Ukrainians’ Choice: Fight or Flee? | #lovescams | #military | #datingscams

sabrina tavernise

It’s 9:30 in the morning in Central Kyiv. I’m at the bus station. And it’s absolutely packed, long lines of people trying to pack onto buses. Just overheard a young man saying there are no tickets, there no tickets, I don’t know what to do.

I’m walking up to a large white bus, two large white buses. People are arguing over who gets to get on.

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sabrina tavernise

People are scrambling to leave and are in shock.

Hi. [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH] I’m a journalist from The New York Times. Can I ask you a question?

sabrina tavernise

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dimitri

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sabrina tavernise

[NON-ENGLISH SPEECH] Sabrina [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH]

dimitri

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sabrina tavernise

This is Dimitri. He’s looking at a bus going to Lviv that is absolutely packed. His bus is supposed to leave at 9:00. [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH]

dimitri

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sabrina tavernise

I called my friends all around Ukraine yesterday, and everybody was intending on fighting.

dimitri

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sabrina tavernise

I myself am taking my family to the village outside Lviv, and then coming back and signing up immediately for military service.

dimitri

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sabrina tavernise

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I think if there’s one sound of Kyiv this morning so far, just after 10 o’clock in the morning, it’s the sound of wheelie bags being dragged over cobblestones and pavement.

From The New York Times, I’m Michael Barbaro. This is The Daily.

As Russia’s full-scale assault on Ukraine enters its second day, the people of Ukraine are starting to come to terms with the reality that the unthinkable has actually happened.

Today, my colleague Anton Troianovski explains the significance of this moment. And Sabrina Tavernise, Lynsea Garrison, and Michael Schwirtz speak to Ukrainians about the agonizing decisions that they now must make.

It’s Friday, February 25.

Anton, we are talking to you on Thursday night in Moscow. We are coming to the end of day one of this invasion. Help us wrap our heads around what’s happening and the significance of what we’re all witnessing. Because even if we’ve been hearing warnings about this for weeks, it’s hard to believe that we’re now experiencing a full scale attack on Ukraine by Russia.

Yeah. It is really hard to believe. It’s the biggest attack of one nation on another nation in Europe since World War II. It is really kind of the worst case scenario of all those scenarios of a potential Russian invasion of Ukraine that have been discussed. It’s something that I’ve spent just about every day writing about this crisis for the last two months or so. And honestly, even until yesterday I didn’t think that this could actually happen.

It’s Europe’s most powerful military, bearing, basically, its entire firepower, much of its firepower against the neighboring country. So since about 5:00 AM, we have seen cruise missile, ballistic missile strikes against infrastructure targets, military targets in Ukraine. Then during the day, today, we started seeing footage coming in of helicopter assaults, of paratroopers landing, of tanks rolling across the border.

And this is happening from 3 sides, from the North, Belarus, from the East, Russia, from the South, from the Black Sea in Crimea. It started, what, like 18 hours ago or so, and it’s still very hard to just wrap our heads around the magnitude of what’s happening.

And what do we understand to be the end goal here at this point?

Well, Putin laid it out quite clearly in his early morning speech. He said, our goal is to demilitarize and de-Nazify, in his words, Ukraine.

And just explain that because—

Yeah.

De-nazification is not a familiar phrase in 2022.

Exactly. And I mean, I will say, until recently, it hasn’t been a familiar phrase in Russia either. But the Kremlin in their propaganda they consider the democratically elected government of Ukraine a Nazi regime. They claim falsely that it has perpetrated a genocide on Russian speakers in Eastern Ukraine. And so Putin is trying to claim the moral high ground here.

He is saying he’s going in to remove this evil regime. And what that means is this is a full scale military assault to topple the government, most likely, of another country. This is just a massive undertaking that we’re only seeing the beginnings of.

So we’re talking about a sovereign nation in Europe being attacked by another European nation. And its democratically elected leadership being, by what you just described, deposed. And these are developments that are unheard of in modern Europe. So how should we think about that?

Yeah. I think it’s really the end of a certain post-Cold War order in Europe. It’s the end of 30 years of Russia trying to find a place in that kind of Western led order. It’s the end of 20 years of Putin trying to use diplomacy as well as his kind of hybrid warfare tactics to try to further his interests in Europe. That’s all gone now.

We’re in a new reality now, where Russia is showing it is prepared to fight a large land war in Europe to achieve what it describes to be its aims. It’s just a totally different world that we’re in now.

Well, so let’s talk about the consequences of that for all involved.

