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Russia Attacks Ukraine in "Act of War". Aired 5-5:30a ET

Aired February 24, 2022 - 05:00   ET

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

[05:00:21]

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning to our viewers here in the United States and around the world. It is Thursday, February 24th. And I'm Brianna Keilar, with John Berman.

And we're beginning this morning with breaking news.

Russia has launched a large scale military attack on a number of Ukrainian cities. Ukraine calling this an act of war. Explosions heard throughout the night in Kyiv, Mariupol, Kharkiv, Odessa, and other cities as well.

Air raid sirens even going off in the western city of Lviv, far away from the Russian ground force presence that is in the eastern side of the country.

Local authorities telling everyone there to take cover and these brand-new images from the Ukrainian ministry of internal affairs show some of the damage done by a bombing operation done by Kyiv. Some of Kyiv's 3 million citizens grabbing their belongings fleeing west in an exodus from the mass capitol as you can see here.

The breadth and scope of Vladimir Putin's operation is frankly stunning. CNN obtaining this from Ukrainian border guards showing Russian military vehicles entering the country from Belarus in the north.

President Putin going on state TV to announce a military operation to protect Donbas region. The goal he says is the demilitarization and denazification, his words. These Ukrainians disobeying orders to stay in their homes, instead kneeling and praying in the streets of Kharkiv.

Ukraine's president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, pleading for peace.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PRESIDENT VOLODYMYR ZELENSKY, UKRAINE (through translator): Putin began war against Ukraine, against the entire democratic world. He wants to destroy my country, our country. Everything we've been building. Everything we were living for.

We know the strength of the armed forces of Ukraine. You can. You are indomitable. You are Ukrainians.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Our reporters not to mention 44 million Ukrainians are in the middle of it all. This is CNN's Matthew Chance. You can see him doing the live report as he heard air raid sirens and explosions, he needed to take precautions to protect himself just like millions and millions of people in that nation are doing now.

There were missile strikes reported near the capital city. The U.S. embassy in Kyiv is telling all-Americans to shelter in place.

After lying for weeks if not years about his intentions, Putin has declared war as the U.N. Security Council meeting was taking place. This gives you a sense of his level of respect for international order that was not lost on the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LINDA THOMAS GREENFIELD, U.S. AMBASSADOR TO THE UNITED NATIONS: President Putin has ordered that last step at the exact time as we are gathered in the council seeking peace, Putin delivered a message of war in total disdain for the responsibility of this council. This is a grave emergency.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: In a phone call with Ukraine's president, President Biden promised Russia will be held accountable for what he called an unprovoked and unjustified attack.

This afternoon, President Biden will deliver remarks to the nation but the whole world will be listening.

KEILAR: And we do have CNN reporters covering the story from every angle, from Moscow, to Lviv to Kyiv.

But, first, let's go to Sam Kiley who is live on the ground in Kharkiv, Ukraine.

Sam, tell us about what happened overnight and set the scene for us right now.

SAM KILEY, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Brianna and John, the attack on the military installations it seems so far the attacks have been limited to military installations started a couple of hours before dawn here in Kharkiv. You recall just across the border which is only 25 miles away, a very substantial Russian force has been building up around Belgorod, where our own Fred Pleitgen was able to see, more importantly hear outgoing artillery being fired presumably in this direction or in the direction south towards a military installation.

Clearly, if you look at the pattern of attacks across the country, the aim of the Putin administration at this stage in the conflict is to attack air defenses, air installations, there have been airports and air installations and communications attacked throughout the country, including here around Kharkiv.

The mayor of Kharkiv has asked people to remain at home. Some people have heeded those words. Some shops are closed, some are open.

[05:05:02]

And the metro system is -- public transport is still running. The metro stations are also being opened up for use as places to shelter if the conflict comes closer to this city of at least 1.5 million people. The real estimates should probably put that around 2 million.

It's the second biggest city in the country. It's a significant target depending on what Putin's game plan is. Is he trying to draw Ukrainian forces off -- away from the east by that threatening move with the transporter crossing from Belarus south towards Kyiv? Is he trying to do the same by threatening Kharkiv by knocking out the defensive positions and carving out those in the east, Luhansk and Donetsk oblast, we don't know yet exactly what the game plan is.

