losing his troops to them says the whole war was started on false pretexts. the ukrainians did not provoke us. we decided to do it because we wanted to control them because we -- a whole bunch of oligarchs who had been making money in the donbas. he provides a kind of alternative narrative that is not one that looks good for putin. it completely contradicts putin's own narrative about ukraine being taken over by neo-nazis. and i wonder whether that will turn out to be, you know, if things go down badly for putin, i wonder if this becomes a central issue, which is that his own guy says the whole rational for this war is a lie. >> ukrainian president volodymyr zelenskyy has spoken with close allies about the turmoil in russia, saying the crisis is a result of russia's own aggression. >> translator: the longer