Yeah. I mean, I would break it up into a few different parts, the consequences for Ukraine, for Russia, for Europe, and the U.S., and the rest of the world. So starting with Ukraine. This is just the beginning, I fear. If this continues, if this continues the way we think it’s going to, to Putin pursuing regime change, it could get much more bloody. So we don’t know yet what happens to the cities.

There is a fight for territory going on in Eastern Ukraine, where those separatist regions are. But the big question is, will they go into Kyiv?

Right.

Very scarily, it looks like they may well.

OK. So what about Russia, where you are based? What are the consequences you are seeing and expecting there?

Well, so people are expecting a new crackdown on civil liberties, on freedom of speech, freedom of the press, even on business. The reason being that whenever we’ve had crackdowns here in Russia, the justification has always been that the Kremlin is hunting down internal enemies, who are serving some kind of foreign agenda to destabilize the country. So that’s certainly one thing to watch over the coming days and weeks is how much of an additional crackdown is there.

Tonight, we had pretty significant anti-war protests—

—in Moscow, and St. Petersburg, and in a number of cities in Siberia all told several thousand people were in the streets and there were more than 1,500 arrests. So—

Wow.

—one thing that’s very important to point out is, there has been next to no outpouring of support for this. And there is a lot of anger, disbelief, fear to see your country inflicting so much suffering on a neighboring country is awful, and this narrative for why it was necessary to do it. It really does fall apart quite quickly upon inspection. Why— How does Ukraine actually threaten Russia?

Can it really be true that the Ukrainians were planning an invasion of these pro-Russian separatist areas in the East just as 150,000 plus troops were surrounding Ukraine on three sides? There’s just so much in the Kremlin propaganda narrative that doesn’t hold up, that I think a lot of people aren’t buying that story.

OK. Finally, let’s talk about the consequences for the United States and for the rest of the world.

So President Biden and the E.U. announced major sanctions today against Russia. And Russia has promised to respond potentially asymmetrically. So we might not see sanctions by Russia against the U.S., but we might see Russia take other actions that could cause harm and pain in the U.S. And they’re— We can really only speculate what that would be. Some folks are talking about the potential for cyber attacks here in Moscow.

There’s been a lot of talk that Russia could base missiles or other military assets in Latin America, to more directly threaten the United States. Russia, obviously, is one of the world’s biggest energy suppliers, especially to Europe. If it were to turn that spigot, that could cause incredible problems for Europeans. So there is so much uncertainty here still, not just in Ukraine, not just in Russia, but really about how this crisis plays out and what it means for the rest of the world.

And Anton, as you’re preparing to sign-off for the night, I want to return to Ukraine and where this situation leaves its people at this moment.

I mean, it’s a horrible situation. These are people who— I think there was so little expectation that Russia could actually go ahead with this kind of invasion. And now they are making choices they would never thought they would have to make. Do they stay in Kyiv? Do they try to flee West? Do they try to get out of the country? Do you sleep in the basement? It’s really an unimaginable situation for millions and millions of people right now.

Well, Anton, thank you. We’ll talk again soon. Stay safe.

Thank you.

We’ll be right back.

All day yesterday, my colleagues in Ukraine and back in the U.S. we’re speaking with Ukrainians around the country about their experiences of the past 24 hours.

Hello.

Hi. How are you?

Hi, Lynsey.

Not good.

Not good.

It’s not the same.

Lynsea Garrison got on the phone with Denis Surkov, who lives in a city called Dnipro in Eastern Ukraine.

I am doctor, Chief of Dnipro Regional Children’s Hospital.

You’re a doctor at Dnipro Regional Children’s Hospital.

Yep.

OK.

And I am Chief of NICU and I.C.U.

Chief of NICU?

Exactly.

Got it. Can you just tell me a little bit about what the past 24 hours have been like for you?

So in the morning, we wake up and we have heard, first, rocket explosions near Dnipro Airport. So I was in my hospital. We were nervous. We were confused. Everybody was near their laptops or iPhones.

Yeah.

And checked the news. And the news were and are dramatic.

Dramatic.

How were you understanding this? Did you think that this would happen?

Honestly, no. We were expected for the beginning of the attack, but we didn’t know that it could be so, so fast, so right now.

And now, the borders between Ukrainian regions are closed. We had some possibilities and some efforts to go last week.

OK.

I can’t explain, but something stopped us. We hoped that finally everything will resolve. But now, honestly, I don’t know exactly what to do.

What do you think stopped you?

