it's good to be with you. i'm chris jansing in for katy tur. republicans are still battered and bruised from this miserable midterm cycle, still reeling

over the red wave that never was, but for at least one man, it's all about 2024 today. former president trump is expected to launch his third bid for the white house tonight, refuses to let the losses stall him, but if he's expecting wave of republican support and well wishes, he might be waiting a while because if gop members aren't silent, they're acting to a potential trump run like this. he's an aging picture who keeps losing gains. it would be a bad mistake. desantis is the leader of the republican party. 2020 didn't work out. we have to look forward. gop lawmakers aren't the only ones grumbling over a trump bid. voters are backing away, too. 65% of republican voters surveyed said donald trump should probably or definitely not run again. so if not him, who?

at this point, the new breakout star is obvious to everyone, including donald trump. florida governor ron desantis, who has kept his lips sealed in a fuch run, is keeping up in the polls. 37% of potential republican voters said they would back him for the white house. that's right behind trump at 47% and miles ahead of mike pence. if tonight's announcement is in fact an official campaign launch, it's unusually early. which suggests donald trump may be concerned. concerned enough that he is trying to fend off challengers like desantis years in advance, forcing his party to chart a course now, seeing his unwaivering base might not be so unwaivering. joining me now from mar-a-lago, the former president's former home, is vaughn hillyard. so he's refusing to put it off.

what can we expect out of this announcement from mar-a-lago tonight. >> reporter: we're just about seven hours away from when this announcement is slated to take place here at mar-a-lago tonight. this is a campaign though that one could contend has been ongoing since january of 2020. he's talking about rescinding the 2020 election. talking about having a redo election. he is still talking about state legislatures decertifying the last one and when you are looking here at 2022, he is facing a backdrop in which the slate of endorsed candidates largely lost in these pivotal elections like arizona, wisconsin, michigan, pennsylvania. at the same time, the republican party is largely been shaped in his image and the list of individuals who have thrived with standing up to donald trump is very small. you could look at georgia.

brad raffensperger, brian kemp, but there's a longer list of individuals who have suffered for standing up to trump from kinzinger to cheney to tom rice. that is where if you are glenn youngkin or ron desantis here, who are both early in their careers, but there are questions about whether it is worth waging that battle here at that point and that's where you see the former president expected to jump in ahead of time and essentially sending the messages. his own daughter-in-law, laura trump, is suggesting and sending a warning shot over the weekend to desantis warning him about jumping into the race here, that it would be a messy situation. that is the question. is there anybody actually willing to stand up to him. another name is mike pence, who is just today releasing his memoir which has outlined the danger he felt he was in on january 6th, yet is he going to be able to wage his own battle.

>> i think you've got to silence to his decision to go ahead and make the announcement tonight then the backlash. some people very publicly speaking out as we've pointed out. so i guess the question becomes is his message essentially what we heard from lara trump, which is enter at your own risk. is it a threat? is it a expectation, bring it on? what are you hearing about how the former president has been reacting to this? >> there's been no coalition that's taken on trump since he won the gop nomination in 2016 that's why it was notable to hear the wyoming senator say it should be desantis. those are fractures within the party here. but do those fractures amount to

building an apparatus and building a ground swell of support around somebody that is not donald trump? liz cheney last year, she looked to be that individual, but you saw only a few individuals stand up and defend her. that being adam kinzinger. mid romney here. until that sort of effort is underway, donald trump feels good about where he is at and that's why you should expect to see him tonight and the weeks ahead continuing to hold campaign rallying around the country. take georgia. herschel walker is still his backed candidate and you can expect him to be there in georgia alongside of that candidate because there's a lot of elections, a lot of elected republicans that still owe donald trump for their electoral success and understand there is a major share of the american voting electorate that still use him as the de facto leader of the party and for those elected leaders down ballot, they understand they need those for

