ukraine's decision to blow up bridges
across the country was a key to fending
off russia in the early part of this war
now 79 days into the invasion the battle
for ukraine is still being fought along
the river's edge a few days ago
satellite images picked up what appeared
to be temporary pontoon bridges built by
russian forces along a river in
northeast ukraine
the russians were believed to be trying
to cross that river in order to try and
surround tens of thousands of ukrainian
forces the arrow you see on the map is
the approximate location of where they
were trying to cross
today british intelligence was able to
confirm these aerial photos first
released by the ukrainian military
showing the remains of a decimated
russian battalion along what remains of
those pontoon bridges
ukraine claims that as many as one
thousand russian troops were killed in
that attack and while we cannot confirm
those numbers the new york times reports
that russian troops have been repeatedly
thwarted trying to cross the saverski
donets leading to heavy losses and
slowing their already plotting advance
the loss of this russian battalion is
just the latest in a long series of
blunders by russia since the start of
this horrific war
today a former commander of pro-russian
separatist forces in eastern ukraine
accused the russian defense minister of
criminal negligence over moscow's
military blunders
this comes as ukraine kicks off its
first war crimes trial of a captured
russian soldier the 21 year old tank
commander stands accused of shooting a
62-year-old civilian a ukrainian
civilian
in the head through an open car window
during the first week of the war
as russia's war on the ground continues
to plod along vladimir putin's larger
political ambitions for the war appear
to have completely fallen apart
putin's causes belly for this war his
justification for starting this
nightmare in the first place was at
least partly about keeping nato weapons
off of russia's border
but since the beginning of this war nato
member countries have poured troops and
weapons into the region to defend
against potential russian aggression and
now
as a direct result of putin's invasion
russia's border with nato is poised to
expand dramatically
yesterday the nation of finland
officially announced its plan to apply
for nato membership and just today
sweden's parliament released a report
indicating it too may soon apply for
nato membership
now for context here this is what the
current nato map looks like in fact you
can't even see the top of it where the
top of russia uh is but
russia goes even to the top of that one
the nato countries are the countries in
bright green you can see finland and
sweden at the top of your map there are
not in dark green now russia shares
nearly 1300 miles of border with nato
across estonia latvia and lithuania
if finland and sweden were to join nato
the russia russia-nato border would more
than double
now the push to join nato by those two
countries is far from a done deal
joining nato is a complicated matter and
just today the turkish prime minister
erdogan signaled that he may oppose
letting finland and sweden into the
military alliance but the fact remains
that nearly three months into this war
vladimir putin's plans to overtake
ukraine have stalled and his plans to
halt nato expansion have backfired
joining us now is the former u.s
ambassador to russia michael mcfaul
ambassador good to see you i think back
i guess it was 79 80 81 days ago at the
beginning of the war when you and i were
talking and at the time
uh he doesn't talk about it as much
anymore at the time vladimir putin had
really uh planted a flag around this
idea of you the west forced us into this
by continuing to push toward us with
nato expansion i want no more nato on my
borders this was a big excuse for going
into ukraine this feels like a bad
trade-off for him
i think it is a bad trade-off for him in
fact i think he's lost the war in
ukraine already
he may win some battles we don't know
what's going to happen in donbass but if
you go back to those original
conversations we had it it feels like
years ago but i know it was just a few
months ago
he's failed on all of his major military
objectives remember he was going to
bring ukraine in as part of russia
because they're not a separate people
that's failed denotification that's
failed demilitarization that's failed
taking the major cities including kiev
that's failed uh and you're absolutely
right he said he was fighting nato and
yet he has expanded nato and he has
strengthened nato as a result of this
war in ukraine so on all of his major
objectives that he himself defined not
me he himself you can read it in a
speech he has failed to achieve
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