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At This Hour

Russia Launches Large-Scale Military Invasion of Ukraine; Ukrainian President Orders "Anyone with Military Experience" to Report; Kharkiv Subway Station Serves as Bomb Shelter; Russian Attack Includes Missiles, Tanks, Artillery and Jets; CNN Correspondents Witness Beginning of Attack on Ukraine. Aired 11-11:30a ET

Aired February 24, 2022 - 11:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


[11:00:00]

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (voice-over): This is CNN breaking news.

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, everyone. I'm Kate Bolduan. We want to welcome our viewers here in the United States and around the world. Joining me this hour is my colleague, Jim Sciutto, in Ukraine.

And right now, here's where we are: a democratic nation, a sovereign country is under attack, being invaded as we speak. Ukraine now facing a full-scale assault from Russia. Here's the NATO secretary general's ominous words this morning.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JENS STOLTENBERG, NATO SECRETARY GENERAL: Peace on our continent has been shattered. We now have war in Europe on a scale and of a type we thought belonged to history.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BOLDUAN: A former U.S. ambassador to Russia putting it this way, "This is the largest conventional war in Europe since 1939."

Russian president Vladimir Putin ordering a large-scale military invasion across pretty much all of Ukraine. Explosions have been seen, heard and reported in at least 16 locations throughout Ukraine, including the capital of Kyiv.

New images are coming in by the minute of the damage caused by the attacks. And also, massive traffic jams were seen in the capital as people tried to flee. And Clarissa Ward showing us hundreds of people now packing a subway station turned bomb shelter, conjuring images of World War II. Ukraine says more than 40 soldiers and at least 10 civilians have

already been killed in the fighting. This morning, President Biden met with G7 leaders to discuss how to respond to all of this.

And next hour, the president will be addressing the nation and the world and we'll bring that to you live.

We are watching history unfold. CNN correspondents are covering every angle and station throughout Ukraine, Russia and Washington. Let's get to my colleague, Jim Sciutto, live in the western part of Ukraine.

Jim, this has been remarkable to watch unfold. And you've been up from the wee hours of the morning.

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN ANCHOR AND CHIEF NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: It's remarkable, it's harrowing, it's sad. And we now know the aerial assault extends the length and breadth of this country, from here in Lviv -- attacks outside the city all the way to Kharkiv in the northeast; to the south, Mariupol and north by the capital, Kyiv.

It's a deadly assault already and it continues on the ground tonight. CNN's Sam Kiley, he's live on the other side of the country, in the city of Kharkiv, not far from the Russian border.

And Sam, we've seen the rockets headed your way, artillery; we've also seen tanks driving toward where you are. Tell us what you're seeing.

SAM KILEY, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, just in the last few minutes, Jim, there's been a distant sort of pop, pop, pop of either grenade launchers or small arms. That's the first sign of any kind of physical ground engagement that we've heard or seen from here, the center of Kharkiv.

But it is a city of 1.5 million people. It does have a ring road around it, where the Ukrainian government forces claimed earlier on today that they knocked out four tanks on that road.

We don't have any independent confirmation for that but we've seen the missiles fired from Belgorod only 50 miles north of here. We've certainly feflt them landing. We felt some of the concussive power of those long-range missiles landing here.

And Fred Pleitgen has been reporting on the movement of heavy armor, the tanks and the 155 mobile howitzers across the border from that location, which is only 25 miles up the road due north from where I am.

And all of this coming at a time when similar levels of pressure are put on Kyiv, the capital, with the capture of fighting over airfields there, threats to the capital, threats to the second largest city, combining to lead President Volodymyr Zelensky to appeal to his citizens to take up arms, whoever they might be. This is how he put it earlier on today.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) VOLODYMYR ZELENSKY, UKRAINIAN PRESIDENT (through translator): We are issuing arms, defensive weapons to all those capable of defending our sovereignty. Each citizen of Ukraine will decide the future of our people. Anyone with military experience who is able to join the defense of Ukraine must report to stations.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KILEY: The critical thing there from the Ukrainian and the Russian perspective is can the Ukrainians break the momentum of this Russian air war and any advance they might be making overnight on the ground?

