To decode what President Putin had to say today and assess the state of play of all this diplomacy, we turn now to two longtime Russia watchers.

Thomas Graham served on the National Security Council staff during the George W. Bush administration and at the State and Defense Departments.

He's now a distinguished fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations.

And Andrew Weiss is a former

State Department official who served in the George H.W. Bush and Clinton administrations.

He's now the vice president for studies at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Welcome to you both gentlemen. Andrew, I'll start with you. You heard President Putin say

he's open to proposals to stop the ceasefire, but he has questions. What's your read on what he's

doing here? Does he actually want a ceasefire? I think Vladimir Putin's going out of his way not to

taunt the West. He's trying to look reasonable. He's trying to avoid irritating Donald Trump,

who's obviously invested his own personal prestige and trying to bring about a ceasefire.

But Vladimir Putin's in an uncomfortable position.

He's essentially been wrong-footed by the diplomacy that we saw in Saudi Arabia earlier this week.

And now he's the one who looks like he doesn't want peace.

He's the one who wants to impose conditions on any ceasefire.

Thomas Graham, what's your take on this?

And we should note you were in Moscow recently.

So how are you decoding what President Putin had to say?

Well, I pretty much agree with what Andrew has just said.

You know, Putin is under, feels under no pressure to bring this war to an early settlement. He has his demands. He thinks that he is

winning on the battlefield. He sees the problems that Ukraine has. So he's prepared to drag

these out with discussions about his conditions. The only thing that gives him pause is that

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