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Russian Forces Launch Full-Scale Invasion Of Ukraine; Ukraine President Declares Martial Law Following Russia Invasion. Aired 7:30- 8a ET

Aired February 24, 2022 - 07:30   ET

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

[07:30:00]

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: So, Frederik Pleitgen, again, over the Russian border here near Belgorod, literally seeing tanks rolling in, tanks rolling into Ukraine. And let's go now to our Sam Kiley, who is in Kharkiv. Sam, we saw firing from the Russian side at Fred Pleitgen's location. What did you hear in Kharkiv?

SAM KILEY, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: I'm pretty sure we heard the incoming not into the city, I have to say. But strangely enough, I was stood against the window of my hotel room and could feel the concussion against the glass. Now, that does not happen unless you're very close to something that's going out. So there was definitely significant incoming that timed pretty closely to what Fred was showing us live on CNN there with the outgoing salvos coming from the Russian missiles and artillery into locations, in or around Kharkiv.

They've been hitting, not downtown Kharkiv where I am, but there have been hitting the periphery, a block of flats of apartments was struck. We know -- we also know that military installations here have been struck. But if -- what Fred is seeing now and I've been up that road, just about 10 days ago, it's a direct road, pretty much due north from here, it's only 25 miles to the border crossing, and even a tank moving across the landscape there will move fairly slowly but coming down the main road will be able to move pretty fast.

So, there will be an anticipation. I think that the Ukrainian military may try to stop them. This will not be something, this will not be a move that would come as a great surprise to the Ukrainian military. The real issue is what do they have to block its path. Or even if they're going, are they going to bother? Or are they going to melt away and try to run some kind of counter insert an insurgency I should say, rather than in counterinsurgency forcing the Russians into fighting, what would in the later days and months weeks, and may turn into a counter insurgency.

BERMAN: Sam, Fred standby for a minute, if you will. And just again, to give people a sense on this map. Fred is up here in Belgorod. Sam in Kharkiv just over the border there, not a large distance separating them. General Mark Hertling is with us. We saw in Fred shot and we can get these all guys back up again. We saw the beginning of a column of tanks moving from Russia into Ukraine, Sam, speculating that maybe the Ukrainian military will try to stop them. How? How would they?

LT. GEN. MARK HERTLING (RET.), CNN MILITARY ANALYST: What you're seeing John, it very unlike desert warfare where the defender has no place to hide. There are forest and an undulating terrain throughout Northern Ukraine. So what you're talking about is this is perfect counter or anti-armor territory. This is where the javelins will have effect, because the soldiers firing those javelins, which have about a 3,000 meter range are going to be able to hide in woodlands, they're going to be able to hide behind Hill masses, when they see those tanks go past on the road.

What the Russian way of war is, is you keep those tanks. We call it nose-to-butt (ph). They're literally about 10 meters apart when they're traveling down the road. But when they get into their final expedition, a spread out over the ground, so they can move quickly on the roads but then they go into the terrain and start attempting to maneuver on anything that's firing back at them.

These kinds of positions that could be there with Javelin anti-tank missiles will certainly affect those. You see some more rockets going off. But that's all the prep for the battlefield. Because those rockets are traveling, like I said, 50 miles, those tanks won't get to the area where those rockets are landing for at least, at least two hours. So you're talking about a very slow movement.

Now what you're seeing is an artillery piece on the screen, very different from a tank. That's the thing that has the range of about 20 miles, give or take. And those are the things that travel along with the tanks that provide close in artillery fire.

BERMAN: General, Fred, Sam, don't go for standby please pipe up if you see any more developments. In the meantime, I do want to bring in Lieutenant General H.R. McMaster, former US national security advisor and author of the book Battlegrounds. General, I do appreciate you being with us. We have these breaking developments happening before our very eyes, tanks rolling past our reporter in Russia into Ukraine. What do you make of that this morning, General?

