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00:00Let me ask you Mr. Secretary about that intelligence because of course you were not only secretary offense you were also director of the CIA. To what extent do we have intelligence about Mr. Putin and his inner circle. Have we learned from this. Anything about him. Do we have any degree of confidence about how he's making decisions. I think without question Putin is increasingly isolated. He really he has a few people around him. They're the ones that are largely puppets very frankly. There's nobody of quality that can really provide effective guidance to Putin. So he's pretty much making these decisions on his own. And because you know when you're a bully and you're in a corner. Bullies will strike out. And I think that's what he's trying to do. He's trying to find a way to try to achieve some some parts of his mission. I mean you asked about whether he would agree to an off ramp on negotiations. I know they're negotiating. They seem to be making progress. But my sense from talking to people in the Pentagon and elsewhere is that they're very worried that the Russians are simply going to use that as an excuse to rebuild their forces and continue the offensive. So I think we've got to be careful. I think the only way to basically deal with Putin right now is to double down ourselves which means to provide as much military aid as necessary to the Ukrainians so that they can continue the battle against the Russians. Does that mean supplying military aid almost without regard to provocation. I mean we actually talked with former Defense Secretary William Cohen yesterday. He said you know I don't talk about provoking when they're destroying all the civilian places. Should we be worried about going too far and provoking Russia. Well it's a little bit difficult to try to be careful when somebody is beating the hell out of you and not respond. And that's what's going on. And so you know I think we are engaged in a conflict here. It's a proxy war with Russia whether we say so or not. That effectively is what's going on. And for that reason we've got to make sure we're providing as much weaponry as possible to give the Ukrainians the ability to continue what is a very courageous fight. I mean they're putting their lives on the line. They're fighting as well as any units that I've seen in my time working with defense issues. These are good fighters. They're small unit operations. They're working well. And I think ultimately the key here is for the Ukrainians to carry this battle to the Russians. The Russians have stalled. I think John Kirby is right. The Russians have stalled. And in war there's no such thing as just kind of holding the line. You're either moving forward or you're moving backward. And I think right now the Russians are taking it pretty hard from the Ukrainians. Finally Mr. Secretary what about some help from some third party. We now know that President Biden will speak with President Xi of China tomorrow. There's also talk perhaps about the Turks getting involved. Is it possible for either China or Turkey to really bring the parties together and maybe move forward. Well obviously I think all of those diplomatic options ought to be pursued. I think we ought to try to be working with the Turks. I think we ought to be trying to work with well with China to try to exert as much influence as possible on Russia. I know Israel is trying to work at this as well. There are other third parties that are trying to work at this. I think we need to explore that. But make no mistake about it. Diplomacy is going nowhere unless we have leverage unless the Ukrainians have leverage. And the way you get leverage is by frankly going in and killing Russians. That's what the Ukrainians have to do. We've got to continue the war effort because that this is a power game. Putin understands power. He really doesn't understand diplomacy very much. He understands power. And the only way to convince Putin that this is not going anywhere and that he should take some kind of off ramp is to continue to beat him on the battlefield.

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U.S. Is in a Proxy War With Russia: Panetta

Former Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta says Russia's Vladimir Putin is increasingly isolated and his forces have stalled in Ukraine. Panetta says to get leverage over Putin, you have to go in and kill Russians. He speaks to Bloomberg's David Westin. (Source: Bloomberg)

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