Steve, you say that this -- this guy is not the rank imperialist and rank dictator we see him as. Explain why he isn't those things.

STEPHEN F. COHEN, PROFESSOR EMERITUS, NEW YORK UNIVERSITY AND PRINCETON UNIVERSITY: Nor is he, as Secretary Albright and Professor Brzezinski suggested, Hitler with their references to Munich.

Putin is not a thug. He's not a neo-Soviet imperialist who's trying to create -- recreate the Soviet Union. He's not even anti- American.

What he is is intensely historically pro-Russian. He's been in power nearly 14 years. And his mission, as he sees it and many Russians see it, is to restore Russia from the disaster of 1991, the collapse of the Russian state.

Remember that was the second time in the 20th century that the Russian state had collapsed, the first time in 1917. So to recreate stability, prosperity, greatness, whatever that means in Russia at home and, in the process, restore Russia's traditional zones of national security on its borders, that means Ukraine as well.

He did not create this Ukrainian crisis. It was imposed on him and he had no choice to react. That's where we stand today.