He has insisted that he's coming into the country sending troops to protect, he says, Russians against what he's called Nazis and occupiers. And there has been in intelligence saying that they had list of people they were going to kill, capture and jail as part of this program to attack the structures, the political structures still running the country.

BERMAN: Sam, I just want to give people a sense of where you are on the map here. This is Kharkiv. He were talking about Belgorod, right over the border in Russia, where we saw satellite imagery of supplies being amassed yesterday. You said Frederik Pleitgen heard artillery. It is some distance from the separatist region.

Sam, any impact that you can see yet in a civilian population, any casualties that you have heard in Kharkiv at this points. We got local reporting. We haven't been able to go out and look yet. We are letting things settle down. We think this is the first wave of the military action here. Everybody is concerned about the deployment of ground troops.

There have been reports in Kharkiv of the reports of an apartment being struck. We don't have any reports of civilian casualties. I'm just about 150 yards up to my neck from the biggest hospital which is next to a number of medical institutes in Kharkiv. They appear to be working as normal. It's certainly not a rush of people in and out, emergency sections there.

The population is milling around. Some people are out on the streets. The majority would say have stayed in.

There are claims, John and Brianna, coming from -- and again, we have not been able to identify this, the Ukrainians having knocked out what they are claiming are Russian tanks on a ring road surrounding Kharkiv. It has a very clear ring road around it. There are social media posts on that which we are investigating.

The Ukrainian military is reporting from where we were yesterday on what was the front line, they're claiming there are a number of aircraft downed by Ukrainian forces and further south, even a number of Russians killed by Ukrainian forces. In all of these, the Ukrainian military of defense we only have their word for it. As you know, as well as we do, the first casualty in war is frequently the truth.

BERMAN: We circled it, Sam, what you were talking about. Kramatorsk, what you're talking about there. I can also show people a sense of the scope of where there have been explosions we're told by CNN. Kharkiv, Kramatorsk, Kyiv. It gives you a sense of the scope of it.

Sam Kiley, thank you very much for being with us. Stay safe, keep us posted.

Let's go now live to Lviv. This is in western Ukraine. I want to bring in CNN's Michael Holmes. This is where Michael is.

Michael, I understand there have been air raid sirens there.

MICHAEL HOLMES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, there have. Multiple times. John, just to give you a sense, this is a city that's in the west of the country. It's not far to Poland from here. This is where the embassies all fled to, if you like. They moved their stuff out of Kyiv and came here to Lviv. The U.S. staff for their own safety, they zip across to Poland and spend the night there and come back to work here to Lviv in the day.

We have the first of the air raid sirens. We heard them eight different times in different parts of the city too . Over the next couple of hours, that's a good sign.

Meanwhile, we've seen things like runs on the ATMs here. Long lines I think you're seeing there, gas stations, people trying to gas up their cars, get some fuel supplies. Huge lines there. But also at ATMs.

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We've got video earlier of some people in an air raid shelter singing songs to try to keep their spirits up. Local television here came on -- oh, that's the video there. Yeah.

It was remarkable to stay positive where it's almost impossible to do so. Earlier, state television was on, this is around the time of the air raid sirens telling people to stay in their homes, gather their documents and await further instructions and to stay calm, which clearly is fairly ridiculous in this sort of situation.

You've got a sense here, John, of -- I've been here for a couple of weeks and anticipation has been perhaps the strongest word you could use. People have been going about their daily lives being very calm but now, it's turned to real anxiety. I mean, so many people thought it would not come to this and yet here we are, John.

BERMAN: Again, to give people a sense where Michael is, Lviv is all the way here. As he said, the far west of the country and if there are air raid sirens there, you get a sense of the concern, the scope of the concern all over this very large nation of 44 million people. Michael, electricity, internet, basic services -- any signs of

disruption to any of that yet?

HOLMES: No, and that has been a big fear, of course. That's something the Russians, they could turn that off pretty easily if they wanted to, either by hitting installations or cyber warfare or whatever. They could shut down electricity. That would cause a lot of panic really because once you're out of that, you're out of water. Water won't generate without power.

