Video: Sen. Tim Kaine Explains Why “No-Fly Zone” Could Lead to “much broader war which we are trying to avoid”

Speaking this morning with Ali Velshi of MSNBC, Sen. Tim Kaine said the following:

• Ukrainian President Volodomir Zelenskyy will “get more than he’s getting right now…We are likely to approve an additional $5-$8 billion of military aid in the next couple of weeks, and this is aid that’s very, very critical to the Ukrainian forces as they battle…Russian aircraft, Russian tanks, et cetera. We’re going to do a lot more.”
• “We’ve done no-fly zones before. We tend to do it in areas where there’s not contested airspace…This is very contested airspace. the Russian air force is one of the most powerful in the world, and there’s probably no way to do or announce a no-fly zone without it involving direct combat between the U.S. and Russian aircraft and that can escalate it to a much, much broader war which we are trying to avoid. We want to end this war and not escalate it.”
•  The difference between giving Ukrainians weaponry vs. a no-fly zone is “really the direct involvement of U.S. troops.”
• The aid package to Ukraine will have a “mixture” of weapons “that is most potent in helping the Ukrainian defense force.”
• “The direct involvement of U.S. troops…Russia would sort of like to paint this as the U.S. against Russia and shift the focus away from illegal Russian invasion of a sovereign nation. We need to keep the eyes of the world on Russia as the sole
  cause of the war and do everything we can to undercut
  Vladimir Putin even at home…We’ve got to keep the focus on their misbehavior. Part of him would like it to escalate into something broader. I don’t think that’s in Ukraine’s interest or in ours.”