captioning funded by cbs and ford. we go further, so you can. ( ticking ) >> critics will say, "why now, in a book? why didn't you speak out during the trump administration?" >> it's very simple. if i spoke out at the time, i would be fired. i had no confidence that anybody that came in behind me would not be a real trump loyalist, and lord knows what would've happened then. >> tonight, former defense secretary mark esper, a lifelong republican, on his tumultuous tenure during one of the most chaotic times in the nation's history. ( ticking ) >> even before the pandemic, american kids have been dealing with a crisis-- rising rates of suicide, self-harm, anxiety, and depression.

your generation got hit with this in what's supposed be kind of a fun, carefree time. what was lost? what did you guys lose during the pandemic? > myself. >> yourself? >> yeah. yeah. ( ticking ) >> olga smiranova is a russian prima ballerina, one of the world's leading dancers. but, days after russia invaded ukraine, smirnova pirouetted and stepped off her stage, at the renowned bolshoi theater, with dramatic flourish. >> i was so ashamed of russia. this is the true. i'm not ashamed that i'm russian, but i'm ashamed because of russia started this action. ( ticking ) >> i'm lesley stahl. >> i'm bill whitaker. >> i'm anderson cooper. >> i'm sharyn alfonsi. >> i'm jon wertheim. >> i'm norah o'donnell. >> i'm scott pelley.

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side effects include nausea, vomiting, and diarrhea, which can lead to dehydration, and may worsen kidney problems. ask your doctor about once-weekly trulicity. >> norah o'donnell: mark esper is a washington insider who spent his whole career flying below the radar-- until he became president donald trump's second secretary of defense. a west point graduate and paratrooper, esper spent ten years as a by-the-book army officer. and, when he left active duty, he moved through the revolving doors of think tank jobs,

capitol hill and pentagon staff positions, and defense lobbying. it all turned out to be boot camp for his assignment as defense secretary-- and a face- off with mr. trump, whom he came to regard as a threat to american democracy. but we begin tonight with the former defense secretary's thoughts on russia's war in ukraine. overall, how would you grade president biden and his administration's performance, in terms of ukraine? >> mark esper: it's mixed. they had a shaky start. i would've never taken the military option off the table, for example. i don't understand the reluctance to provide the ukrainians with migs. >> o'donnell: fighter jets. >> esper: fighter jets, that's right. but, since then, it's picked up. i think we're now flowing more supplies and material and weapons into ukraine. i think they've done a good job of bringing the allies along, which is important. you-- you have to act collectively. and you have to give some credit, by the way, to the congress, which i think-- you know, in the few-- few issues that has unified congress has been this one, support for ukraine. and in some ways, they've led the administration.

so, it's good to see now congress and the executive branch acting together, reasonably aligned, to help the ukrainian people. >> o'donnell: tomorrow, may 9, marks an important day on the russian calendar-- victory in world war ii. >> esper: well, i think the conventional wisdom right now seems to be that by may 9th, putin is going to try and secure donbass, which would be occupying the rest of the donetsk and luhansk provinces, if you will, and declare them protected. >> o'donnell: is there any scenario where president putin could take those regions and then just declare victory? >> esper: absolutely, absolutely. i mean, if i were a betting man today, i'd say that is what he will do. he'll at least secure the-- all of donbass, declare that he's liberated the russian- speaking peoples of that region, and declare victory. and that will become another frozen conflict. >> o'donnell: mark esper's time as secretary of defense began when he was overwhelmingly confirmed by the senate 90 to 8 on july 23, 2019. two days later, on a phone call

with president zelenskyy, mr. trump asked for a "favor" while he was holding up aid to ukraine. the call ultimately led to his impeachment. you had to keep pressing president trump to release $250 million in aid to ukraine? >> esper: yes, it would be an argument after an argument. and i'd have to say, "look, mr. president, at the end of the day, congress appropriated. it's-- it's the law. we have to do it." >> o'donnell: esper writes in his new memoir, called "a sacred oath," that the ukraine affair was an early source of tension between him and president trump. that tension would grow, as he told us when we met him at his alma mater, west point. >> esper: because it's important to our country, it's important to the republic, the american people, that they understand what was going on in this very consequential period, the last year of the trump administration. and to tell the story about things we prevented. really bad things. dangerous things, that could have taken the country in-- in a dark direction. >> o'donnell: what kind of terrible things did you prevent? >> esper: at various times, during the-- certainly the last