their electoral success. >> thank you so much. joining me now, josh dawesy. so assuming this will be a campaign launch, i want to read from your latest story. the differences it will have compared to his last run. quote, compared with 2020, the 2024 bid is expected to have a smaller staff and budget. the new campaign is expected to be based in south florida. trump has told others he wants to recreate the underdog vibe of the 2016 campaign. i mean, there's a whole range of kpalss in executing that, but what do you see as the main ones? >> there's lots of blame to go around for why he lost in 2020. a lot is on the coronavirus and some other things he did. in his mind, that he had an ineffective and bloated campaign. he says i had all these people, i don't know what they did. we spent all this money on

headquarters in arlington that was useless and i want to have a lean campaign. he talks to advise about how fun he thought 2016 was in his words compared to 2020. he's trying to do it differently. i think most of it will be based around mar-a-lago. he'll have a small set of aides around him. one of the more interesting things we learned school district that there will not be a campaign manager. he's fired many as we know. and that time, no one's taking title. in this campaign. folks who are leading the campaign and a smaller budget and a smaller footprint and office than the last time. >> we also can't forget the midterms are not over. there was hand wringing over this announcement. over the timing. trump was advised to wait until after the georgia runoff. that isn't happen, but the time frg republicans now, is it going

to be a kind of one and done and they'll move on? are you hearing concerns this is just bad for the party for a while? >> well, among the elected officials, party leadership, donors, you know, elites, i think most people would rather have a plan for a race now after georgia based on our reporting. a lot of folks want him to stay out for good. but coming off blistering losses on tuesday night, he was not going to take that advice to look like he was relenting or backing down after those losses. that was kind of a nonstarter. a lot of his aides, in fact, he polled much of his inner circle last week and most wanted him to delay it. he was not interested in that. he's coming at this election this time from more of a place of weakness. he has multiple investigations going on. you have to remember, chris, he

still remains significant support among the republican party and there's been so many times in the past where the words of elites and folks in washington have wanted him to go away. think about access hollywood. after january 6th, and the base of the party was not going to have it. the test will be do the folks who want him to go away, do they have enough pop with republican voters to make it happen? so far, i'm not seeing that. we're seeing some deterioration. he's in a far weaker position than he was maybe two or three years ago, but i'm not sure that he's dead man walk wg like some of his foes and critics wish he was. >> there are plenty who think you under estimate trump at your own risk. but would it be fair to say that to go out against him now is a lesser risk than it's ever been

before given the polls and everything else? we have a pentagon briefing. there's this report that a senior ugs intelligence official says russian missiles crossed into poland killing two people. let's listen. >> resulted in contamination of the navy's drinking water system. the department of defense recognize that is the 2021 incidents at red hill created a trust deficit between the dod and people of hawaii and that it's incumbent upon the department to earn back that trust. on march 7, 2022, secretary austin directed the permanent closure of the facility. since then, the department has stood up a joint tasks force. the jtf red hill recently completed a preliminary step in

the process and removed over 1 million gallons of fuel from the facility's fuel pipelines. the operation known as unpacking conclude t without anying involving the handling, transport of storage of the fuel. the next phase includes performing all necessary repairs, modifications and enhancements to the structure to reduce risk during the defuelling of the storage tanks. >> we are told now at the top of that pentagon briefing, the officials say they have no confirmation of what the associated press is reporting, which is that some missiles went into poland from russia and that two were killed. a polish prime minister did however this is according to reuters, called an urgent meeting of a committee for national security and defense affairs. according to a defense spokesman on twitter. this committee is a large group

of people. heads of defense, interior, justice, foreign affairs ministers, as well as various coordinators of intelligence agencies. it's a body that prepares and coordinates on national security issues. the spokesman was not available for comment and did not mention what the committee was set to discuss but obviously, this is a very interesting bit of timing. look, here's what we know. we know that when ukraine was making continued advances, that we saw that putin made a decision, we don't know why, not to go to the g-20. i just talked a short time ago to admiral steveritas. he said there's any number of reasons. one is that when he decided to go to war against ukraine, he went to his friend and his ally,

