I agree that we should engage with reality as it currently exists. Davyd Arakhamia [1] is a Ukrainian member of parliament, in Zelensky's party. He was one of the negotiators early on with Russia. He stated that Russia's main demand was simply that Ukraine agree to not join NATO. Meduza has an article about it (which also links to the interview itself) here, as well as spin from various sides. [2] If you're unaware of the source Meduza is to Russia as MSNBC is to the Republican party. Here's his quote:
---
"They actually hoped until nearly the last moment that they could press us into signing this agreement, adopting neutrality. That was their biggest priority. They were willing to end the war if we took on neutrality, like Finland once did, and gave assurances that we wouldn’t join NATO. That was essentially the main point. Everything else was cosmetic and political embellishments about ‘denazification,’ the Russian-speaking population, blah blah blah"
---
He goes on to elaborate that the main reason they didn't agree to such is because (1) they didn't trust Russia and (2) Boris Johnson told them they should "just fight." And maybe Russia would have "really" invaded with the sort of logic you put forth in your post later on, but that was clearly not their goal in this invasion. Not joining NATO is hardly some Hitler level appeasement as our propaganda spins it.
Russia was paranoid about NATO, which has gradually been working to surround it with nuclear weapons, having a base setup in Ukraine which has a geographically clear path straight into Russia's heartland. And I don't find such paranoia particularly unreasonable. Countries that strongly turn against America tend to find death and destruction at their doorstep soon enough.
And none of this is to justify Russia's invasion, nor condemn Ukraine's decision to fight. Rather I emphasize that we live in a world that's a million shades of gray, even if propaganda from one side or the other invariably frame it as the clearest thing ever. And enough people will believe such unquestionably, ensuring war will be with us til our final days.
[1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Davyd_Arakhamia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Davyd_Arakhamia
[1] - https://meduza.io/en/feature/2023/11/28/we-had-to-buy-time https://meduza.io/en/feature/2023/11/28/we-had-to-buy-time
Your version of history entirely ignores the fact that Russia recently grabbed Donbas and then Crimea.
The root issue is the culture of fear among Russian leadership. They are constantly afraid that someone is trying to stab them in the back. (And they are often right, but the backstabber is usually another Russian leader.)
Because they live in fear, they cannot afford being trustworthy. And because they are not trustworthy, Russia's neighbors seek protection from other powers. Which in turn fuels the fears of Russian leadership.
Russia could break the cycle by stopping to be afraid. They could find role models in Europe. Germany, France, and the UK are all former major powers that started behaving like normal countries. With varying degrees of success.
Imagine Russia completely disarmed itself, destroyed all nuclear weapons, deposed its entire military, and all military weapons and production capability. Exactly how long do you think it would be before the US invaded? We might debate the timeline, but I don't think you can argue in good faith that they wouldn't be invaded.
But if you accept this then it becomes clear that trust is impossible. You have a power that wants to overthrow you surrounding you with military bases and pointing countless nuclear weapons at you. That, by the way, is also not necessary to maintain mutually assured destruction type deterrence. But it is necessary if you want to consider a rapid first-strike complete annihilation type attack, hitting them before they can return fire.
Of course, vice versa, imagine the US disarmed. They'd be invaded by like 80% of the world within a fortnight. Unfortunately I think the cycle is unbreakable. I don't think there's anybody that actually likes war, but it's been with us since the advent of civilization, and I expect it to remain with us til the end of civilization.
I find this summary https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/did-ukraine-miss-an-early-chance-to-negotiate-peace-with-russia/ar-AA1mug8o https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/did-ukraine-miss-an-ear... pretty convincing. It basically says that the massacres of Bucha and the disastrous Russian performance in their attack on Kyiv are the reason that Ukraine did not negotiate a seize fire. Plus, while Russia started very tough in the negotiations, after their Kyiv convoy broke down they basically agreed to everything. If you know anything about Russian military history, you know that this means they wanted to use negotiations to consolidate their forces and try again better prepared.
We in the western world tend to see such conflicts like a game/puzzle where there is always a winning door that leads to happiness for all participants. Since there are only two choices and the current situation is bad, Ukraine must have made the wrong choice and we would be living happily ever after, if they only had agreed to a deal.
Needless to say that Putin loves to play on this mindset by saying all the things all the time. There will always be many groups in the west that will pick out quotes to bolster their favorite narrative and ignore the rest.
> Russia was paranoid about NATO, which has gradually been working to surround it with nuclear weapons, having a base setup in Ukraine which has a geographically clear path straight into Russia's heartland. And I don't find such paranoia particularly unreasonable.
Sorry, I find it unlikely that even you believe this line of reasoning.
Russia has the largest nuclear arsenal in the world. It is delusional to think that Russia is remotely at risk for a Iraq/Libya/Yugoslavia type situation.
