanctions, economic war, which is what they're calling it now, and cyber war. those kinds of oppressive kinds of attrition will lead to conventional war and nuclear anyway. it is all the same kind of attrition. conventional war, the purpose of conventional war is to deplete your enemy's economic base, their resources. we think that we can do that safely with cyber and sanctions, but that is an illusion because that puts pressure on your enemy, as it were, to escalate if the sanctions become too crushing, too effective.

you put them in a chokepoint, in a corner. one step leads to another. it can't be avoided, i think. host: let's hear from louis in illinois who says not enough is being done. hello. caller: hi, pedro. i am a democrat, born during world war ii. i believe we should get much more involved in this war. putin is a big bully. i think we should take our planes and start hitting the tanks and artillery inside of ukraine, but not cross over into the russian area, the russian border. you don't win wars by talking about them. we have to get very much involved. host: is direct escalation a concern only because nuclear capability of russia and the united states as well, is that the concern? caller: i believe putin will do what he wants to do no matter what we do.

he could devise a scenario in his own mind that we escalated for any reason, so we have to stop. he is a madman. anyone who attacks a hospital with children in it has to be stopped immediately. and this will not be the last atrocity. i don't know how this man got so crazy. for us to talk about it continually in the congress and on the news media is not going to stop this war. host: let's go to melissa in louisiana, she says too much in being done. hello. caller: good morning. i think there is too much being done. my heart bleeds for the people in ukraine. there is a monster bombing them from russia. we need to have our president

talk to them, speak to him personally about these things to de-escalate. pedro, i really want people to know, while we are printing money and sending it over there in large amounts -- and if you try to pin down the amount of money we have sent since 2014 or even just in the past year, you can't get that number. i can't. i have searched and added up until my adding machine is breaking. this is an incredible amount of money. we have soldiers over there. again, there is not a single source i can find to pin down the amount of soldiers that are over there in poland and elsewhere in the region. so the news isn't reporting that. host: are your concerns ultimately economic in nature? caller: my concerns are greatly

economic. i am in lake charles, louisiana. we are still devastated by hurricane laura and then immediately following that, hurricane delta, historic flooding, an ice storm, and we haven't received help from the federal government other than cleaning up debris. people are truly suffering here. i thank you for asking and letting me share my voice on this. people in america are suffering. host: that is melissa in louisiana. let's hear from bill in alabama. he says the effort is just about right. hi. caller: hi, pedro. i called this number because it is the regular number. i do not agree at all with the united states -- host: you are calling in on the number saying that you think it is just about right. caller: no. host: then i will stop you there and invite you to call back on the line that represents you only because people are waiting

and taking a line that best represents this topic. i apologize. call back and pick the line that represents you. joyce in kansas says the effort is not enough. hello. caller: thank you for taking my call. i believe that we have to stand up to putin and tell him to get out, or we surrender to him. that is all he wants, is to take over the world. thank you. host: then how much further you feel comfortable in going? joyce, are you there? one more time for joyce? are you there? let's move on to renee. rene on our line says the effort is too much. hi. caller: hi. don't get me wrong, my heart goes out to the people in ukraine and i respect them, they are trying to fight to maintain

their country. but what is the end result? are we going to end up in war with russia? russia is not going to stop. it's not that simple. over throwing billions and billions of dollars? another thing, whenever there is a vote to help or even to finish out the covid, you know, because covid is getting better, things are getting better, people are trying to return to work, but every time they have to vote on money for covid, and it is temporary, i hear people complain, the politicians call people lazy in america, all kinds of things. they never want to give people in america help. the woman from louisiana, all the damage from the hurricanes, they still don't have relief. yet we are so quick to jump up and give billions and billions and billions of dollars

somewhere else quickly and we don't even help our own country first. i have a problem with that. going back to russia and the ukraine, should we give some aid? yes. but what is going to happen in the end? are we going to end up in a physical war with russia? what's going to happen? host: that's renee in pennsylvania, she mentioned covid relief. you may have seen that debate on the house floor. when it comes specifically to covid, there was a setback in biden administration's covid strategy. democrats were forced to scrap funding for therapeutics and research in the spending package after an internal revolt from members who objected using unspent relief. speaker pelosi who called the removal of the funds heartbreaking and told reporters that the change was necessary in order for the package to clear

the senate. it forced democrats to rely on the vote of at least 10 republicans. quote "we have a deadline, we are keeping the government open." you remember that omnibus package does include funding specifically for ukraine, about $14 billion. we will show you the breakdown of those figures. this idea of when it comes to efforts by the united states involving russia and ukraine, is it too much, not enough, or just about right? 202-748-8000 if you say it is too much. 202-748-8001 if you say it is not enough. if you say it is just about right, 202-748-8002. mike in north carolina says it is not enough. hello. caller: it is nowhere near enough. putin and his entire army should have already been wiped out, but just like fox news, is reporting right now, they knew about this last may. that is what is being reported right now on fox news.

they knew about this last may and did nothing. that is because joe biden is a traitor to this country. host: when you say not enough then how much further do we need to go, in your opinion? caller: what did i just say, pedro? putin and his army should have been wiped out already. they cannot even take out a third world country that has 1/5 of the military, and we are scared of them, because putin is a madman with nuclear weapons? to be crystal clear, the original plan was for biden to have trump supporters and trump rounded up and arrested, but putin stepped in and altered his plans. host: ok, back to the direct engagement part of it, why do you think that is the best route? host: because i am a man and i am an american and i am sick of watching babies get slaughtered. maybe you are not. maybe you are fine with it, but

i am not. i don't like watching babies get blown up. host: ok. dennis in south carolina says the effort is just about right. hi. caller: the other day i was watching the ukrainians get on the trains. putin is a terrorist to the world. he is just like hitler. if he had his soldiers at the train, either he would put those people in concentration camps, or he would have a massacre just like the jewish people. he is a terrorist to the world, just like hussein, just like osama, how he attacked the world trade center, just like japan came over here and attacked hawaii. host: because of all of that, you say the current effort is just about right. can you tell us why? caller: what it is good to come down to, we are going to have to

get putin. americans are probably going to have to die, just like with all the outside countries. if you look at the history, we lost our military soldiers. i am not a veteran, but i support my veterans. i've got church members who are veterans. host: to clarify, you called in on our line that says the effort is just right. >> i do not want to disappoint you, but i have no toppers today. would you like to kick us off? >> i want to talk to you about being on the lookout for biological weapons and ukraine and possibly creating false flag operations. what is the evidence beyond what you said? is there more to this? >> they have a large biological and chemical weapons program so it is a pattern but they