chinese president xi, and he told him this was going to be essentially a cake walk. this is something that russia could do. russia was going to take back ukrainian territory. as we know, it has not turned out that way. nothing even close to that. now we have seen the retreat of russian forces from the largest city that russia took. that's one possibility. the second, at least according to the admiral, is that there's a desperation there. he knows he's backed into a corner and he's worried about leaving the russian federation. what the official kremlin statement said was that the russian federation needed to keep him there but did they need to keep him there or did he need to stay there because he's concerned about pressure of people around him who frankly are fed up at the number of lives that have been lost, the number of casualties and

frankly, the fact that they have been in retreat. so again, it's possible, it's possible, we don't that this confirmed, a senior u.s. intelligence official says russian missiles crossed into nato member poland killing two people. we have the admiral with us on the phone. let's talk about just how extraordinary and how complicated this is if this is indeed true, admiral. >> let's start by stipulating, chris, that we don't have all the facts in hand here and we've got a ways to go. first of all, we've got to determine where these missiles came from. are they russian missiles? seems like a logical event here would have been not a deliberate attack on poland. that's really virtually inconceivable, but are these

russian missiles that were programmed incorrectly that malfunctioned in flight, crossed the border. perhaps they were directed at the western ukrainian city of lviv. missed that target. flew across the border. the p polish are assembling their team. they'll go into evidence gathering mode. they'll try to ascertain where these missiles came from. i would guess the highest probability is a russian in add inadvertent event. they'll come to convene the north atlantic council, the decision body of nato. they'll assemble representatives from the 30 nato nations because bottom line here, this is extremely serious and within nato, the most central tenant is

article five, which says in essence that an attack on one nation is an attack on all nations. so putin, if these are russian missiles, is really expanding this conflict and we have to gather more information before we can make a determination of where this is headed. >> let's step back for a second because what we know is at least according to the energy ministry in ukraine, is at least 100 missiles for fired. we saw those pictures of an apartment building that went up in flames. one of the missiles struck an apartment building. so we know that had been going on. but again, the united states, i'm going to read what we heard from the pentagon. let me highlight up front that we are aware of the press reports alleging that two russian missiles have struck a location inside poland near the

ukraine border. we don't have any information at this time to corroborate those reports and are looking into this further. what happens to corroborate that and how complicated could it be, admiral? >> considerably complicated, chris. the ukrainian air defense systems will have been tracking these missiles. it's quite possible by working with the ukrainians we would be able to get a pretty good idea of the trajectory. also, our own satellite systems are quite capable of tracking movement of missiles over battlefields. it will take some time, but we're talking hours, not days or weeks. and more importantly i think on the ground in poland, presumingly, probably, are some remnants of these missiles. these all look like broken up pieces of some kind of probably

air to ground or surface to surface, ground to ground missiles. the pols, believe me, will have teams on the ground this minute combing through the wreckage and in particular, looking for serial numbers, profiles, anything to identify the weapon. it is hard to imagine what else this could be, but certainly the ukrainians fire air defense missiles against incoming russian missiles, could one of those have gone in a different direction? i think that's far less likely than the obvious explanation here, which is a russian missile that has been fired in a way that has malfunctioned, perhaps wrong coordinates put it, perhaps the missile malfunctioned and ends up striking and killing tragically, evidently according to reports,

two polish citizens. so i think that will be clarified over the next number of hours. we're not going to have to wait days. >> the report from reuters is that polish prime minister has called an urgent meeting. obviously. you already have a meeting of world leaders all gathered minus obviously the leader of russia. what are those conversations like? what do you imagine is happening now? what is the polish leadership doing? what are the conversations among leaders at nato? >> if you're the polish leadership, what you're looking for is the facts. you're looking to understand exactly what has happened. in the pols believe me are not looking to start a war between poland and russia or nato and russia. so they're going to look very carefully to try to ascertain exactly what's happened here. at the same time, i would

