menendez. we begin tonight with what comes next after this weekend. short-lived yet startling rebellion against russian president vladimir putin. saturday s march on led by the one-time protegee did a head blow to the strongman image. he still wages war on ukraine. today, we learned president biden spoke by phone with ukraine s president on the sudden instability in russia. the white house says president biden offered his, quote, unwavering support for ukraine s counteroffensive against ukraine. the revolt is the first serious threat to putin s power in decades. secretary of state anthony blinken today said could it could change the port of the democracy in ukraine. i think we ve seen more cracks emerge in the russian facade. it is too soon to tell exactly where they go. and when they get their. certainly we have all sorts of new questions that putin is going to have to address in the weeks and months ahead. and we also confirmed that u.s. intelligence agencies knew in ad
his fighters. and accusing the military of launching a war in ukraine based on lies. early saturday, demanding the military leadership meet him in the city vowing to march on moscow if they refuse. news readers on state tv calling on wagner fighters to lay down their arms. in russia cities, authorities are tearing down wagner recruitment posters. security forces setting up roadblocks and checkpoints to protect moscow. bolstering security around the kremlin. the sea of russian power and the president himself seriously challenged. though the immediate threat appears to have subsided. up next nbc s chief international correspondent keir simmons sat down with president putin just before the war in ukraine. now he is back in moscow for us after the break. and later, what united states knew and when about this
putin cracks down too hard, he threatens and potentially risks undermining the war effort here in ukraine. we saw prigozhin clearly has a level of support among his wagner mercenaries. we ve seen some videos today that suggest he has a fair bit of support among russian ordinary soldiers also. his wagner mercenaries have been some of the most effective troops here. so, for putin, there is a risk that if he comes down hard on prigozhin, he may reopen these cracks that he appears, at least for the moment, to have papered over. in terms of russia s military leadership. that s the push of the pole. julia, a house armed service community member today urged his fellow republicans to back more aid to ukraine. take a listen. i think we have a moral obligation to stand up here and hope ukraine i think too many republicans have tried to stay under the radar. we do best we stand for what s right, and what is truthful. i believe that ronald reagan s
governed with moral authority and really brought his people with him. not through fear but through their own patriotism and wanting to protect the sovereignty of their country. i think what we saw this weekend is how fragile putin s leadership is right now. how fragile the military is, the russian military. the only real answer here is that putin s got to stop this war and pull it of ukraine. if you want to save his country, save his leadership position i think that s really the only answer. because it all started overnight friday when yevgeny prigozhin started to turn on putin and attempted to lead 25,000 troops in an attack on moscow. prigozhin had halted the attack after it includes dropping charges against prigozhin for his actions allowing him to relocate to butler s. there s been no movement from the wagner group since. let s bring in texas congressman joaquin castro who serves on the house foreign affairs committee. congressman, good to see you.
if this changes his calculus as he approaches taiwan and his alliance with russia, this could really be a moment of reset there, alicia. raf sanchez, the potential dissolution of the wagner group, what does that mean for fighting in ukraine? had a really good question. it s the question that officials here in kyiv are asking. the wagner mercenaries have delivered some of the key battlefield victories for vladimir putin after his offensive stalls. it was wagner mercenaries who eventually street by street and house by house had an enormous cost and were able to take that symbolic city of bakhmut in the east. alicia, even before things erupted this weekend, there has been months and months of bad blood between the wagner mercenaries and the regular russian military. prigozhin regularly accuses the military leadership of starving his truce of ammunition. basically sending them to die in places like bakhmut, where