year of the administration, you know, folks in the white house are proposing to take military action against venezuela. to-- to-- to strike iran. at one point, somebody propose we blockade cuba. these ideas would happen, it seemed, every-- every few weeks. something like this would come up and we'd have to swat them down. >> o'donnell: who's "we had to swat them down"? >> esper: well, mostly me. i had good support from-- from general mark milley. >> o'donnell: mark esper and chairman of the joint chiefs of staff general mark milley ran the army for over a year before finding themselves in charge at the pentagon. in order to deal with what he calls some of the "crazy" ideas coming from the white house, esper and milley came up with a system. >> esper: i come up with this idea. actually, mark milley and i discuss it-- what we call the "four no's". the four things we had to prevent from happening between then and the election. and one was no strategic retreats, no unnecessary wars, no politi-- politicization of the military, and no misuse of the military.

and so, as we went through the next five to six months, that became the metric by which we would measure things. >> o'donnell: esper told us he had reason to be concerned, not just about an unnecessary military conflict with an adversary, but with one of our closest neighbors and largest trading partners. >> esper: the president pulls me aside on at least a couple of occasions, and suggests that maybe we have the u.s. military shoot missiles into mexico-- >> o'donnell: shoot missiles into mexico for what? >> esper: he would say, to-- to go after the cartels. and we would have this private discussion where i'd say, "mr. president, i-- you know, i-- i understand the motive"-- because he was very serious about dealing with drugs in america. i get that. we all understand. but i had to explain to him, "we-- we can't do that. it would violate international law. it would be terrible for our neighbors to the south. it would, you know, impact us in so many ways. why-- why don't we do this instead?" >> o'donnell: you politely push back on the idea. did president trump really say, "no one would know it was us"? >> esper: yes.

yes. i-- i-- he-- he said that. and i-- i just thought it was fanciful, right? because, of course it would be us. i was reluctant to tell this story, because i think-- i-- i thought, people won't believe this. that they'll think i'm just making it up, and folks in-- in- - in trump's orbit will-- will dispute it. and then i was having dinner after the election in 2020 with a fellow cabinet member. and-- and he said to me, he goes, "you know, remember that time when president trump suggested you shoot mess-- m-- missiles into mexico?" and i said to him, "you-- you heard that?" he goes, "oh, yeah. i-- i couldn't believe it. and i couldn't believe how-- how well you managed and talked him down from that." and at that moment, i knew i've got to write the story, because at least i have one witness who will verify that this really did happen. >> o'donnell: when asked whether esper's story about mexico was true, donald trump said in a statement to "60 minutes," "no comment." esper says to fact-check his book, he sent all-- or parts of- - his manuscript to more than two dozen current and former

four-star officers, senior civilians from the pentagon, and cabinet members. "60 minutes" spoke to six of them, who said what they read was accurate. during the late spring of 2020, it was not a foreign crisis, but the murder of george floyd in minneapolis, that esper calls a "turning point" in his time as secretary of defense. on the night of may 31, in washington, protests for racial justice were marred by rioters, who set parts of washington ablaze, and, esper says, enraged president trump. at a meeting the next morning, esper told us, the commander in chief was on the verge of ordering 10,000 active-duty troops into the streets of the capital. what was the most disturbing thing that the president said during that meeting on june 1st? >> esper: the president is ranting at-- at the room. he's using a lot of, you know-- foul language. you know, "you-- y-- you all are 'eff'-ing losers," right? and then he says it to the vice

president, mike pence. he-- he's using the same language, and he's looking at pence. >> o'donnell: he called mike pence an "eff"-ing loser? >> esper: he-- he di-- he didn't-- he didn't call him directly, but he was looking at him when he was saying it. and it really caught my attention. and i thought, "that-- we're at a different spot now. he's going to finally give a direct order to deploy-- paratroopers into the streets of washington, d.c." and i'm thinking, with weapons and bayonets, this would be horrible. >> o'donnell: what specifically was he suggesting that the u.s. military should do to these protesters? >> esper: he says, "can't you just shoot them? just shoot them in the legs or something." and he's suggesting that that's what we should do, that we should bring in the troops and shoot the protesters. >> o'donnell: the commander in chief was suggesting that the u.s. military shoot protesters? american protesters. >> esper: yes, in the streets of our nation's capital. that's right. shocking. >> o'donnell: we have seen, in other countries, a government use their military to shoot protesters.