If they can be stopped, if they can be held, then this war takes on a very different dynamic, one that necessarily doesn't play well to either side --

[11:05:00]

KILEY: -- and could lead to even more civilian casualties, Jim.

SCIUTTO: Well, Ukrainians facing enormous odds, outnumbered by many multiples, we're told. Sam Kiley, please stay safe there.

Now go to Russia. Vladimir Putin warned that any country that tries to interfere with his plans in Ukraine will face consequences, he says, they've never seen before. It was quite a threat. CNN's Nic Robertson is live in Moscow with that part of the story.

Nic, do we know who he was threatening and exactly what with?

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: The implication would seem to be NATO as his main, his biggest enemy in this current situation. It's NATO's projection of force, he says, that's led to the insecurity that he feels in Russia.

He hasn't been precise in what he's threatening but I think it's very clear that the joint military exercises that he had just over the past weekend, when he was testing out his nuclear missiles, his ballistic missiles, his hypersonic missiles, his cruise missiles, were all intended to send a very clear message of what he's capable of.

And his message is not just for the international community. There is a message from the government authorities here today, telling Russian citizens not to go out and protest because it could have legal consequences, that there could be -- they could be found criminally responsible if they go out and join anti-war protests.

Indeed, the government went on to spell that out. Somebody with a criminal record could find their future life made more difficult. That was the message from the government authorities. The Russians internally told not to hold anti-war protests.

Nevertheless, nevertheless, there have been protests across his country in many cities -- Moscow, St. Petersburg, Perm to the east and the west of Moscow, other cities; dozens, we understand, have been arrested at those protests so far, Jim. SCIUTTO: That's a brave thing to do in that country. You can pay a

heavy price for it. Nic Robertson, thanks so much.

And, Kate, I will say just in this last, less than 24 hours, how this country has changed. It was peaceful for so many days; you might even say defiant, somehow going on with life as normal. It's changed. People trying to leave this country, people trying to save their lives by hiding in bomb shelters and subway stations. It's quite a different reality.

BOLDUAN: Absolutely. Jim, thank you.

We'll get back to Jim in just a couple of minutes. As Jim is pointing to, there are 44 million people in Ukraine. Kharkiv is second largest city in the sovereign democratic nation and the people there are now sheltering in place. And that includes in the city's subway system, now a bomb shelter.

CNN's Clarissa Ward has been there all morning with hundreds of people, who now have nowhere else to go. Watch this.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CLARISSA WARD, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: I never really have seen a situation like this. This feels to me like scenes from World War II and the Blitz. There are just hundreds and hundreds of people, who are hunkered down here, with absolutely no sense of what tomorrow will bring; frankly, of what the rest of today will bring.

I want to introduce you to Oksana (ph) here, with her two children.

What are your children's names?

(CROSSTALK)

WARD: Your name is Yaroslav (ph).

How old are you, Yaroslav (ph)?

YAROSLAV (PH), BOMB SHELTER RESIDENT: I am 9 years old.

WARD: Are you scared?

YAROSLAV (PH): So-so.

WARD: So-so. You're a very brave boy.

OKSANA (PH), YAROSLAV'S MOTHER: Thank you.

WARD: And you have a daughter here as well.

OKSANA (PH): Yes, she's named (INAUDIBLE) and she's 6.

WARD: Is she OK?

OKSANA (PH): I think she wants to sleep because we woke up in 5:00. WARD: 5:00 am, yes.

OKSANA (PH): Yes, it was -- we heard some --

WARD: Explosions.

OKSANA (PH): Yes.

WARD: What was your reaction?

OKSANA (PH): It was scare, we was scary, of course. We heard the -- many some boot cases (ph).

WARD: Suitcases?

OKSANA (PH): Suitcases, yes. And --

WARD: You came here.

How long have you been here?

OKSANA (PH): Not so long, I think two or three hours. We came to parents of my husband and, after, we came here.