surmise that in the nato headquarters where i served as supreme allied commander, the general of nato, former prime minister of norway, very experienced, steady hand, he will be a assembling the leader of the 30 countries. he'll be calling the supreme ally and at that headquarters, chris, which is effectively the pentagon of nato, they will be doing the intelligence forensics using overhead sensors. everyone will be trying to put together the facts. we can look again i would say over a matter of hours we'll start to get a good picture of what's happened here. >> you make a good point about when you talk about him being a

steady hand. that is what you need in a situation like this, but having said that, what would it take to invoke article five? >> if this were proven to be a deliberate attack by the russian federation against poland, next step would be the north atlantic council, which is the actual group of representatives in brussels, belgium would convene and they would hear the evidence then make a determination whether to invoke article five, which is at the heart of the nato treaty and it would state simply that poland has been attacked and all members of nato will now gather together and defend poland. again, chris, we need to slow down here and get the facts on the ground. we are quite a ways away from a

determination of an attack. most likely, this is an inadd ver tant event. >> let me bring in andrea mitchell. what are you hearing? >> we have confirmed what the admiral and you have been discussing that yes, some missile or missiles hit territorial poland. obviously, this is crossing a red line. the red line of all red lines because nato has not been involved in this war. and the question is was this deliberate, errant? as to the admiral's suggestion, this could have been an accident. the timing and everything else about it. would be so extraordinary if this were a deliberate expansion of the ukraine war. to nato taking it to nato's front door. that said, administration officials now are scrambling as

you can imagine. they've confirmed that something happened. they don't know exactly what kind of missile this was or missiles. they don't know what the casualties may or may not have been, but they know and they have confirmed the report that was originally on the associated press that something indeed did hit poland from russia. and that the entire u.s. government is mobilized now trying to nail down exactly what it is that happened and how of course to respond if they determine by going back over the intelligence that this was deliberate. but there's a very big chance here, but everyone gets to on it, that this -- at the former nato supreme allied commander, that this could have been an accident. if so, it's still terribly serious, but the response will be very different. >> i want to read what a senior

official told nbc news. we must figure out if this was russian rockets. russia has not been precise so it has plausible that rockets went astray. that would be stunning but we just don't know and as you said, admiral, we may know this in a matter of hours, but in the meantime, it's something we've talked about for a very long time. the concern that if backed into a corner, we'd have to see what would happen with putin, putin we know firing missiles against ukraine and it's possible that they went errant and so how does this escalate the level of concern and how do you as you say get the steady hand to be at center of this and make sure it doesn't become more than it needs to be? that this doesn't escalate more than what called for until we

know what happened here? >> we wait. and that's frustrated and we're all spring loaded to the take action immediately, but this is potentially one of those moments when events carry a weight of their own. the next thing will come to warsaw. it will be the pols laying out the evidence. they're in control of the sovereign territory where these missiles landed. simultaneously, the rest of nato, including the military headquarters of this supreme ally command, will be supporting the pols with satellite intelligence. any other human intelligence. all that will be put together. i think with a very logical

tick-tock of here's how we reconstruct the events that's just happened. again, be logical here. if you're putin and you have decided to attack nato, the odds of launching two random missiles into a field in poland, that's not how this is going to start. so if you had to bet right now, i think you'd bet these were errant missiles. they went astray. that will require a significant response itself from nato and we could talk about what that might include, but that's very different that be a presumption or an action response to a deliberate attack, which i find highly unlikely and illogical at this moment. >> but at this moment, admiral, are they preparing for every

