Alexander Vindman, a Ukrainian immigrant best known for his award-winning role as the star witness in the first Trump impeachment trial, told NBC's "Morning Joe" on Wednesday that it is probably too late to avoid war with Russia in Ukraine. "These things are already moving," he said. "It's almost certain that this is going to occur, and now is the time to take those last-minute steps." "This is the time" to send weapons to Ukraine, Vindman said. "Doing more now is less escalatory than options we have to execute in the middle of February after this unfolds, after Russian blood starts to flow... on Ukrainian soil." Vindman serves as a colonel in the <i>United States</i> military, though he was asked by Ukraine to serve as minister of defense. "Doing more now potentially prevents this," he said. "Now, it's almost certain this is going to occur, and now is the time to take those last-minute steps, position troops, again, to defend European allies, to send the message that Russia's precipitating this." <blockquote>ALEXANDER VINDMAN: I think it's more than a semantics game, and more, I think simply put, yielding to Russian demands is not going to end this. Because Ukraine is making progress on its own. Because Ukraine is becoming more of a sovereign, independent state, has grown multi-capabilities, has a consolidation of national identity. All of these guarantees, all they do is offer to Putin this idea that he could act with impunity. He could still conduct this military operation in spite of all these guarantees because he doesn't end at the threat with guarantees. He ends the threat through achieving a failed state in Ukraine. Why is this important to the American public? It's important because we're about to have the largest war in Europe since World War II. There's going to be a massive deployment of air power, long-range artillery, cruise missiles, things that we haven't seen unfold on the European landscape more than 80 years, and it is not going to be a clean or sterile environment. <b>We know that Eastern European allies want to help. We have the UK offering both training and weapons to Ukrainians.</b> It's not going to end just simply with Russia attacking Ukraine. There's a very good possibility that other European allies do get pulled in, and this means there's an increased threat of a confrontation between Ukraine and the NATO alliance, Ukraine and the U.S. This is what we're trying to avoid. That's why this administration needs to take such a firm position to defend U.S. interests, to avoid a confrontation that this massive confrontation that draws the U.S. in. That's why they need to be talking about more than the diplomacy, which has been highly ineffective with Russia. Largely effective in bringing coherence to the U.S. and to allies, both on sanctions, on the kinds of support that we're prepared to offer Ukraine, but not nearly potent enough with regards to the pressure track... Offering troops to Eastern European allies. These are where our obligations lie. Posture changes reassuring them -- what happens when they do attack, that they're actually precipitating this kind of security dilemma, the positioning of troops. More weapons in Ukraine to further deter them -- and really sanctions. This Menendez bill introduced last week is maybe one of the most potent tools we have right now to avoid this confrontation. It's so encompassing and broad, it includes things like Lend-Lease to get even more potent capabilities to the Ukrainians. This is what Russia is causing. Their entirety may have a small chance of affecting the Russian calculus. I doubt it at this point. We're almost locked into a course of action. WILLIE GEIST, NBC NEWS: Wow, Colonel Vindman, you said we're locked in a course of action. Kind of answered my question. You've seen a lot of this. You've seen these threats. Seen Russia and Putin deliver on these threats before, sometimes to back away from them. So on the spectrum of what you've seen and studied in your career, how seriously are you taking this threat from Putin, and if he does cross that line and go into Ukraine, what happens from there? What's the United States role? ALEXANDER VINDMAN: More likely than not, we're actually likely to see this massive offensive against Ukraine unfold in February, in the coming weeks. The last pieces of the puzzle are coming together with force flows, both in terms of putting the forces in place for a multivector attack from the North, East, and South. We see the troop presence to fall in, the equipment arrives, when we see the last-minute rehearsals come into place, when we see logistics come into place. These things are already moving. Basically, the entire military package to conduct this operation. So I think we're, we're, like I said, just days, weeks, away from seeing this offensive. The U.S. options become significantly worse after the offensive than they are even today. They were better two weeks ago, several months ago. Some of those options were foreclosed or delayed with the expectation this may have been just a bout of diplomatic coercion. Now it's almost certain this is going to occur, and now is the time to take those last-minute steps, position troops, again, to defend European allies, to send the message that Russia's precipitating this. It is much better to do that now when out of a war, when we're out of a major fight in Ukraine, than when there's already a major fight going in, and then U.S. presence starts to flow into Eastern Europe. It's a lot more provocative and escalatory. Same thing with weapons. This is the time to provide weapons. Better to do it weeks or months ago. You'll get some limited gains. Not change Russia's calculus, to put additional weapons, defensive lethal aid into Ukraine. Better to do it now than flow additional weapons in when fighting starts. That's when it becomes more escalatory. Doing more now potentially prevents this.</blockquote>