My family didn’t want to leave Ukraine because we love Ukraine, and we wanted to live here happy and in peace, and so on. So I said, OK, maybe everything will be not so bad. Let’s wait. So my main question for myself is, if I made a very, very big mistake not to move from Ukraine when I had an opportunity to do this.

That’s a heavy question.

Yes.

If there was a big mistake or not so big, and I have no answer. I can ask you, do you want to wake up in the morning and understand you should go forever, not for one day, not for two days, forever? Can you make such a decision in— I don’t know, in 10 minutes? My question to you.

Yeah.

To bring just a bit of water, just a bit of food, single cloth, documents, money, and go outside your home forever, can you make such a decision?

Just imagine.

Yeah.

So this was my family feeling last week. Even though yesterday in the evening, I told to my wife that this is the last calm day we can evacuate. In the morning, we realized that war came to Ukraine, not conflict, not disturbs, war, conventional war.

What are your children asking you? Like, how are you talking about this with them?

I say to my children, everything will be OK, your father will care about you.

How old are they?

My elder daughter is 30 and she lives abroad. And my younger daughter, she is 14. She’s with me.

How is she doing?

She believed me.

That you’ll protect her? And how does that make you feel that she believes you?

I will do all I can to protect her.

I don’t know exactly what, but I will do everything, everything can.

Are you worried it won’t be enough?

I am worried.

Everything could be changed, I don’t know, next few hours or even next few maybe minutes.

sabrina tavernise

It’s 3 o’clock and I’m getting out of the gas station.

So I’m looking at this line, I’d say it’s maybe 30-40 cars long.

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sabrina tavernise

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sabrina tavernise

Everybody is limited now. You can only get 20 liters of gas.

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sabrina tavernise

I’m walking up to an ambulance that’s waiting in line for gas. The ambulance is being ushered ahead. [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH]

speaker 7

Ya.

sabrina tavernise

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sabrina tavernise

The man who’s managing here says he’s too busy. He’s running, trying to usher the ambulance to the front of the line. I’m going to talk to another person. [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH] Sabrina [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH] The New York Times [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH]

varari

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sabrina tavernise

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varari

Varari.

sabrina tavernise

This is Varari. Varari, [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH]

varari

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sabrina tavernise

I hear— I’m hearing on the radio now that they’re bombing us. I live in this area that they’re bombing.

varari

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sabrina tavernise

No one believed it. No one believed that they would act toward us this way. We were brothers. We’re neighboring countries. We’re brothers. No one believed it.

varari

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sabrina tavernise

I feel— I have this feeling of nervousness, of anxiousness.

varari

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sabrina tavernise

I’m calling with my loved ones, my mother.

varari

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sabrina tavernise

He said, she’s an elderly person, she doesn’t see very well, and she does not hear very well. So it’s very difficult for her, she’s not understanding what’s happening.

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varari

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sabrina tavernise

So, so far, I’m going to hunker down in place, but I’m getting as much gas as I can because I might need to make it to my mom’s.

varari

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sabrina tavernise

I bought some food.

varari

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sabrina tavernise

I got all my phones, passports, documents.

varari

Yes.

sabrina tavernise

I bought—

varari

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sabrina tavernise

—vermicelli bread, milk, and dill, and sour cream.

I’m going to talk to another person.

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ura

Ura.

sabrina tavernise

Ura. [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH] Ura. I’m taking to Ura, who’s getting some gas. He says he does not plan to leave.

ura

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sabrina tavernise

I’m a little shocked—

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sabrina tavernise

—that Russia attacked Ukraine. It’s so bad.

ura

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sabrina tavernise

We’re going to defend our country to the last drop of blood.

ura

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sabrina tavernise

Tomorrow I’m going to sign up for a territorial defense force. And I’m going to defend my country.

ura

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sabrina tavernise

It’s 3:30 and we’re driving in Central Kyiv, and this is just a closed town right now.

The day is still very gray. The sky is very low. Feels sort of raw, and cold, and wet.

The air has a kind of bitter smell of ordinance. It’s the smell of the air after an air strike.

Someone carrying a gun and some body armor down the street. A very sweet little bakery, I’m going to come in.

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sabrina tavernise

Yeah. [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH] The New York Times.

speaker 10

Yeah.

sabrina tavernise

[NON-ENGLISH SPEECH] Sabrina. Yeah. [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH] I’m saying I’m a journalist from The New York Times and I would like sweets, but also her opinion. [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH]

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sabrina tavernise

Today, there’s panic, people are panicking very strongly.

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sabrina tavernise

You can see that they’ve bought me a lot of bread.