>> esper: right. >> o'donnell: what kind of governments are those? >> esper: oh, those are banana republics, right? or authoritarian regimes. we all remember tiananmen square, right, in china. >> o'donnell: regarding whether he suggested shooting protesters, in his statement, former president trump said "this is a complete lie, and ten witnesses can back it up. mark esper was weak and totally ineffective, and because of it, i had to run the military." esper told us he wanted to avoid the president invoking the insurrection act, which would have allowed mr. trump to deploy active-duty troops. instead, esper says he helped mobilize 5,000 members of the national guard, whose mission includes responding to civil unrest. and, to placate mr. trump, esper writes, he also ordered part of the 82nd airborne up from fort bragg, north carolina to a base just outside washington. that evening, the u.s. park police used force to clear protestors from lafayette park, and the cabinet was called back to the white house.

>> esper: the president greets us, and i say, "where are we going?" and he-- he just ignores it, and starts walking out the door and crossing-- across the-- the lawn, heading out the gate. and as we round that corner, the press is all over-- all over the place, filming, taking pictures. and it-- it just dawned on me, at that point in time, that we'd been duped. >> o'donnell: duped, how? >> esper: this is a pol-- this is now a political stunt, right? and-- and w-- we-- i allowed myself to be put in that position. and it only gets worse, right? >> o'donnell: how does it get worse? >> esper: well, we end up in lafayette park, up near the church. and that's where the president steps out of the crowd, if you will, goes up, picks up the bible and holds it up for everybody to see. and i eventually get directed to come up and join him. and, i made that mistake to-- to kind of be there in the first place, and to join him. >> o'donnell: within 24 hours, esper says, he sent out a message to employees of the department of defense reminding

them they must remain apolitical and protect freedom of speech. then, he decided that wasn't enough. >> esper: the republic felt wobbly. and that's what prompted me to decide to-- to go before the podium at the pentagon on june 3 and say what i said. the option to use active-duty forces in a law enforcement role should only be used as a matter of last resort, and only in the most urgent and dire of situations. we are not in one of those situations now. i do not support invoking the insurrection act. >> o'donnell: right after that, esper was summoned to the white house. he says he was sure donald trump would fire him. why did you think he would fire you? >> esper: because i publicly rebuked him. and what i would learn later is, at the white house, is he thought i took away his authority to invoke the insurrection act. he did not believe that he had the authority to impose it. >> o'donnell: politically, you might have. >> esper: i suppose, at a political level, i-- i did. but he still had that authority.

what he also knew was, i wasn't going to go along with him. >> o'donnell: esper believes president trump didn't fire him at the time because it may have hurt mr. trump's chances for re- election. esper also told us he did not vote for either joe biden or donald trump, but mailed in a ballot for another candidate. you're a lifelong republican. but, in this book, you detail how you subverted many of the president's wishes. people will say you were disloyal. >> esper: i never disobeyed a direct order from the president of the united states. i was fortunate that he often didn't give direct orders. but otherwise, i did what i thought was best for the nation and for our security, and completely within the authority granted to me under the law. >> o'donnell: critics will say, "why now, in a book? why didn't you speak out during the trump administration?" >> esper: it's very simple. if i spoke out at the time, i would be fired, number one. and secondly, i had no confidence that anybody that came in behind me would not be a real trump loyalist. and lord knows what would've happened then.

>> o'donnell: esper says, six days after the election, he and his staff could hardly believe they were still at the pentagon. then he got word that the president planned to fire him. the phone rang, and donald trump's chief of staff, mark meadows, was on the line. you write in the book, he says, "the president's not happy with you. he feels you haven't supported him enough." he added, "you aren't sufficiently loyal." and then, you replied? >> esper: i say, you know, "that's his prerogative, to fire me." but i say, "my oath is to the constitution, not to him." ( ticking ) if you have advanced non-small cell lung cancer, your first treatment could be a chemo-free combination of two immunotherapies that works differently. it could mean a chance to live longer. opdivo plus yervoy is for adults newly diagnosed with non-small cell lung cancer that has spread, tests positive for pd-l1, and does not have an abnormal egfr or alk gene.