eventuality? if we find out it's a, here's what we do. if it's b, this is how we respond. >> yes, we are. and when i say we here, i mean across the alliance, in national capitals, in the pentagons of 30 different nations, senior military leaders are doing exactly what you just described. i think they will be saying to their civilian masters that logically, this is unlikely to have been a deliberate attack so let's go on the presumption that it's inadvertent. but you're right. as military leaders, they're also responsible to plan against a worse eventuality, which could be that again, very illogical, very small percentage, but the percentage of this being some

kind of deliberate action by the kremlin. i think that invites a different and more robust set of responses out of a nato alliance. we're not there yet. let's take a deep breath and get the facts on the table. >> i want to go to kyiv, which is be the target of many of these missiles. molly hunter is there for us. >> reporter: i've been hearing your conversation with the admiral. everyone here is trying to figure out what happened. you know those phone con verations have been happening behind closed doors. we've asked if there's any confirmation. they are right on the border. where the missiles hit is js

across the border. today saw the biggest ariel bombardment, the brightest, broadest, country wide russian attack since the sart of the war according to ukrainian officials. the numbers are still coming in. about 90 missiles rockets were launched at ukraine and the ukrainian air force says they shot down more than 70. there were also ten drones, but they targeted critical infrastructure. we know there's critical infrastructure in lviv. they've been spared the kind of destruction and damage that kyiv and kharkiv have seen. so whether or not what those rockets and missiles were targeting, we don't know. we know according to ukrainian officials, the targets of these russian ataxes tonight were energy plants, power stations. critical infrastructure which of course directly targets the

civilian population by knocking out electricity, water. half of the city is without electricity. >> thank you. i know you'll be listening in and seeing if there are any official statements. stay with us as you get more information. >> admiral, we have a little more information via "the new york times" who has been listening to broadcast reports in poland and say that the deadly explosion took place at a grain processing facility near the border with ukraine. they pinpoint it to a village about four miles north of the ukrainian border. according to polish media outlets, the top government officials have called an emergency meeting, but how easy or how difficult would it be for a missile to go off of its course, four miles or more? >> unfortunately, it is all too easy. and we have learned anything in watching the russian military

over the last eight months, we have learned that are not a well oiled machine. they seem to be quite careless as a general proposition in hurling missiles at civilian targets. there's no precision in it. so unfortunately, chris, i think it's all too likely that this was a missile that was either programmed incorrectly at its origin or had a malfunction and simply overflew a target. probably the city of lviv in the west. the major population city of ukraine in the west. came across the border and tragically has landed in poland and evidently killed several

civilians on the ground. again, looking at the russian records here, it is hardly unlikely that this is a bad mistake by a poorly performing military. >> let me ask you some specifics about missile defense systems because again, we've been hearing -- how close to the border, what would they cover and would they have seen incoming in the sense that it was going over poland? >> the way air defense works, chris, is the ground based air defense systems each have radars which are detecting income k targets and there's no radar that's covering a vast --

ukraine is the size of texas. so think of texas. you're going to have a radar system in dallas, in the north central part. houston. down on the coast. one out in el paso in the west. and so on and so forth. each of them have a varying degree of range and each will have associated with them surface to air missiles that would go up and knock down incoming russian cruise missiles or russian aircraft. those will vary in range from dozens of miles to some systems can push out 50, 70, 100 miles. they kind of link together, they create a defense and depth system. to knock down 70 sounds to me about right when i think about the ukrainian systems. i think super high-end u.s. air

defense systems patriots, sad, some of those i think would get an even highe percentage of kills, but the ukrainians do an incredible job and a good job of keeping those systems up and maintained. we've helped support those, but when they miss some number of missiles entirely possible. could for example a ukrainian missile have a near miss that affects its missile and it goes astray? yes, that's another scenario. all this is going to need to be examined with precision and depth. we'll know more in a matter of hours. look for statements coming out of warsaw about their initial analysis. >> molly hunter, we're finally