And so, people would then be in a real situation of crisis. That has not happened yet. We hope it doesn't happen yet.

The other thing you mentioned, the proximity to Poland. If things like power went out, water was cut out, there were communications jammed and so on, they would head to Poland. I spoke to someone from the Norwegian Refugee Council on my show a couple of hours ago. He said the world does not understand how this potentially could lead to a massive humanitarian crisis.

You could have 2 million people fleeing to neighboring countries. We saw the traffic jams earlier from Kyiv heading out of the capital. They were heading this way. So we're expecting a lot of people coming to Lviv. A lot of them might head on to Poland, John.

BERMAN: This is the border with Poland. U.S. troops are now stationed in Poland to deal with the potential for a refugee situation.

Michael Holmes in Lviv, please stay safe. Keep us posted.

KEILAR: All right. Let's get some analysis on the situation with retired Colonel Cedric Leighton, CNN military analyst and former member of the joint staff at the Pentagon.

What is your assessment of the situation right now, Cedric?

CEDRIC LEIGHTON, CNN MILITARY ANALYST: Well, Brianna, it is a bad situation for the Ukrainians. When you look at the map right here, you take a look at the map and see Kyiv here, forces in the north central part of the country. This right here, I believe, is one of the major targets of the Russian effort because what they're going to do is come down here from Belarus. They are also going in through Belgorod to Kharkiv where Sam Kiley was at.

What else is going on here is we've heard explosions in Odessa and the fact that these explosions have occurred there indicates that there's probably a seaborne missile strike effort going on from the Black Sea.

So with all of this what you're seeing is basically a three-pronged attack to not only take a large portion of Ukraine but potentially divide the country in half.

KEILAR: Is there a pattern at all that you're seeing here? And how much more is this than you expected?

LEIGHTON: Well, I actually expected them to go big. I think that when you -- the incremental approach that a lot of people talked about in the west was not the way Putin was going to do it. So I did expect them to do this.

Now when you look at the various areas that they actually set off detonations and basically you're looking at something throughout the entire country. So every single point here shows that there were some type of efforts that Russia made. They targeted entities. That shows how difficult the planning process was for them. It was also an extremely thorough planning process.

KEILAR: So, you mentioned Odessa and that there appears to be a seaborne missile system that would have been used there. Can you tell us a little bit more about that?

LEIGHTON: Sure. What they basically have is on some of the Russian naval vessels they have, they have cruise missiles that are basically surface-to-surface missiles that are ship born.

And what they do is they target areas on the coast lines.

[05:15:02]

They could also use the same kind of missiles to go after Mariupol, and we have heard reports of missiles there. This is part of the Russian inventory and they are also a very common thing to use in these kinds of operations. We use them on our side. The Russians have them and some of their missiles are a bit older than ours but nonetheless, when they are coming after you, it doesn't matter what kind of missile it is, it is still bad and it's still dangerous.

KEILAR: Certainly is.

All right. Colonel, if you can stand by for us. We'll be touching base with you. Our coverage on the ongoing situation in Ukraine will continue. We'll head to the Odessa area where Russian troops have been spotted. So stay close by.

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[05:20:06]

BERMAN: All right. Welcome back.

This is CNN's special live coverage of a large scale Russian attack on Ukraine. All these locations you see on this map are where CNN has heard loud explosions or we have reports from locals.

Our team down here in the city of Odessa, an historic Black Sea port heard explosions a short time ago. And then we also have this video in recorded by a border guard of Russian military vehicles entering Ukraine from Crimea. Let me show you where that is just so you have a sense on the map of where that will be. That's down here. So you can see the area we're talking about.

Let's go to Odessa now. Our Nick Paton Walsh is on the ground near there. Nick, give us a sense of what you've heard and seen.

NICK PATON WALSH, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: Yeah, John, let me wind you back to before sunrise. Three, four blasts about 5:20 a.m. distant in the city center, two again at 6:00 a.m. and then a couple more about an hour or so ago.

One very cloud and quite close to us here, I would say 45 minutes ago now. It set off a car alarm. We don't know what it was that caused it. The closest we've heard it to the city center, the port where we're standing here.