WARD: And what will you do now?

Will you stay here tonight?

OKSANA (PH): Yes, I think yes.

WARD: Do you have food?

Do you have everything you need?

This is what you have.

OKSANA (PH): Yes, and water. That's all.

WARD: You seem remarkably strong, given how scary the situation is.

OKSANA (PH): We try to be brave because we have children and we don't want to show them that we are scared.

[11:10:00]

WARD: What do you think, why would President Putin do this?

Do you understand?

OKSANA (PH): I think he don't want our president to be in -- be our president.

WARD: He doesn't want President Zelensky to be in power.

OKSANA (PH): Yes. Yes, yes. I think --

WARD: Did you ever believe that this could happen?

OKSANA (PH): No, no, no. It's impossible. I don't believe now that this happened with us, really.

WARD: OK. Oksana (ph), Yaroslav (ph), thank you so much for taking the time to talk to us. I know how difficult a time it is.

And, you know, Jim, Oksana (ph) and her family are incredibly strong. And you see a lot of strength and resilience down here.

You also see a lot of desperation and a lot of tears, a lot of people holding hands, a lot of people holding each other and just waiting to see what comes next, where they go from here and what their place, if any, is going to be in this new Ukraine.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BOLDUAN: Amazing. We'll get back there in a second but let's go to Washington right now. President Biden will be addressing the nation and the world next hour, his first remarks since this Russian attack in Europe began.

The president said on Twitter this morning, as part of his remarks, he will be announcing new sanctions against Russia. CNN's Kaitlan Collins is live at the White House.

What are we going to hear from the president?

KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: He will detail those sanctions they say they're going to impose. We've been told by officials those are the sanctions they've been talking about for weeks now, Kate.

If President Putin took the moves last night, going into Ukraine, attacking Ukraine, these are the sanctions that will follow. We don't have them in detail on the specifics. We expect President Biden to lay that out when he speaks in the next hour.

But I think a big question so many people have had is you've heard other world leaders talk about the actions they're going to take, is what the sanctions can do, because clearly they're not a deterrent for Putin, who knew these were looming over him, the threat of sanctions being imposed, not just by the United States but by other nations in Europe as well were hanging over him.

And yet he went ahead with this attack anyway. SO President Biden will speak to that, calling this last night in a statement, immediately after this attack happened, a premeditated war on President Putin's behalf, saying that this will bring a catastrophic loss of life and human suffering, President Biden believes.

This morning, he did meet with National Security Council in the Situation Room and then he spoke to leaders of the G7 for a little over an hour this morning in a virtual session, which, of course, West focused completely on this. And so we will hear from President Biden shortly. Following that call he had last night, just minutes after those attacks started, Kate, with President Zelensky of Ukraine, who asked him to rally the international community to come to their support, of course.

Big questions about what is going to happen going forward, now that a senior U.S. Defense official says they do believe the Russians are intent on taking the capital city of Kyiv. They are intent on installing their own government.

So everyone waits and watches to see what it is that President Biden is going to say when he speaks in just about an hour from now.

BOLDUAN: Absolutely, Kaitlan, thank you. So much more to come from the White House.

In the face of this massive assault from Russia, the Pentagon is considering repositioning even more U.S. troops further east in Europe to bolster NATO allies. This as we've already seen Russian rockets flying through the sky, as CNN's Frederik Pleitgen also witnessed firsthand Russian tanks moving toward the Ukrainian border.

CNN's Barbara Starr is live at the Pentagon for us now. . And Barbara, just got an update, a briefing over there.

What's the very latest?

BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Well, the Pentagon continues to say, as the Biden administration says, U.S. troops will not go into Ukraine or fight in Ukraine. This is not their war.

But we are on the cusp, potentially, of the administration announcing quite a change for the number of U.S. troops operating in Europe on that eastern flank of NATO. There are indications that the administration, at this hour, is considering several things: adding additional troops already in Europe to the eastern flank; possibly sending some troops, already on some stage of readiness, from the United States to the eastern flank of NATO; NATO possibly, in the coming hours or days, activating its rapid response force, which would also bring more U.S. forces into the eastern flank.