starting to get some reaction from nato countries. >> reporter: we are just seeing reaction is that every leader would be calling each other trying to figure out how to get on the same page, but we're sarting to see public statements. the ministry of foreign affair of latvia has tweeted out russian missiles is a dangerous escalation. russia will bear full responsibility for all consequences. we're hearing something similar from estonia. latest news from poland is most concerning. we are consulting closely with poland and other allies. estonia is ready to defend every inch. we are waiting right now for any information from poland and i

don't imagine evenen ukrainians would get out in front of what has happened on polish soil from the polish government. we know there are high level national security meetings happening inside poland. no doubt ukrainian officials will be kept abreast as soon as they decide, determine what to put out publicly, but we'll start to see public statements from nato allies expressing solidarity with poland. >> zelenskyy gave a speech today and outlined, oh, okay. so i have kelly o'connell. andrea is working her sources on the phone. kelly, the timeline is that zelenskyy gives a speech. we see a reaction almost immediately from russia. this 100 missiles or somewhere in that neighborhood being launched at ukraine.

already what we have seen from the g-19 who are there because putin is not there. was a growing frustration. impatience. i'll let you kparktize it, but it's clear that the members of the g-20 who are there were looking for what is the next step with ukraine. they're obviously concerned about inflation worries. about the cost of fuel. the cost of food. food insecurity. give us the context against which all of this is happening now. >> having these leaders come together in bali and ukraine's involvement for months now, the weariness all of these world leaders have about the many human costs of this war is clearly present here. the foreign minister of russia has been here at the g- 20 so russia is represented and that

adds to put it in an understatement, an awkward and difficult factor to have russia represented here at a time when so many of the other nations want to try compel russia to change its behavior. the questions are how to do that. they have tried so many different ways through sanctions, through international os raization and now trying to get them to a peace process. clearly, that's not case. it is the middle of the night here. i woke up white house officials trying to get information about these new reports. what i have been told at a senior level is they don't yet know what the ground truth is. this is a grave concern because as we've been talking about poland is a grave concern about european allies an the west about any incursion into nato

changes the game so that's why this is so, so highly volatile and such a great concern. i'm told that u.s. officials at the state department, the department of defense, are trying to work with partners in poland and ukraine to assess the details. i was told we know russia's track record for accuracy is woefully bad so the idea there could be stray rockets is plausible. at the same time, i was repeatedly told we don't know the ground truth. we don't know what happened. one of the big questions will be how will this affect what president biden does next. this kind of possibility has always been front and center in the briefings and reality that these leaders are dealing with. the kind of moment where war goes off the planned page and into territory that causes them to have to change their thinking or adjust. part of what this g-20 was intended to do was to try to

move something forward. is there a any way to get russia to go to a peace table? and then all of the sort of consequences that come from this. the food insecurity. the energy insecurity. with winter months coming. so it's hard at this early middle of the night moment to gauge is this a turning point in the war. is this a critical stage that will change things because we need more facts. but the initial reports certainly suggest that this is going to get the attention of world leaders, many of whom have been asleep and may have been awakened by their teams to inform them of this. one of the things we want to know is what has the president been told. he was not at the gala dinner. lavrov was. we are told the president was dealing with other matters. we were told they were not urgent and that the president was not sick, although he had said he had a cold. is there any relationship

between that and this? we don't know. clearly, the u.s. wants to find out who's responsible, what's the extebt of the casualties. i think we can all see the potential for consequences is evident now. >> thank you for that. with me now is former adviser to president zelenskyy of ukraine. we don't want to get ahead of things, but we know from polish reports that at least broadcast reports there say a grain processing plant was hit. that two pols have died. what's your assessment of where this puts this? >> first of all, let me share my condolences with the people of