So I’m doing a bit of panic buying myself, two large bags of cookies, three candy bars, 10 quiches, and a bunch of almond croissants.

speaker 10

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sabrina tavernise

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speaker 10

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sabrina tavernise

[NON-ENGLISH SPEECH] I’m asking her if she plans to leave. No, I don’t plan to leave.

speaker 10

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sabrina tavernise

I really don’t have a place to leave to.

speaker 10

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sabrina tavernise

I’m here.

speaker 10

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sabrina tavernise

I have my home here.

speaker 10

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sabrina tavernise

I think everything will be OK.

[MUSIC]

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speaker 10

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sabrina tavernise

Today is the hardest day. I think tomorrow might be easier.

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sabrina tavernise

OK. Back to the hotel.

Everything is closed now. It’s almost as if it was nighttime. A few cars are still going by, but almost no pedestrians. It’s very central. The street is just completely deserted.

It does feel ominous.

who was just sitting in his car listening to the Ukrainian national anthem cranked up on high volume.

sabrina tavernise

It’s 11:30 AM on Friday in Kyiv.

Last night, in the city there were a lot of airstrikes and it seems like they’re getting closer. [NON-ENGLISH SPEECH]

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sabrina tavernise

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The airstrikes are beginning again. You can hear the siren. We’re trying to decide whether to leave.

Our colleagues, a few of them drove out this morning because it’s really unclear what’s going to happen. Will there be a big fight with the Ukrainian military? Or will the Russians just come in? What will happen if they take the city? And it seems like that is imminent.

So we’re trying to make arrangements. Our hotel doesn’t have a generator, which means we would be out of power if the power gets cut off in the city, which is a pretty good chance.

Yeah. We’re trying to figure it out.

I guess, like a lot of people here, we’re trying to make that decision. Should we leave or should we stay?

As of Friday afternoon in Kyiv, Ukrainian officials were bracing for an attack on the capital city as Russia’s military offenses pressed closer to the heart of the government.

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In a televised address, Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky said that at least 137 Ukrainians, military and civilians, had already been killed. And he called on Ukrainians to defend themselves against Russian forces, saying that nobody else would come to their rescue.

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Zelensky, who was unshaven and in a t-shirt said that he himself was now Russia’s number one target. Followed, he said, by his own family.

We’ll be right back.

Here’s what else you need to know today.

On Thursday, three former Minneapolis police officers were found guilty of federal crimes for failing to intervene as a fellow officer, Derek Chauvin, killed George Floyd by pressing his knee on Floyd’s neck for more than 9 minutes. The case is believed to be the first time that the federal government has charged police officers for inaction when a more senior officer was using excessive force.

Two of the officers were rookies at the time of Floyd’s death, but the jury rejected their defense that they had been trained to obey superior officers, like Chauvin, and to carry out orders without question.

Today’s episode was produced by Rob Szypko, Rachelle Bonja, Lynsea Garrison, Rachel Quester, Kaitlin Roberts and Clare Toeniskoetter. It was edited by Lisa Tobin and Lisa Chow. Contains original music by Dan Powell and Marion Lozano, and was engineered by Corey Schreppel. Our theme music is by Jim Brunberg and Ben Landfurg of Wonderlake.

The Daily is made by Lisa Tobin, Rachel Quester, Lynsea Garrison, Clare Toeniskoetter, Paige Cowett, Michael Simon Johnson, Brad Fisher, Larissa Anderson, Chris Wood, Jessica Cheung, Stella Tan, Alexandra Leigh, Lisa Chow, Eric Krupke, Marc Georges, Luke Vander Ploeg, M.J. Davis Lin, Austin Mitchell, Dan Powell, Dave Shaw, Sydney Harper, Robert Jimison, Michael Benoist, Liz O’Baylen, Asthaa Chaturvedi, Kaitlin Roberts, Rachelle Bonjour, Diana Nguyen, Marion Lozano, Corey Schreppel, Anita Badejo, Rob Szypko, Elisheba Ittoop, Chelsea Daniel, Mooj Zadie, Patricia Willens, Rowan Niemisto, Jody Becker, Rikki Novetsy, and John Ketchum.

Special thanks to Sam Dolnick, Paula Szuchuman, Cliff Levy, Lauren Jackson, Julia Simon, Mahima Chablani, Sofia Milan, Des Ibekwe, Erica Futterman, Wendy Dorr, Elizabeth Davis-Moorer, Jeffrey Miranda, Renan Borelli, Maddy Masiello, and Daniel Friedman. That’s it for The Daily. I’m Michael Barbaro. See you on Monday.