Already today, under previous deployments, some U.S. fighter jets are arriving in the Baltics and U.S. troops, from -- already stationed in Italy, from the very elite 173rd Airborne unit, they arrived earlier today in Latvia.

So what you are seeing is the beginning of putting into place of U.S. troops in a more in-depth, more comprehensive, if you will --

[11:15:00]

STARR: -- deterrent posture against the Russians, not to be fighting the Russians but we are seeing U.S. aircraft fly. Some of that airspace can get very tight. It's going to get very interesting on how they interact with the Russians if they come across them -- Kate. BOLDUAN: Just showing also how dangerous this is already and could

very quickly become on a whole other level. Barbara, thank you very much.

We'll stay close to Barbara at the Pentagon because much more could come from there.

Just ahead, much more on the breaking news. Russia attacking Ukraine, President Biden to speak next hour. Stay with us.

(MUSIC PLAYING)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[11:20:00]

(MUSIC PLAYING)

BOLDUAN: As Russia's military assault of Ukraine is underway, Germany's top diplomat put it in stark terms, "We woke up in a different world today."

CNN's Matthew Chance is on the front lines and I want you to watch what he and his crew came upon only 20 miles outside of Kyiv.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MATTHEW CHANCE, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: We are here at the Antonov airport, 25 kilometers, 50 or so miles at the center. These troops you can see over here, they are Russian airborne forces. They have taken this airport.

They've allowed us to come in and be with them as they defend the perimeter of this air base here, where helicopter-borne troops, these troops were landed in the early hours of this morning to take and to form an air bridge to allow for more troops to come in.

You can see these are Russian forces; you can tell they're Russian, I've spoken to them already. You can tell they're Russian, they've got that orange and black band to identify them as Russian forces.

I've spoken to the commander on the ground there within the past few minutes. And he said they are now in control now of this airport, within the past few seconds just when he came to us (ph), they are engaged in a firefight, presumably with the Ukrainian military, which says it is staging a counteroffensive to try to take back this airport.

We can tell you now, I'm standing outside the perimeter of this Antonov air base. And it has not been taken back by the Ukrainian military. It is the Russian military, you can see them now, moving back to a different position.

It is the Ukrainian military who say they are now in control. This is about -- I would say about 20 miles from the center of the Ukrainian capital. So it just shows us now, for the first time, just how close Russian forces have got toward the center of the Ukrainian capital.

It's not -- I've spoken to officials earlier, Ukrainian officials. And they're saying that the plan isn't just to surround the Ukrainian capital. They fear now that the plan is to take the capital, to decapitate the leadership of Ukraine and to replace that leadership with a pro-Russian government.

That's what Ukrainian officials are telling us now, they think, is the Russian plan. I can tell you, it is a very tense situation. We're expecting to see Ukrainian military -- we didn't even know, frankly, we didn't even know that the Russian forces were going to be here. We assumed this was the Ukrainian forces.

So I went up to speak to them, saying, hey, we've come from Kyiv. But it only emerged during the conversation that they're all Russians and there were no Ukrainian military forces in sight.

But I can hear them because they've been shooting ferociously in the last few minutes. So we're sort of in a defensive position behind this wall here. We've got our car here with the crew here as well, as the Russian airborne troops defend this position that they've taken on the outskirts of Kyiv.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BOLDUAN: Unbelievable. I mean, what Matthew Chance is saying -- and all of the images coming out of Ukraine depict a surreal scene: war in Europe. Russian president Vladimir Putin upending decades of geopolitical stability overnight, when he decided to, unprovoked, launch attacks on multiple locations across Ukraine.

Moments ago, a statement that was just put out from the G7 leaders condemning Vladimir Putin, saying, quote, "He has put himself on the wrong side of history."

Joining me right now, CNN political and national security analyst David Sanger, the author of "The Perfect Weapon: War, Sabotage and Fear in the Cyber Age."