poland. unfortunately in ukraine, we're used to tragedy, like that, but in poland, it's the first time so i'm really sorry about what happened. secondly, there are a few takeaways. i know as much you know. i know there's been an explosion. there's a suspected missile hit. the ukrainian government is in direct contact with the government of poland, but let's assess the situation. first of all, it's not the worst case scenario. this situation has been long time coming and i've been warning all along that a stray missile can hit a nuclear power plant in ukraine. that would defect poland and baltics and everybody in europe. we're also entering dangerous territory here because if it was a russian missile and if even if it was an accident, if there's no pushback on putin, if there's you know, no price to pay for this, this will only encourage him to try it get intentionally

and that's very dangerous because we're playing with article five here these missile strikes on our critical infrastructure had nothing to do with putin's military objectives. there's no battle front there. he's basically trying to make sure that ukraine is cold and dark. that's the reason for those attacks. i can confirm that the accuracy of those missiles is abusiness mall. it hits the mid ofl the field. there are no targets there. no military infrastructure. no infrastructure whatsoever. this could well have been you know an accident hit in nato territory. >> i'm sure you saw and know that president zelenskyy spoke to the g-20 today. he laid out conditions for the end of the war.

real end to hostilities he said along with nine other demands and freeing ukrainian prisoners. does this change, do you think, the way the approach is? president zelenskyy, what do you think is on his mind right now? >> i think it doesn't change his approach. i think he's been proven right. he's been warning against such accidents if in fact it were an accident and he was claiming the faster we provide the weapons ukraine needs, the faster we defeat putin on the battlefield, the less chance there is of an accident. they're trying to pacify putin. they were trying, they weren't listening to what zelenskyy was saying and now this is the first tangible consequence of this war dragging on for so long because certain weapons are missing and certain capabilities are going to end this war and is missing

from ukraine. we shouldn't be making rash decisions whatsoever. but i think the consequences, this will only serve you know as encouragement for putin to carry on and the fact that whenever there's no price to pay, he keeps going further. >> thank you for being with us. joining me now from capitol hill is congressman, ro khanna. you know probably as much we know at this point although a white house official says we are working to find out what happened, but something did happen. there are reports in polish media about the strike that potentially hit a grain

processing plant. what's your reaction to what, and is there anything else you know that you can tell us? >> first of all, my con dole enlss fot families that were killed in poland. it is heart wrenching and also to the people who have been killed in ukraine. we should not forget that putin is striking a lot of the power grid in ukraine, 40% of the electricity is destroyed and you can -- civilians and also destroy the country's electricity. we need to find out if there was deliberate or accidental before we rush to a judgment. >> even without rushing to a judgment, does it make what obviously has always been a potentially volatile situation, people predicted this. people said and we just heard it from the former assistant to president zelenskyy. that there has been long talk that a stray missile could cause destruction. obviously one of the worst case

scenarios that it would hit a nuclear plant, but in this case, has hit a grain processing plant and killed two people. does it change the calculus? >> i think it vindicates president biden's approach that we still need to have conversations with the russian counterparts on deescalating the conflict and ensuring it doesn't lead to a nuclear war. the president has warned about that. jake sullivan and blinken has been -- and that needs to continue. >> but do you think in any way, this changes how putin thinks? does it put any pressure on him to be more open to going to peace talks? >> well, he has not been reasonable for almost nine months and has led an unprovoked, illegal war. so i'm not sure that he's going

to suddenly change, but he should have no doubt that united states will defend. if this is accidental, there have to be some consequences and we have to make sure we're doing everything we can to deescalate. the my view is they they have been doing the right thing by stand standing firmly with ukraine to try to deconflict situation. >> kocan na, thank you so much for being with us. back to andrea. this is all just happening and information is coming in quickly. you have an update. >> they know something happened and they need to be absolutely positive about what this was