LT GEN. H.R. MCMASTER (RET.), FORMER NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISER: Well, John, it's not going to be over soon. Right. We are already, you know, in the middle of a war that began in 2014. And it's actually a long campaign over 20 years that Putin has been launching to restore Russia to national greatness and to mainly do that by dragging everybody else down, disrupting countries in the former territories of the Soviet Union, the former Warsaw Pact with, you know, with the massive attack like this, massive cyber-attacks, remember the invasion of Georgia in 2008.

[07:35:05]

And we're going to see more and more of this until we're able to impose costs on Putin beyond those that he factors in at the beginning of this decision making process now to end this decision to renew the invasion of Ukraine.

BERMAN: General McMaster, what kind of man does this? What kind of man launches this type of aerial assault just so people can see? At least 16 locations, I'm sure there are more on this, air assaults on an entire nation unprovoked. What kind of a man does this?

MCMASTER: Well, this is somebody who grew up in a poor neighborhood and a rat infested apartment in St. Petersburg. He's somebody who then dedicated his whole life within Russian intelligence to hold up the corrupt regime of the Soviet Union. He then saw that collapse and what he described as the greatest catastrophe in history in 1991.

And then, when he took over in 2000, reforms had failed in Russia under Boris Yeltsin. And Putin found himself at the top of really a criminal enterprise kleptocratic regime in Russia. And so what Putin has been obsessed with, you know, since 2000, year 2000, New Year's Day, when he gave a speech in which he laid out his desire to restore Russia to national greatness is to do just that. And of course, to maintain his grip on power.

So what he's been doing since then, is perfecting what you might call Putin's playbook, or Russia new generation warfare, and we're seeing just the latest evolution of this of this strategy to restore Russia to national greatness.

BERMAN: Is this a man to be praised, though general to be honored by the West as we watch innovation like this?

MCMASTER: Is that certainly not someone to be to be praised. And I think what we ought to be encouraged by is the reaction across the free world. I mean, really what Putin wants more than anything, John is disunity, right? Because disunity will lead to an ineffective response.

I think what we've seen so far despite, you know, some exceptions across the free world here with maybe initially tepid response by Germany and maybe Emmanuel Macron, stepping into the trap of Putin's feigned desire to continue diplomatic dialogue, we've seen really the stories was one of unity. And maybe we can even see that in our own country, John, as we confront this threat, and recognize that your threats like this to develop abroad and mature abroad can only be dealt with at exorbitant costs once they reach our shores.

So it's time for us certainly to lead as part of the free world and to recognize that, you know, this is a return of great power competition. And it's a dangerous competition, because Putin, I think, will not back up or back off, John. I mean, and, you know, we have to see it in context, right. This is a man who has enabled the serial episodes of mass homicide in the Syrian civil war. This is a person who has continued to subvert Europe by weaponizing migrants on Poland's borders. This is somebody who's encouraging Serbian separatist movements in the Balkans. Right. This is one campaign in his larger effort to drag everybody else down.

BERMAN: General H.R. McMaster, I appreciate you being with us this morning. Thank you very much. Brianna, let's go to you.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN ANCHOR: All right. I want to talk now with Julia Ioffe. She is the founding partner and Washington correspondent of Puck and also with us, CNN political and national security analyst, the New York Times is David Sanger.

All right, let's just start with what we saw there in Fred Pleitgen's live shot from the Russian side of the front here. How flagrant Russia is being in this, Julia?

JULIA IOFFE, FOUNDING PARTNER AND WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT, PUCK: Yes, I mean, that's been kind of their MO this whole time, right? They said, you know, earlier this week, Dmitry Peskov, the Kremlin spokesman said Russia has never in its history invaded anyone. You had the week before that Putin announcing a drawdown of troops while actually adding troops. You have them staging these false flag attacks that they're not even bothering to make look professional or good.

