president putin earlier this month that there will be very severe economic consequences should russia invade. the white house also making it clear as they accept this invitation and look forward to the talks in january that diplomacy is their preferred path and that's why president biden is also going to say he wants to see further deescalation on the part of russia heading into those talks. >> ambassador, we will bring you in here. so should the fact that putin requested this call set off any alarms in the west wing? what do you make of that and who has the leverage here? >> no, i think it's a good sign. president putin rarely asks for calls. i worked in the obama administration for five years, i think i remember one time that he asked for a call, it's usually the other way around. that means he has a message he wants to send to the president. and because the talks have already been organized in january, both bilateral talks between russia and the united states, followed by talks between russia and nato, followed by multilateral talks