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long term consequences. now as you're thinking about all the vaccines your teen might need make sure you ask your doctor if your teen is missing meningitis b vaccination. >> sharyn alfonsi: the u.s. surgeon general has called it an "urgent public health crisis"-- a devastating decline in the mental health of kids across the country.

according to the c.d.c., the rates of suicide, self-harm, anxiety, and depression are up among adolescents-- a trend that began before the pandemic. tonight, we'll take you to milwaukee, wisconsin, a community trying to help its kids navigate a mental health crisis. wisconsin has the fifth highest increase of adolescent self-harm and attempted suicide in the country, with rates nearly doubling since before the pandemic. ( sirens ) in the emergency room at children's hospital in milwaukee, doctors like michelle pickett are seeing more kids desperate for mental health help. >> dr. michelle pickett: we unfortunately see a lot of kids who have attempted suicide. that is something that we see i'd say at least once a shift. >> alfonsi: once a shift? >> dr. pickett: oh, yes. yes, unfortunately. >> alfonsi: dr. pickett has worked in the e.r. for nine years. is there any group that's not being impacted?

>> dr. pickett: no. we're seeing it all-- kids, you know, who come from very well- off families; kids who don't; kids who are suburban; kids who are urban; kids who are rural. we're-- we're seeing it all. >> alfonsi: the surge of families needing help for their kids has revealed a deficit of people and places to treat them. wait time to get an appointment with a therapist is 48 days, and for children, it's often longer. what does it say to you that the place they have to come to is the emergency room? >> dr. pickett: that there's something wrong with our system. the emergency room should not be the place to go and get, you know, acute mental health care when you're in a crisis. we are not a nice, calm environment. >> alfonsi: but they're desperate. >> dr. pickett: yeah, we're there, and we see everybody. but i wish there were more places that kids could go to get the help that they need. >> alfonsi: to manage the mental health crisis and heavy caseload, dr. pickett introduced an ipad with a series of

questions that screen the mental health of every child ten and older who comes to the e.r. for any reason. among the questions: "have you been having thoughts about killing yourself?" and "have you felt your family would be better off if you were dead?" harsh questions, that can be lifesavers to the kids who answer them. >> dr. pickett: we've had four kids that i know of personally, that came in for a completely unrelated problem. so, a broken arm or an earache, or whatever it was. and actually, were acutely suicidal, to the point where we needed to transfer them to inpatient facility right then and there. so, we're catching kids, you know, who are in very much crisis like that. but we're also catching the kids that just need help and don't know what to do, and haven't really talked about this. >> alfonsi: according to the c.d.c., hospital admissions data shows the number of teenage girls who have been suicidal has increased 50% nationwide since 2019. sophia jimenez was one of them.

>> sophia jimenez: i remember crying every night and not knowing what was going on and i felt so alone. >> alfonsi: sophia, and her friend neenah hughes, were in eighth grade, looking forward to high school, when covid turned their worlds upside down. >> neenah hughes: i've always been a super smart kid, and i've always had really good grades. and then, as soon as the pandemic hit, i failed a class. when i was virtual, i had no motivation to do anything. i would just sit in my room, never leave, and it was, like, obvious signs of depression. >> jimenez: my mental health got really bad, especially my eating disorder. i was basically home alone all day. my parents-- well, they noticed that i wasn't eating. i would refuse to eat. so then they ended up taking me to the hospital. >> alfonsi: sophia had to stay in the hospital for two weeks before a bed opened up at a psychiatric facility. your generation, like, got hit

with this, in what's supposed be kind of a fun, carefree time. what was lost? what did you guys lose during the pandemic? >> jimenez: myself. >> alfonsi: yourself. >> hughes: yeah. i would definitely say there were big pieces of myself that i-- were definitely lost. i lost friends, because we wouldn't see each other. we couldn't go to our first homecoming. i couldn't have an eighth-grade graduation. i know that doesn't sound like that big of a deal, but we were looking forward... >> alfonsi: but it is a big deal when you're in eighth grade. >> hughes: yeah. i feel like if the pandemic hadn't happened at all, a lot of my, like, sadness and mental problems would not be as bad as they are. it just made everything worse. >> alfonsi: are we in crisis mode right now? >> tammy makhlouf: we are. we are in crisis mode. and it's scary.