Russia might not like its neighbors joining NATO, but maybe they wouldn't feel the need if being Russia's neighbor didn't suck so much?
In any case, Russia's actions in the last decade culminating with February 2022 have essentially convinced all post-1989 NATO inductees that it was the right move.
You need to look at the world probabilistically and over an extended period of time, not just try to guess what will immediately happen and go with that. The United States is still longing for global hegemony, when it's increasingly clear such is no longer possible. That creates a very dangerous situation, especially when we seem to keep picking rather poor leaders who lack much in the way of competence or foresight.
There's also simply misreading other leaders' intentions. If the US does not believe that Putin would respond to a conventional attack with nuclear weapons, then that also dramatically increases the chances of such an attack. And in fact one could argue that we're currently trying to probe how Russia would respond to slowly escalating types of provocations.
There's also the future. As we enter into a multipolar world it's possible the dollar could collapse, which could create unimaginable chaos. Russia could have some degree of turmoil once Putin permanently leaves office, which could be seen as an opportunity for the US. We might even develop a means of completely mitigating nuclear weapons, and so on. And so Russia is going to be looking at scenarios probabilistically. You're absolutely right the chances of the US trying to directly invade are extremely low, but they are also nowhere near 0. And that's in the current state. Who knows what the future holds? And once a country is right there, in NATO, it's there 'forever'.
----
Like try to take yourself back to WW1. Tensions were of course very high, but try to imagine what you'd think would happen if a Bosnian Serb (with secret state backing) assassinated an Austro-Hungarian royal. Would you expect to see Brits killing Germans over it, and tens of millions of people being killed? It just seems like a highly improbable outcome, to say the least. And in fact we could be living in a timeline where some 0.00001% probability event played out, and has completely shaped our world ever since. Such things can, and will, continue to happen - history makes this clear.
Russia promised not to invade and then invaded, then promised not to invade, then invaded, then promised not to invade, then invaded, then promised not to invade Ukraine. Did the same trick for all former parts of Russian Empire, including Poland, Baltic States, Finland, etc.
Let's take this as a given, which it isn't. Calling actions of people like e.g. Stalin, a Georgian leader of the USSR, simply "Russia" is not entirely reasonable, but whatever. It's inconsequential. We'll not only take it as a given, but also assume that Ukraine knew, without any doubt, that if they sign this agreement then Russia will come marching in and try to "really" invade them in 5 years.
The point remains is that this war was a choice. They could fight now, or not. Ukraine could have, instead, spent the next 5 years setting up an unprecedented series of defense in depth series of barriers around the border, akin to what Russia did when preparing for the Ukrainian counter-attack. This was not an obligatory war for self existence, but a choice - a choice made at the urging of the West.
Ultimately I think the complete catastrophe this war has turned into is largely due to multiple miscalculations. Russia obviously thought they were 'ambushing' Ukraine and would be easily able to impose their demands. And the US/UK, in turn, thought they were 'ambushing' Russia and would be easily able to impose their demands. There's some extreme parallels with WW1, where I think everybody thought they were going to be able to go in and just finish the job pretty cleanly. If those nations could have seen out outcome they were signing up for (win or lose), WW1 would have never happened. And I think the same is true here.
So that leads me to wonder then, what is the future that we're signing up for now 5 years or another decade down the line? Does what sound good today, instead lead to regrets tomorrow? And that consideration is what drives my views, today.
> if they sign this agreement then Russia will come marching in and try to "really" invade them in 5 years.
5 weeks. Typical Russian tactics is to invade, then call for peace, then reinforce area, perform ethnical cleansing, solve problem with logistic, then blame other side for something and invade again.
> Ukraine could have, instead, spent the next 5 years setting up an unprecedented series of defense in depth series of barriers around the border
We spent 5 years preparing our defenses, spending 5% of GPD on that, BUT huge border with RF (1974 km) and Belarus + shore (1500 km) are not easy or cheap to reinforce. Ukraine has the largest border in Europe between two countries.
> This was not an obligatory war for self existence, but a choice - a choice made at the urging of the West.
LOL
"Talk peace, make war" is not a strategy Putin invented, and to confirm this all you need is a cursory reading of the history of Hitler's foreign policy, appeasement, etc. Of course NATO membership is, at first, "all Putin wanted" - after achieving that he can defer conquest of Ukraine until a time of his choosing, time is on his side to reform his army and try again. In fact, NATO membership is an existential necessity for Ukraine, the only possible way it can have a peaceful and stable life alongside a huge irredentist/fascist state next door. Nothing is possible without meaningful security and deterrence.
All that feigned "paranoia about NATO" talk is trivially invalidated by the fact that Finland joined NATO, it was obvious that Finland would join NATO no matter the outcome of the Ukraine invasion, and it's obvious that Putin understood this. The only threat NATO poses is to Russia's ability to re-colonize its neighbours.