As tension continues to mount between Ukraine and Russia, former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley warns Russian President Vladimir Putin “smells blood in the water.”
Haley told Fox News Channel’s “America Reports” that Putin and other nations see America as “weak” because of President Joe Biden and his mishandling of the Afghanistan withdrawal.
“This administration has been very clear on how weak they are,” Haley emphasized. “They have been clear on how weak they are by selling out the Nord Stream 2 pipeline that has made Europe so dependent and Germany very dependent on Russia. They have sold us out by letting the world watch what happened in Afghanistan as we watched our American soldiers die. They continue to show weakness in the fact that they can’t seem to get it together with Ukraine and Russia. I mean, look, I dealt with the Russians for two years at the U.N. My first speech at the Security Council was against Russia on their aggression in Ukraine. I know how they think.”
“[P]utin absolutely gets this is an opportunity, the same way Xi does and North Korea and Iran, they see this as an opportunity where America has never had a president this weak, and if they want something, they better take it now because they know that Americans will not keep this in 2024, so they are trying to move now,” she continued. “What you look at is Putin’s intention was never to go to war. It’s not popular for Russians to want to see their troops go to war. He doesn’t have the money to do it. But he’s willing to do it if he can win something, and he smells blood in the water, and that’s what we are seeing him do.”
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