tl;dr Ukraine could have withdrawn their interest in NATO, which Putin wanted them to do. This is nonsense. It's not like Putin needed an excuse to invade. He

tl;dr Ukraine could have withdrawn their interest in NATO, which Putin wanted them to do. This is nonsense. It's not like Putin needed an excuse to invade. He had already annexed a large chunk of the country and was actively waging war in it for 8 years. Ukraine could have avoided this war, but what would Putin have done after that? How could they then avoid returning to a neo-Soviet Union?