Very important issue right now, specifically in what we're talking about, David.

No matter, David, how this ends, do people across the globe need to start considering that this will impact and change security worldwide, including for Americans?

DAVID SANGER, CNN POLITICAL AND NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: Oh, I think our world has changed today, just as the German foreign ministry said. I think he had it just right.

And I think that's true for a couple of reasons.

First of all, Kate, if you and I had been on the air a year ago and would have tried to lay odds on the thought that there would be a war in Europe, unprovoked, in which a rising European democracy, a flawed one, a corrupt one, but one which has hope, was taken over by a superpower?

I don't think either one of us would have given that much chance.

The second is, listening to Matthew Chance and his incredibly brave and great work out there, think about this: he's telling us Russian forces are 20 miles from Kyiv. That in itself tells you people, just this morning were thinking that would be a few days, maybe a week.

I think the third big thing we have to think about for this is that we have gone from a world, in 15 years, where we were discussing Russia as a potential partner, even talking about whether they might join NATO, to one in which the country and its leader are an outcast. I don't think it's very long before you hear people discuss -- and I've heard some already (ph) --

[11:25:00]

SANGER: -- whether or not this is a war crime that's gone on because it was nothing to provoke it. It was a sort of big lie that Ukraine was seeking nuclear weapons, that it was planning genocides, all of it was nonsense. And so we have a lot to reevaluate and then the cyber element may be what's coming.

BOLDUAN: I want to get to that in a second. So Biden will announce new sanctions in really just minutes.

Why didn't sanctions work to stop Putin?

SANGER: That's a great question. I mean, the oddity of this case is, in this particular time, Kate, is that we had near perfect intelligence. We've had other cases where we've had big intelligence failures.

Here, the intelligence agencies were on it early; they analyzed it correctly; they told skeptical Europeans, hey, this isn't a bluff, we think he's getting ready to actually wage war and take back Ukraine.

Even the Ukrainians didn't believe that until just a few days ago. And yet, our deterrence effort failed because, at the end of the day, we couldn't come up with a penalty for President Putin that seemed to him to be worse than not restoring part of the old Soviet empire.

And, in the end, for deterrence to work, somebody-- the target of it has got to want one thing or avoid a penalty greater than they want their strategic objective. And we didn't come up with that.

BOLDUAN: Let's talk about cyber. Mark Warner, the senator on earlier in talking about how the cyberattack aspect of this only just begun. Let's play that.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. MARK WARNER (D-VA), CHAIR, SENATE INTELLIGENCE COMMITTEE: If the Russians launch a more massive cyberattack, for example, try to shut down all the power in Ukraine, that you can't control once you unleash cyber weapons, malware by geographic locations, that cyberattack could bleed into Eastern Poland, where there are American troops, where it could shut down a Polish hospital.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BOLDUAN: David, what do you think of that?

Is that then an attack on NATO?

SANGER: It's a great question. I think the senator had it exactly right. When you're doing physical attacks of the kind playing out on our screen, horrific and brutal as they are, you can control the boundaries that they're in.

The nature of cyberattacks is they frequently go outside the boundaries you intended them for. And particularly, the case with the Ukrainian electric grid, which is connected both back to Russia and to parts of Europe, certainly communications grids, so there's lots of reasons to think it could spill over.

And some of the biggest cyberattacks, including in Ukraine, the NotPetya attack that was the most expensive one -- took out Federal Express and Maersk and others -- went way beyond Ukraine's borders inadvertently.

And then NATO's got to say, is this now an attack on NATO?

Because NATO has said cyberattacks can also be regarded as an attack. I think they would be hesitant to get in the middle of a war and let that escalate with Russia. But it certainly is a big issue.

BOLDUAN: That's the danger, that's why this is just beginning in how dangerous this really is. David, thank you so much.

Ahead for us, our continuing coverage of this breaking news: Russia's assault on Ukraine. We're also waiting to hear from President Biden in the next hour, addressing the nation.