>> alfonsi: tammy makhlouf has worked as a child therapist throughout wisconsin for the last 25 years. i think there was a hope that, you know, we're back in school, the kids are able to see their friends again, and play sports, that this would all go away. has it? >> makhlouf: no. no. i've noticed that the wait lists are longer, kids are struggling with more anxiety, more depression. so, we were in a mental health crisis prior to the pandemic. >> alfonsi: did the pandemic accelerate it? >> makhlouf: i believe so. we're coming out of the pandemic, but kids have still lost two years. two years of socialization, two years of education, two years of their world kind of being shaken up. so as we get "back to normal," i think kids are struggling. even when the pandemic is over, this crisis isn't going to be

over. >> alfonsi: c.d.c. numbers show that even before the pandemic, the number of adolescents saying they felt persistently sad or hopeless was up 40% since 2009. there are lots of theories on why-- social media, increased screen time, and isolation-- but the research isn't definitive. this past march, tammy makhlouf was tapped by children's hospital to run an urgent care walk-in clinic specifically opened to treat kid's mental health. >> receptionist: how can i help you guys? >> mother: we are here to get some help. >> alfonsi: open seven days a week from 3:00 to 9:30, it is one of the first clinics of its kind in the country. >> makhlouf: now, what's going to work for you? and what's going to work for you? so when they come to our clinic, we assess them, and we provide them with a therapy session. so we give them some interventions. we give them a plan, an action plan. >> alfonsi: the plans are catered to each child's situation, actionable things families and kids can do while

they look for a doctor or facility to make room for them. how long have the wait lists been to get help? >> makhlouf: normally, you're put on, you're scheduled an appointment within a few months. >> alfonsi: months? >> makhlouf: yeah. and then, if you want a child psychiatrist, you're looking at months to a year. >> alfonsi: how important is it to get them help when they need it, immediately? >> makhlouf: as days go on, the symptoms get worse. if you have a depressed child, you know, maybe they started out where they were feeling depressed, and then as the days goes on, they're suicidal. so it really-- you really do need to get that help and that support right away. >> alfonsi: 11-year-old austin bruenger desperately needed that support during the pandemic. he's a fifth grader at roosevelt elementary school in milwaukee. how old were you when the pandemic hit? >> austin bruenger: i was nine. i was still going to school, but then i kept hearing on the news in the car, just like, pandemic, stay put, quarantine, 14 days.

>> alfonsi: when they first said, "hey, you don't have to go to school," what was your reaction at that moment? >> austin bruenger: heaven. but then i realized it's the complete opposite. >> alfonsi: opposite, because like millions of school age kids, austin was forced into remote learning for more than a year, and disconnected from friends. >> austin bruenger: i was like this shut-in. the only way you could see people is through, like, phones, or your family that you live with. >> alfonsi: that isolation took a toll on austin, who was already struggling with news that his parents were getting a divorce. >> melissa bruenger: and that's when i think everything just started to magnify. he, you know, he was always asking to see his friends. we couldn't. and i remember there was one moment that he was just on the

floor, like, kicking and punching the air. just-- but couldn't describe why he was upset. >> alfonsi: unable to vent with friends, and without access to in-person therapy, austin's mother melissa says his world began closing in on him. >> melissa bruenger: it felt like he was interacting less and just kind of withdrawing into himself and spending a lot of time by himself. and i went to go tuck him in, and he said, "mom, i'm having suicidal thoughts." >> alfonsi: and he was how old? >> melissa bruenger: he was nine. and, like, i was kind of like, i-- i didn't know what to say. i didn't know what to do. >> austin bruenger: i just imagined myself going through all these things, like jumping from a building, and taking a knife from my kitchen and ending my life. it was over 50 of them that just flooded my mind. i don't really know if it was from all the, like, anti- socialness and not being able-- it also felt like, with the divorce came a lot of yelling, and it felt like my parents didn't need me anymore. it's just really hard to think about that moment.