And now they're not, you know, everybody who's ever tried to take a picture in Russia know, especially if there's anything military around, even if it's like a grocery store that like no photos, no photos, and they clearly don't care. They're just like, they're rolling in very brazenly.

KEILAR: Rolling tanks right past, obviously Western cameras. And they know this, David.

DAVID SANGER, CNN POLITICAL AND NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: They do. It has been Russia's version of the big lie. And it's gone beyond even what Julia laid through. We've had -- we've heard Putin in the past three days, say that. Ukraine needed to be denotified (ph), who we heard him say that it was trying to develop its own nuclear weapons. In fact, it gave up the remnants of the old Soviet nuclear weapons and has no evidence it's ever tried to build its own.

And it said that it was allowing the United States to put nuclear weapons and other arms aimed at Russia on his territory.

[07:40:03]

None of this seems true. All of it is a pretext to roll in.

IOFFE: Except, by the way, I'm sorry to interrupt. Zelenskyy, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the Ukrainian president, when things were looking quite desperate, said, we're going to examine -- reexamine the Budapest Memorandum and try to redevelop our nuclear weapons. So that's what --

SANGER: That's what they gave him. That gave him a way in. He didn't actually go quite as far as saying you would develop the nuclear weapons. But he did say would we look at this memorandum, the central swap of which was that Ukraine gave away what it was left with in the Soviet Union, and in return got a security guarantee for its own security and its own borders and Zelenskyy, like I saw in Munich this weekend, was asking what happened to that guarantee.

KEILAR: And look, all of that is just untrue. So let's talk about what Russia is trying to do here. Specifically, let's talk about where these are going. These are heading towards Kharkiv. We heard Sam Riley (ph) just reporting from the -- I guess what would be -- where these -- where these artillery shells are landing. He said it's not in the city proper, but it's outside. Kharkiv is the second largest city in Ukraine. What is the goal here?

IOFFE: Well, they're shooting at pretty much every major city. You have in the port of Odessa, you saw amphibious vehicles show up on the shore and basically Russian seals, you know, navy seals on being unloaded. In Odessa, you have troops crossing all over. He see missiles -- shells flying even in Ivano-Frankivsk in the far west of Ukraine. And it just looks like this overwhelming, I hate to use the term, but it certainly looks like it -- looks like a blitzkrieg.

SANGER: The most amazing thing, though, is it in this statement announcing the military action. He said he didn't want to occupy Ukraine. So what are his choices? If he occupies, he knows he's facing a huge insurgency, probably bigger than he anticipated.

KEILAR: Major Ukrainian resistance.

SANGER: Major Ukraine, right, which the United States would end up in a proxy war, because the U.S. has already said it would help arm the insurgency. If he doesn't occupy, then he's facing a situation where he's going to put in a puppet government. Within a few years, there will be another Maidan, the 2014 uprising against the government that cast out a pro-Russian leader, and he'd have to come in and put that down again.

So, you know, the central question here is what does the world do if anything to protect an emerging democracy that's not a member of our alliance? And one in which we don't have any great strategic purposes to go defend them. But we have a moral purpose.

KEILAR: Yes. And look, as we were talking about in the break, we are watching what you're watching right now these images. This is Russia trying to upset the world order that has benefited many Western countries, perhaps the most among them, the United States, you're watching it happen before your eyes. Julie and David, thank you so much for the analysis. Appreciate it. Berman.

BERMAN: it was just an armored personnel carrier crossing from Russia into Ukraine before their eyes of Fred Pleitgen in and our team there. We saw tanks moments before that. This is an invasion, an invasion of Ukraine by Russia, we're there. CNN's breaking news coverage continues, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:47:47

KEILAR: Breaking news, Russians attacking Ukraine. This is underway right now CNN live on the ground. This is just from moments ago, just a few minutes ago. Our Fred Pleitgen was there on the Russian side of the front and he could see these artillery shells going from the Russian backed separatists area into Ukraine.

