and that is one of the pretexts that they could use. >> fiona hill, what is the impact? is a statement like the one that cameç out today, secretary kerry saying it would be a terrible mistake or words to that affect for the russians to do something, the white house itself putting out a statement. how is that read by moscow do you think? >> the problem we have right now is we have all kinds of competing narratives about what is happening. the russians have also been accusing frankly the united stitz and the european union have directly intervening here as well. so sometimes the statements are not received in the way that we would hope they are in moskow. this might be seen as grandstanding in fact. rather than as a very clear statement that there is a red line here. we were as nadia suggested in the situation before in 2008, before the war with georgia in august of 2008, similar statements were made on all kinds of sides. and there was also a situation there where many citizens of russia, people without were living in the ses sessionist republic had assumed russian citiz

fiona hill i begin with you and i have three questions and i would like for each of you to sort of get to it. where are we right now, how did we get there and where are we going and what are the risks in terms of where we're going. start with in fact a sense of why did this happen now and what is the moment that we're at now and then where are we going. >> well the precipitous events for the series of protests that have led us to this situation where yanukovych is now has essentially fled and resigned being president of ukraine was checkered off by a summit for the european union. ukraine was scheduled, this is the end of november and the capital where ukraine was scheduled to sign an agreement with the eu the association and joining a free trade area. yanukovych decided not to sign it. he said this to his europeans and a series of protests broke out in the heart of kiev but over time really morphed into these huge scale demonstrations we saw. from being a protest against yanukovych's decision to essentially protest against his rule and against the whole system of governance in ukraine

fiona hill, i begin with you. i would like -- where are we right now, how did we get there, and where are we going and what are the risks? start with why did this happen now and what is the moment that we are at now and where we are going? >> the precipitating event for the series of protests that have led us to the situation were triggered off by summits from the european union. ukraine was scheduled to sign an agreement with the eu, an agreement of association and joining a free trade area. yanukovych decided against it. this is widely understood to be under pressure from russia, which was set, and a series of protests broke out in the hearts of kiev. they morphed into the huge scale demonstrations that we saw. there were protests against from yanukovych's decision and move to his rule and the whole system of government in ukraine itself. the focus has been on the independent square in kiev. over the last couple of weeks, it has been that decision to use force to press and on the protesters that has triggered of

i will come back and say word or two before i turn things over to my colleague, fiona hill, who is goingo moderate a discussion among the four of us here which is to say she is a player coach. she will have to moderate herself. fiona i think most of you know is the director of our center on the united states and europe. many things in common with the author of the hour. both of them served as the national intelligence officers and the intelligence community of our government. both of them, by the way, have not typically american accents, which is also an interesting point. they served this government and this nation very well, keeping an eye on -- i guess it was called the eurasian complex. we

hear from peter baker of the new york times and fiona hill who wrote a biography on vladimir putin. >> i apologize about voices and carry. -- i apologize if my voice does not carry. >> terrific for all of you to come out for what i think is going to be a first-class discussion on the relationship both in recent history and no doubt contemporaneously as well between the united states and the russian federation. in fact, i think we will probably reach back into the late soviet period as well. the occasion for this discussion today, although the front pages of the newspaper, including the one you work for, give us an occasion to have this conversation pretty much every day, peter, is the publication of angela stent's absolutely terrific book "the limits of partnership." i will come back and say just a word or two before i turn things over to my colleague fiona hill, who is going to moderate a discussion among the 4 of us here, which is to say she will be a player-coach, because she will have to moderate herself. she has strong views. fiona, i think most of you know, is the director of ou

just word or two before i turn things over to my colleague jonah hill, who is going -- i colleague fiona hill, who is going to moderate a discussion among the 4 of us here, which is to say she will be a player-coach, because she will have to moderate herself. she has strong views. fiona, i think most of you know, is the director of our center on the united states and europe. she has many things in common with the author of the hour, angela. both of them served as the national intelligence officers in the intelligence community of our government. both of them, by the way, have not typically american accents, which is also an interesting point. they serve this government and the station very well, it keeping -- serve this government and this nation very well, keeping an eye on i guess it was called the eurasian complex. we also have with us peter baker of "the new york times." they are all authors. fiona, along with her colleague in our foreign policy program, wrote a book on mr. putin. that is the title, in fact. it is on sale in our bookstore. but you don't have to go even to the bookstore to

i will come back and say word or two before i turn things over to my colleague, fiona hill, who is going to moderate a discussion among the four of us here which is to say she is a player coach. she will have to moderate herself. fiona i think most of you know is the director of our center on the united states and europe. many things in common with the author of the hour. both of them served as the national intelligence officers and the intelligence community of our government. both of them, by the way, have not typically american accents, which is also an interesting point. they served this government and this nation very well, keeping an eye on -- i guess it was called the eurasian complex. we also have with us peter baker of "the new york times." they are all authors. fiona, along with her colleague in our foreign policy program, wrote a book on mr. putin. that is the title, in fact. it is on sale in our bookstore. but you don't have to go even to the bookstore to get a copy of angela's book, which is right outside of this auditorium. as for peter, he has a new book out called "days o