This is very delusional thinking. Imagine trying to negotiate with the winning side and your minimum negotiating conditions are for the winning side to just abandon all of their gains for no discernible reason. This too while the winning side offers generous terms which still leave Ukraine with access to ports and most of its territory, despite Ukraine being in a desperate situation now.
It is even more farcical when consider that these demands are already the de facto conditions. Russia holds most of the territories it is demanding. There are no current plans for Ukraine to join NATO as NATO doesn’t accept members already active in war, and the NATO countries have no actual plan for either shoring up Ukraine’s security in the future or even for rebuilding. The closest NATO states got was trying to use $50 billion from Russian funds to loan to Ukraine for rebuilding, which they didn’t even go through with because the deal involved the EU taking all of the risk while benefiting the Americans.
In fact, ending the conflict now on Putin’s recent terms is more beneficial to Ukraine and NATO than it is to Russia, even if the conflict were to start up again in the future. The returning Ukrainian refugees will restore Ukraine’s manpower, and the NATO militaries will gain the time needed to restock weapon supplies, which they need more than the Russians do because Russian (and allied) military production is higher than that of NATO in volume.
I am of the opinion that the terms Putin has offered are cynically generous. He knows that the west won’t let Ukraine end the conflict right now, so he can afford to boost his image right now. In later negotiations, he can point back to these terms and tell the Ukrainians that if they wanted better terms, they could have gotten them earlier.
This is very delusional thinking. Imagine trying to negotiate with the winning side and your minimum negotiating conditions are for the winning side to just abandon all of their gains for no discernible reason. This too while the winning side offers generous terms which still leave Ukraine with access to ports and most of its territory, despite Ukraine being in a desperate situation now.
It is even more farcical when consider that these demands are already the de facto conditions. Russia holds most of the territories it is demanding. There are no current plans for Ukraine to join NATO as NATO doesn’t accept members already active in war, and the NATO countries have no actual plan for either shoring up Ukraine’s security in the future or even for rebuilding. The closest NATO states got was trying to use $50 billion from Russian funds to loan to Ukraine for rebuilding, which they didn’t even go through with because the deal involved the EU taking all of the risk while benefiting the Americans.
In fact, ending the conflict now on Putin’s recent terms is more beneficial to Ukraine and NATO than it is to Russia, even if the conflict were to start up again in the future. The returning Ukrainian refugees will restore Ukraine’s manpower, and the NATO militaries will gain the time needed to restock weapon supplies, which they need more than the Russians do because Russian (and allied) military production is higher than that of NATO in volume.
I am of the opinion that the terms Putin has offered are cynically generous. He knows that the west won’t let Ukraine end the conflict right now, so he can afford to boost his image right now. In later negotiations, he can point back to these terms and tell the Ukrainians that if they wanted better terms, they could have gotten them earlier.