I also want to bring in now Andriy Moskalenko. He is the Deputy Mayor of Lviv, Ukraine, which is on the opposite side of the country from the pictures that you're seeing here. This is going towards Kharkiv. He is Lviv there on the western side of the country. Mayor, can you just tell us a little bit about what you're dealing with their artillery shells that you've seen explosions that you've seen in the area?

DEPUTY MAYOR ANDRIY MOSKALENKO, LVIV, UKRAINE: It was very tough this morning for the Ukraine and especially as well for our city because during that 9 here this morning, we see information from all of Ukrainian cities about this explosions. In Lviv, we had in the morning sirens and so it was like a sign order to people move to underground places. It's an order some potential threat but hopefully we didn't have any explosions.

So right now city works like usual services. So we have water supply, heat supply. So we have transport and banks and all other institutions work so we together with State Security Service is originally administration it was police manage our work and we have come on headquarter and to provide that services for our residents at this moment.

KEILAR: Our reporter, deputy mayor, in your city had reported hearing an explosion outside of the city. Is there anything you can tell us about that?

MOSKALENKO: So there was information about some explosions in Lviv region but not in CBM (ph). And so it's far away from CBM (ph). And so it was official information also from military minister.

KEILAR: Can you tell me what you've mentioned citizens going underground into bomb shelters? I know there have been folks lining up outside of banks, outside of ATMs trying to get money obviously very concerned, lines at gas stations What can you tell us about that?

[07:50:10]

MOSKALENKO: So, this morning, it was a siren, because it was like some potential threat. So it was for approximately one hour. It's approximately from seven till nine, the time in the morning, Ukrainian time. If we talk about some banks, so it's according to regulation of National Bank of Ukraine, what amount of money can be taken by cash, and so it's regulation like the whole Ukraine, nothing special to leave.

So today, we will provide the health services like I mentioned, and so it's working in regular time. But so what is the morning siren, I forgot to mention about the beginning, so we made a decision and other schools. They were not (INAUDIBLE) children stayed home. And so they have like educational processes online to get, also we meet with a chief of our universities and so also education online.

KEILAR: Education going online. Deputy Mayor, please, we hope that you can stay safe and we do appreciate you being with us this morning. Deputy Mayor Andriy Moskalenko.

BERMAN: All right, as we've noted, there is this large scale area assault on Ukraine right now at least 16. And I think I've lost count here, how many locations we have reports of explosions. I'm joined now by CNN senior global affairs analyst, Bianna Golodryga. And Bianna, I'm looking at this and my question to you is, are the Russian people seeing this? Do the Russians have any sense of the scale of destruction now or Frederik Pleitgen watching the missiles being shot from their territory over the border into Ukraine?

BIANNA GOLODRYGA, CNN SENIOR GLOBAL AFFAIRS ANALYST: It's night and day in the year 2022, given all the communications and technologies that we have in this world down provided to us. What Russians are saying just across the border here on state television, and what's actually playing out in reality, and that's why you saw President Zelenskyy in his address and passionate address yesterday and both Russian and Ukrainian, speak to the Russian people and say that the Ukraine that you're being fed is not the Ukraine that we are now. We are the real Ukrainians, not what you're being fed on television.

And now you're seeing what's has surmised to be a year of Vladimir Putin really cracking down on any independent news outlets, any independent journalists calling them enemies of the state, right, foreign funded all of this trying to get them either to close up shop or to leave the country. And the few independent news sites that I've been following this morning are covering what's happening on the ground here, but the federal oversight, the communications regulator in Russia has now mandated that no programming can show video that hasn't been approved by Russian state media. So they're trying to control this, you're not seeing protests on the street, but at some point they're going to feel the reality of what's playing out.

BERMAN: It was a remarkable moment President Zelenskyy speaking to the Russian people in Russia.

GOLODRYGA: Yes.

BERMAN: Which of course is his native tongue there.

