Studying the silence
and the violence that punctuates it.
That's the job here in Southern
Julia Paul,
where life in the ruins
waits for Ukraine's counter offensive
to push the Russians
right out of their space.
Ludmilla hasn't left since the war began
and knows her artillery
and 11 attackers there.
I, of course deplore
which a little pistol
I can move on Monday.
It's all they've had to do
as they wait down here with only a radio.
They say it brought their best news yet
to this day,
learning
the Russians have bombed themselves
by accident and Belgorod recently.
Nina thinks
she's noticed a change in the bangs.
What's the deal anyway, given
what goes through the city
with new military goals on the tube?
That's what you not you already
know.
It's a commercial as we know it.
I'm sure mission is not yours.
Well, some of my listeners,
I just when there's a guy
which gets a bomb that you will know
now,
whether it's yourself
drove out into the plains earlier
this week,
and the signs
are there in the tracks, in the bombs
that Ukraine might be aiming south
to cut Crimea off from Russia.
It's quiet
then loud, familiar
with the Russians firing from close
by Drone operators fly in gaps
between electronic jamming
and these open fields.
Hear
each side
trying to spot the other weak
in the other.
Ahead of this counter offensive.
One wrote is their target
because the building's
tiny changes and signs of weakness.
Are they getting ready
for the counter-offensive
or just doing nothing? I would never do
it
in the trenches if that's what signal
this is this year,
because they don't
want your skins in their
back
yards from his head.
A Russian booby trap left behind
It's not clear
if the Russians they're facing now
have similar experience
on the demo itself.
After 90 minutes,
each drone parachutes down again, soon
replaced by another
fly spot, shell and repeat.
The waiting
and watching will soon be over
Now, Aaron, it remains unclear exactly
when this counteroffensive may begin.
There are indications
as we drive around
those areas of movement,
of vehicles, of the potential
for something to happen.
But it's so unclear, but it's so vital
for Ukraine
to seize this moment,
to regain
yet more territory
from the Russians ahead
of potentially
another winter stalemate later
on this year.
So much NATO's weaponry headed their way
and so many Western expectations
that it will be decisively used.
So a lot riding on the days
or weeks ahead Aaron.
All right.
Thank you very much, Nick.
From Ukraine tonight.
And I want to go now
to retired Air Force Colonel
Cedric Leighton and Steve Hall,
who is the former CIA
chief of Russia operations.
So, Colonel,
can I just start with that
Russian bombing of a Russian city,
Belgorod, right in there
flying over Belgorod every day
when they're going to Ukraine. Right.
And it is a big city
and it's a Russian city.
400,000 people live there.
You're a former Air Force pilot.
What did you think
when you heard
about the Russians dropping
a bomb on their own city?
Well, Erin, to
tell you the truth, I thought,
how could you make a mistake like that?
And it was really interesting to me
because what they're doing
is they're using Russian territory,
of course, as a stand off launch area
to go
get into Ukraine
and target Ukrainian targets.
But this thing went horribly wrong.
If it wasn't a deliberate act,
I the other thing that occurred to me
is that it could potentially
be a deliberate act
because it actually
the bomb
actually impacted
on a major road intersection
in the middle of Belgorod.
So this is a key indicator
that something is going
terribly wrong with the way
the Russians are preparing themselves
for this.
So can I just ask as a quick
follow up there,
if they had done it on purpose,
that it was a purposeful act,
for what for what purpose
would be
to sabotage
the war effort
to indicate that there is something wrong
with the orders that they're receiving
and they want to,
in essence, protest
as if it is an act like that.
It's pretty incredible
even contemplate that possibility.
Steve, I mean, you know,
this is an AC 34 warplane, right?
They brag about them all the time.
They're very proud of this.
They're incredibly proud of their
Air Force. Right. That's the elite group.
So what does it say about the reality
Yeah, I mean,
if Cedric is right about that,
I mean, that would be fascinating
because it would essentially
mean you've got some sort of rebellion
going on inside
inside the Russian military.
There are other possibilities.
We have seen reporting
that the Russians
have been trying to get,
you know, microchips
from wherever they can, refrigerators,
you know, anything
that's got a chip in it to make it
a smart bomb.
Yeah.
So, you know,
they could have tried to do that
and it simply failed.
It could also be incompetence
because we have seen
some real difficulty
in terms of the recruiting and training
across the Russian military.
And it's possible
you could have
simply an incompetent
pilot or some other part of the military
that caused this to happen.
But I mean, it's amazing.
In Belgorod,
they were worrying about Ukrainians,
you know, attacking.
And now kids in
those schools are having
to duck and cover
because of their own pilots.
So it's just an amazing situation.
I mean, it truly is
it is sort of jaw on the floor
to try to even imagine this.
So, Colonel, this is in the context
right, of the difficulty
training and recruiting
that Steve just mentioned
and those raids
that I was telling everyone
about a moment ago now in Moscow.
Right.
You know, I know people
who, you know,
are friends there
talk about,
you know, it's happening now
when you go down to the subway.
Right.
That they're
they're looking for young men.
But this story was of this 21 year
old department raided
handcuffed, taken
to a military enlistment office
because his deferment had just expired.
And then he joins,
he says, out of complete
psychological pressure.
And we do understand
this isn't
the only time
where this is happening
in other places in Moscow again.
And that is significant, the capital.
What does this tell you about the truth
about Putin's army?
Well, I
think Putin's army has become very much
a hollow army.
And, you know,
as Steve indicated,
he comes to the training part of this.
They need replacements quickly.
And one way to get them
is to draft as many people in
as many people as possible
into the Russian army.
And that's
that's what we're seeing here, Erin.
So, Steve,
another interesting thing happened today.
Okay.
And the Wagner group head, Yevgeny
Prigozhin,
he said that the son of Dimitri Peskov.
Right.
Who is perhaps
the Kremlin spokesperson,
who has been incredibly close
to Putin over decades. Right.
That that his son, Peskov
son is in the Wagner
group, served as a gunner.
Now, Peskov has not responded
to CNN's requests for comment on this.
But what would this say to you
about the relationship
between the Wagner group,
Prigozhin and Putin if Peskov son
was indeed serving with Wagner?
Yeah, This is a
fascinating storyline,
and it's sort of another chapter
in the Prigozhin Chronicles, if you will.
So you got Dmitry Peskov, you know,
a very high ranking guy.
We see him on television
all the time,
not usually saying
anything of much value,
but we see him a lot.
He's clearly close to the Kremlin.
And there have been questions about
what's going to happen with his son,
who is of fighting age in Russia.
And he's been somewhat
defensive about this.
So now there's this promotion
comment that, oh, yeah,
he served in the Vagner group.
It's unclear
as to whether or not
Prigozhin continues
to see a political future for himself,
you know,
ascending inside of the Kremlin,
perhaps even replacing
some of the leaders in Mr. Putin.
And is that why he's
why he's trying to gain friends
like like like Pets.com?
If so, I mean, it's an amazing
breaking of the Kremlin rules
about how you
how you play politics in that country.
It's a very dangerous thing.
But it's so much of this is Byzantine
and behind the scenes, it's
difficult to see
what promotion is up to
with pissed off on this particular story.
Yeah. It's amazing storyline, though.
Because, you know,
we know it's something
it's just so hard to tell exactly what.
Thank you both so very much.
I appreciate it.