>> alfonsi: desperate, melissa called austin's pediatrician, who referred her to outpatient therapists and in-patient psychiatric programs-- only to be told there were long waiting lists and no beds. >> melissa bruenger: all this stuff is racing through my head. and then for them to say, "well, there's no beds right now." and i'm like, "how am i going to keep him safe?" >> alfonsi: in an effort to try and keep kids safe, wisconsin is trying another approach, that's being adopted in other parts of the country. >> dr. brilliant nimmer: hello! how are you? >> alfonsi: 14 pediatric clinics across southeastern wisconsin have incorporated full-time therapists inside their offices... >> dr. nimmer: look who i've got! >> alfonsi: ...offering mental health screenings and treatment as part of routine care. >> therapist: okay, so let's start with our assessment. >> alfonsi: dr. brilliant nimmer was the first pediatrician in milwaukee to create a therapist's office inside her office.

you're saying, "we're here together, we're going to all work on this together," not "we can't help you, go see somebody else." >> dr. nimmer: exactly. and so, having the therapist in our clinic to really just have-- get a team together to discuss that patient and family together, to bounce ideas off of each other, because we both know them so well-- is so much better for patient care. >> alfonsi: dr. nimmer's clinic treats an under-served community where families typically struggle to get mental health help. therapists have treated more than 500 kids here since the pandemic started. >> dr. nimmer: i think as pediatricians and primary care providers, we can no longer just solely say, you know, "mental health providers, you're the only ones that are going to be taking care of our patients, in regards to mental health." this is now something that we need to be doing, too. >> alfonsi: austin bruenger's pediatrician now has a therapist in her office, too. their family was fortunate to find regular outpatient therapy

for his depression. how do you feel now? >> austin bruenger: i don't know. it's much better than before. everything's going up in my life, knowing that, like, i'm friends with everyone in my class, i'm building better, like, social life. it's fun to just know there's others that like the same things as me. >> alfonsi: austin, it's not an easy thing to talk about all this stuff. why did you agree to tell us about what you've been through? >> austin bruenger: because the world needs to-- the world needs to know. mental health and stuff like that needs to be treated, or bad stuff could happen. if you're going through that by yourself, try and contact someone you know, like your friend, your family. >> alfonsi: and talk about it. >> austin bruenger: yeah. ( ticking ) >> find mental health resources for kids and families in crisis, at 60minutesovertime.com.

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( ticking ) >> jon wertheim: for decades now, russians have known the drill. when there's bad news brewing, such as the death of a leader, or a convulsive event, such as the chernobyl disaster, state tv switches its programming and begins airing tchaikovsky's ballet, "swan lake." nothing-to-see-here-folks. but also, note the choice of distraction. ballet is centrally important to russian society, and to russian image. dancers slicing through the air and challenging laws of physics and gravity represent civility and grace. but, after february 24, when russian military troops invaded

ukraine, russian ballet troupes had their western tours canceled. and just last week, moscow's bolshoi theater abruptly canceled shows by directors critical of putin's military campaign. and so it is, the brutal war plays out on the most delicate of fronts, leaving ballet in exile. when ballet dancers are described as god's athletes, well, you could offer up olga smirnova as supporting evidence. she treads on air, coming in on little cat feet. she's a russian prima ballerina, one of the world's leading dancers. but, days after russia invaded ukraine, smirnova pirouetted and stepped off her stage at the renowned bolshoi theater with dramatic flourish. she took to social media to express her outrage, and then fled the country-- the modern- day version of nureyev or baryshnikov defecting. when you sat down to write that social media post, what did you want to communicate?

what did you want to say? >> olga smirnova: i just couldn't keep it inside. i was so ashamed of russia. this is the true. i'm not ashamed that i'm russian, but i'm ashamed because of russia started this action. >> wertheim: i want to read what you wrote. you said you were against this war with every fiber of your being. "but i now feel that a line has been drawn that separates the before and the after." >> smirnova: it's how i felt. 24th of february, this is-- was the line, because it's all changed. all changed. the reputation of russia and russian people, even if you are not a soldier, you're just russian. it, it's all-- it still make a shadow on you. >> wertheim: being russian. >> smirnova: being russian. and it's-- it's really painful. >> wertheim: predictably, smirnova's post went viral.