GOLODRYGA: He said perfectly.

BERMAN: But really is remarkable. Bianna Golodryga, thank you so much. We will see you the top of the next hour.

So our CNN crew in Russia watching rockets in the skies headed towards Ukraine. At least 16 different locations in Ukraine now targeted by the Russian military. Our breaking news coverage continues right after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:55:47]

KEILAR: Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy, calling the large scale Russian attack on Ukraine an act of war. Explosions are now being heard all across the country. In Ukraine is saying that at least 40 people, including many civilians, several civilians have been killed so far. From Jeremy Diamond at the White House. That's what we're hearing actually. Let's go now to Jeremy Diamond at the White House. And Nic Robertson in Moscow. Jeremy, what can you tell us? JEREMY DIAMOND, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, listen, Brianna, President Biden overnight saying that this attack by Russia on Ukraine is unprovoked and unjustified making clear that this is a war of choice by the Russian presidents. And today, you can expect that President Biden will unveil a full range of severe sanctions against Russia.

Senior Administration official telling us that the President alongside U.S. allies will unveil that full range of sanctions that we have been waiting for in the event of a full scale Russian invasion. You can expect that to include full sanctions on Russia's largest banks, cutting them off essentially from the Western financial system. You can also expect that that's going to include additional sanctions against Russian elites. And perhaps as well, these export controls cutting Russia off from key Western technologies.

President Biden is set to discuss all of these measures alongside U.S. allies at a G7 virtual meeting that's set to take place around 9:00 a.m. Eastern time. And then later in the day around noon, we are expecting to hear directly from the President of the United States on these attacks that Russia has been carrying out overnight.

We know that President Biden has been getting regular updates from his national security team, his National Security Adviser, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and I think you can also expect that eventually to see some force posture changes. U.S. forces already we know have been sent additional forces to the Baltic region to shore up those NATO allies. I think you can expect to see more of that in the hours and days ahead. Brianna.

KEILAR: Look, Nic, Russia is expecting this. They know this is going to happen. Putin doesn't care. That is what has become very clear. He doesn't care about the consequences of what he's doing. He's going to move ahead with it. What do you expect the reaction is going to be to additional sanctions?

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: We're already hearing from the president spokesman today saying that there is a -- the markets have been affected and what it's describing as an emotional reaction so far, that this was something that they'd expected, that they predicted, clearly they were expecting to go and invade, as we now see. So they had -- they were aware that this was coming and they believe that they can cope with it.

The President spokesman today is saying that Russia cannot be put behind a new Iron Curtain, perhaps is a reference to the sanctions. They're expecting to hit them. It's interesting today that the President spokesman is still not changing his narrative or the President's narrative about a war, is still calling what we're seeing tanks rolling in, artillery rocket barrages fired and not calling this a war, still calling it a special military operation.

The President spokesman was asked what is the endgame here? What are you trying to achieve? Are you trying to replace the government? He refused to answer those questions, any details about precisely what they plan to do. Beyond what President Putin has said calling this, you know, a going after military targets and in his words, somewhat missile -- very misleadingly and erroneously but in his words denazification, that ambiguity. The President spokesman is not answering.

KEILAR: Yes, look, their goal clearly is not their stated goal, which is built on lies. Nic, Jeremy, thank you so much for the reports.

BERMAN: So as we said at least 16 different locations across Ukraine now -- right now reporting explosions. One of them is Mariupol the city here very close to that separatist region. Our Alexander Marquardt is there. And Alex, I do understand you have seen people there on the streets. We can see them there behind you lining up trying to get cash at this point.

ALEX MARQUARDT, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Yes, John, this city is quite tense right now. This is not just on the Eastern front. As you mentioned, we're about 15 miles from that line of contact but we're on the southern flank as well where there were Russian forces have been building up their troops in the Sea of Azov, in the Black Sea, in Crimea.

[08:00:00]