And then just after that on the distant horizon, I wonder if you could play video of that, another explosion. Quite a significant one. We don't precisely know what was targeted. We know there are quite a lot of Ukrainian military installations along the coast line, its vital strategic coast, its main access to the maritime world.

We're in the third largest city. A place where people are frankly going back to their families, where there is a hope that forecasts of an amphibious landing into here -- I mean an absolutely crazy idea, but this invasion plan appears to be going into the realms of the farfetched as it stands.

People are desperately hoping they don't see Russian troops trying to land here but concerned that the explosions we've been hearing around the town for the beginning of the day are not a prelude to that. They're not a bid to soften up Ukrainian defenses. You are talking about Crimea. There are a number of Russian troops leaving Crimea and heading North.

There's a lot of hard information to dissect there, but the broad concern amongst Western officials, John, during all of the lead up to this in these briefings we heard if you've been looking at this war for a while, it seemed extraordinary that anybody would try as something as multi-pronged and grossly ambitious, ghastly as was outlined. Officials suggested part of the move might be to come up from Crimea, to come down from above Kharkiv where Sam and Clarissa are here and move towards each other cutting off essentially the bulk of Ukraine's military force in the east of the country.

Remember, a lot of the noise has been around the separatist areas in the last 48 hours. Was that the goal or was that designed to get Ukraine's military focused staying in the east while these forces can move in from the south and the north? And then you have an equally troubling move coming in from the north in Belarus near the capitol of Kyiv.

A lot of pieces moving here. A lot of predictions which many felt were farfetched. Seeming to come true. In just the first day and here in Odessa a lot of fears as to what these blasts, distant as most may herald for the next days ahead -- John.

BERMAN: Nick Paton Walsh. We are looking at attacks over the entirety of Ukraine here, not just any one place.

Nick Paton Walsh, near Odessa, stay safe. Keep us posted. We'll come back in a bit.

KEILAR: I want to bring in David Sanger, our CNN political and national security analyst. He is "the New York Times" White House and national security correspondent.

It's really a different world, a different Europe than the one you woke up in yesterday in Munich. I'm wondering what is standing out to you this morning.

DAVID SANGER, CNN POLITICAL AND NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: A few things, Brianna. First of all, we have had this debate about whether he would go small and try to take the country in chunks or go big. I think that debate is over. We pretty well understand he's doing the whole thing.

The second is, I think that everybody in Europe, even those who saw this coming, even those who are highly skeptical of the American intelligence a month or two ago, in the back of their minds, they thought to themselves, now in the end, no one is going to do an unprovoked attack in major European country in 2022 and break through not only the borders but all of the fundamental norms that we've had about how the world works and how the world was going to get organized after World War II.

And Putin has done that.

[05:25:01]

He has basically said, I'm not going by your rules. He's made some crazy claims about what was happening in Ukraine, that they were building nuclear weapons, they're not, and so forth. But the fact of the matter is he decided in the end he wanted to impact part of Russia.

KEILAR: This is an invasion, a war as Ukraine puts it, based on lies. I'm wondering, when you see these explosions in multiple cities, what does this tell you about the end motive of Vladimir Putin with Ukraine, beyond Ukraine? What do you think?

SANGER: Well, with Ukraine I think it's fairly clear. He sees it as his legacy to undo the damage he thinks was done by his predecessor, Boris Yeltsin, others, who at the time of weakness in Russia, gave up these individual states.

And in his long winding speech the other day, he went back and, you know, even blamed back to Stalin, you know, the fact that these were allowed to exist as independent within the USSR and said historically they are part of Russia so they are mine.

The question of where he would go next is really wide. There are some places he could go that are still not NATO members but the big issue is would he dare to cross over the line and take off against a NATO member who would be protected by the United States and the other 29 members of NATO?

KEILAR: He is daring. I think we can say that from what we've seen overnight.

SANGER: For sure.

KEILAR: David, we're lucky to have your insights all morning long. If you can stand by for us, thank you so much.

SANGER: Thank you.

BERMAN: Ukrainians living on the outskirts of Lviv standing in lines outside local banks, withdrawing cash as Russia begins to attack.

And we are following the global markets right now which are down and down big. The world reaction right now to this large scale Russian attack on Ukraine, that's coming up.

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