given it was deliberate or not, it's still a major issue. something hit outside of ukrainian territory. it's the first time that that has has happened in this war. so they are still working on it. we are still working on it, but it is not confirmation of what we are getting from poland and the associated press there that it was a missile. >> that's important information. we are getting more reaction. molly, what are you hearing? >> reporter: >> yeah, chris, and to be clear, polish official, they have not given us any details about what's happened there. they are calling this a crisis situation. a cabinet member says due to the crisis situation, the president has met with the prime minister and ordered a meeting. that we knew because he tweeted that about an hour ago. he continues to say any information that will be presented to the committee today will be communicated to the

public if possible to the fullest extent. so warning people not to go with anything too quickly. then continues, i'm appealing to the public and the press not to publish unconfirmed information. we will comment on it after the meeting. after the relevant information is presented by the services that will inform these events. so he's seeing all of this on social media and the world's media and specifically the press on that. nbc has n not confirm that had. that will not be coming necessarily from kyiv or brussels. it will likely be coming from warsaw. i want to give our audience more context about lviv. really that big western city has been spared the kind of destruction that a city like kharkiv has seen or the damage

to infrastructure around the capital city but, there are power plants, serious critical infrastructure around lviv and it was targeted heavily today. this was the biggest, broadest ariel campaign has unleashed on this country since the start of the war and tonight, 80% of lviv is without electricity. 1% in that western city was injured because of rocket fire. tram, trolly buses. nothing is working that requires electricity. there are rolling blackouts. so just to be crystal clear, that city was heavily targeted today and the city are talking about in poland is just across the border. very, very close to this big, western ukraine city. >> according to the "new york times," it's only four miles across the border. so very, very close. thank you for that. back to you as we get more, but now i want to go to former ambassador to russia. michael mcfall.

let's be clear. we don't know exactly what happened. it could be a matter of hours. having said that, the classification of this as a crisis situation, do you agree with it and if so, on what level? >> i would have said that before in news because before this, we witnessed one of the greatest attacks on civilians in ukraine up to the beginning of the war. i was just on a call with ukrainian colleagues for seminar on security by the way. they were all using generators because the electricity has been wiped out in the capital of kyiv. so even before this attack, i would have said we are in a new moment where putin is terrorizing noncombatants in response to the loss of kherson

but now to add if we confirm this is true, into a nato country, this is a new level in terms of the level of escalation in this war. >> and i was talking earlier, last hour, with the admirable about why perhaps putin didn't go to the g-20 and one of the things he talked about was concern given the growing discontent with what's happening in ukraine, he didn't think he could leave russia and i wonder what your thoughts are about the level of attack as you say like we haven't seen before. we have seen pictures of residential buildings up in flames today and i wonder what your thoughts are about putin at this moment. >> i have a different perspective. i don't think he was worry about a cue deta if he left the country.

i think he didn't want to be among the leaders of the world if he left the g-20 because that would have been an awkward moment for him even with xi. i thought gave a tepid support of his meeting with president biden. so he didn't want to be at this meeting. that said, this is retaliation for the fall of kherson. remember, on paper in the kremlin just weeks ago, putin signed a bunch of papers that said kherson is now part of russia and he said it forever. right? and now, that has been reversed. he doesn't have a military response so he has to have a terroristic response, which is attacking civilians and ukraine's largest cities. >> i want to be fair to the admiral. he gave three possibilities, one was what you said. he said he didn't want to face xi. he went to xi, said i'm going to do this, win it and take

territory. which hasn't happened. what are you going to be watching for over the next critical hours? >> the most important thing is to establish it was a russian missile. we don't know that for sure from our government. second, was it an accident or not. seems to me would have to be an accident, but that's important and it's important that the kremlin acknowledge that. so i'm watching the kremlin. i want to know what sergey lavrov is saying with the other leaders of the world and what the kremlin will say. then the response. even if it's an accident, there has to be a response from the nato alliance. members, alliance country was attacked. whether on purpose. it --

>> thank you so much. so appreciate especially in these situations with breaking news. ambassador mcfall, thank you for your expertise. that's going to do it from me. hallie jackson will pick up our coverage, next. jackson will pi coverage, next

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