she was, after all, a leading light at moscow's bolshoi ballet. from the russian word for "big," bolshoi is the world's largest ballet company, and the most prestigious. the theater is physically close to the kremlin-- a short walk away-- and also aligned inextricably with the russian government. tsars loved the bolshoi. for decades, communist leaders used the bolshoi theater for political stagecraft, holding rallies and giving national addresses there. >> alexei ratmansky: this is something that celebrates russia. every important guest who would visit soviet union would be invited to the bolshoi, see the performance. and that was a pride of, of russia, at any time. >> wertheim: alexei ratmansky trained at the bolshoi school, and was for a time its artistic director. he was born in russia, but grew up in kyiv, where his parents still live.

at the time of the invasion, he was in russia choreographing two ballets. he left the country immediately, unwilling to continue working in a world so tied to the putin regime. >> ratmansky: as i was going in a taxi to the airport, i felt these two ca-- sand castles falling apart-- behind my back. >> wertheim: those sand castles were the work-- the work you had done? >> ratmansky: yes, yes, yes. it was an agony. it was a very hard day. >> wertheim: and, of course, a catastrophic day for ukraine. indiscriminate bombings and missile strikes raining down upon the country, crushing lives and dreams... not least those of an ascendant ballerina from kyiv, polina chepyk, age 17. you wanted to be a ballerina for years and years.

what was it like when suddenly you couldn't-- couldn't go to school, couldn't dance? >> polina chepyk: i was shocked. and i'm like, "oh my god." and first about what i'm thinking that i left my pointe shoes in college. it was my fir-- >> wertheim: that was your first thought? >> chepyk: yes. >> wertheim: you left your pointe shoes a school. >> chepyk: yes. i left everything, actually. >> wertheim: war didn't stop her in her footsteps. she resumed dancing at home, using whatever she could as a barre. but after a few days, her parents, both former dancers, focused on getting polina out. they called on a famously well- connected figure in the tight- knit ballet community-- new jersey-based larissa saveliev. you're getting this barrage of emails from-- from parents, and from dancers. what-- what are they-- what are telling you? what are they asking you? >> larissa saveliev: oh, "please help, get us out of here." they're willing to give up everything else, but they have to dance. and the parents were-- you know, "it doesn't matter what we do,

they have to dance." >> wertheim: this was their-- their life-line, almost. >> saveliev: this is it. they just-- they-- they could not imagine not dance. >> wertheim: in the 1990s, she founded youth america grand prix, a ballet competition and scholarship program, pairing aspiring dancers with ballet schools worldwide. >> saveliev: well, no, they want to see her for full year, but you have to come for the summer first. >> wertheim: now, in a humanitarian crisis, she, and the international ballet community, scrambled to action. saveliev tapped her vast network, relocating more than a hundred young ukrainian dancers to new schools and host families. >> saveliev: we give each child a number, just to move faster. and we say, "okay, number 55 is, like-- just get a spot in stuttgart, okay. okay, number 54 just get a spot in-- dresden." >> wertheim: cross it off the list. >> saveliev: "cross it off the list." >> wertheim: when a slot opened

for polina, she stuffed leotards and tutus into a suitcase, along with a bottle of her mom's perfume, a reminder of home, and then she headed to kyiv's train station. >> chepyk: and my parents are in the window of train. they said "goodbye. we love you. everything will be fine." and i was crying. and we were all crying. i was thinking, maybe i would need to take my suitcase and go back to my family, because my heart was broken, really. >> wertheim: how did you overcome that? what-- what-- what made you not get off that train? >> chepyk: because it's open door for me. it's-- a door for my dream. >> wertheim: 17-year-old that she is, polina documented the lonely odyssey on tik-tok. trains and buses, five days and 1,200 miles, kyiv to lviv, poland to berlin. finally, to amsterdam, where she landed at the dutch national

ballet academy, one of the leading schools in the world. when you got to the new school and started dancing again, how did that feel? >> chepyk: oh, i was very happy. yes. i-- my mind-- changed. because i was thinking about my parents all the time, for my family, for my sister. and when i go to the ballet clas, the-- this world changed for me. i have another world-- a world of ballet. >> wertheim: her adjustment was made easier when she found other ukrainian dance students, who, thanks to larissa saveliev, also found safe harbor in amsterdam. polina fell into a routine immediately. on the cusp of a professional career, she prepared for final exams. she was jittery beforehand. she emerged relieved, triumphant, and eager to report back to mom. what did you tell her?

>> chepyk: that, i was nervous, but when i start, you know, i do everything right. >> wertheim: if the war has made refugees out of some ukrainian dancers, it's made soldiers out of others. when the war began, oleksii potiomkin, a principal dancer with ukraine's national ballet, turned in his tights for military fatigues. here he is in downtown lviv last week, having just returned from duty as a medic. what was your life like before the war? >> oleksii potiomkin: before war i must-- i preparing-- new premiere in ballet-- ukrainian ballet. you know, like, real, normal life. and just, one moment, it's, like, changes. but i need to do something. i can't sit just at home in shelter and watch tv, how my friends die, and-- everyone do something. >> wertheim: what have you seen these last few months? >> potiomkin: every day, it's

really scary. they crushed everything. destroyed houses of civilians people. it's brothers, sons, fathers, sisters. >> wertheim: while he says he's shaken by what he's seen unfold on the battlefield, he's also appalled by a war taking place on another front-- at the bolshoi. >> potiomkin: like bolshoi now, it's toxic theater. nobody want to work with you. >> wertheim: you said toxic? >> potiomkin: toxic, yes. in russia art, it's politics. it's-- russian government use-- use it-- ballet-- it's like weapon. >> wertheim: the weapon was deployed at the bolshoi as recently as last month, when the theater revived a production of "spartacus" in support of the russian military invasion, unnerving many in the dance world, including long-time head of the dutch national ballet, ted brandsen. >> ted brandsen: well, it was a very clear statement that, "we

have to support our boys who are on a military operation to save ukraine from the fascists." which is a totally ridiculous concept, of course. >> wertheim: this allegory, spartacus, about the-- the slave revolt, is-- is somehow being co-opted by-- >> brandsen: yeah. >> wertheim: --the-- the aggressive superpower? >> brandsen: absolutely. now, it's not-- it's not-- it's not for nothing that this became one of the signature ballets of the soviet emp-- of the soviet time. >> wertheim: abroad, the ballet community has staged benefit concerts to raise funds for ukraine, while russia's famed companies, the bolshoi and st. petersburg's mariinsky, have had their touring dates canceled. >> ratmansky: i think you need to be a little bit more active with your arms. >> wertheim: with the iron curtain down, artists have to pick a side. alexei ratmansky left moscow for american ballet theatre in new york, where he is artist-in- residence, and where we spoke with him remotely last week.

it sounds like you-- you don't buy this idea that, look, individuals shouldn't bear the responsibility for-- for the acts of the state? that ar-- artists should just be artists. >> ratmansky: no, i don't think the artists are separate from politics. and besides, it's not-- for me, it's not politics. it's about humanity. it's about responding to war crimes, responding to the crimes of your government, of your president. it just made things clear which things are important and which aren't. and you make a choice. you decide where you want to belong. >> wertheim: for olga smirnova, that choice came together in a matter of days, after she condemned the war. she left russia, and landed on her feet at the dutch national opera in amsterdam, just around the corner from polina's school. it must have been incredibly difficult to leave the bolshoi. >> smirnova: if you make a choice, you have consequences.

but, this is how it works. i had to leave everything. like, my home, my theater, my repertoire, my partners, my parents, sister, brother, everything. but i don't have regrets. >> wertheim: no regrets. >> smirnova: no. because at least i can be honest with myself. ( ticking ) >> cbs sports 2 is presented by progressive insurance, california final round, 68 to take. the wells fargo championship, his second title of the year. nhl playoffs, it was the bruins over the hurricanes to tie up their first round eastern conference series. for 24/7 news and

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>> stahl: the bombshell of a leak from the supreme court-- the draft decision on abortion rights-- shocked much of the country. it shouldn't have. the crucial vote on the future of "roe v. wade" wasn't cast in a supreme court conference room in 2022. it was cast at the polls in 2016, when donald trump was elected president. shortly after election day, on this broadcast, president-elect trump told us he would appoint what he called "pro-life" judges, a promise he made repeatedly during his campaign. it took mr. trump one term to keep his promise and add those three votes to the court. not every political promise is just rhetoric. i'm lesley stahl. happy mothers' day. we'll be back next week with another edition of "60 minutes." ( ticking ) open. it's a beautiful word. neighborhoods "open".

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