I trust Trump about as far as I can throw him, and at the end of the day it's really the Pentagon calling the shots here not the POTUS.

But dudes clearly speaking to a public sentiment here.

  • JerkyChew@lemmy.one
    ·
    5 months ago

    Read between the lines based on his past behavior. "Getting it settled" means "Just give everything to Putin". It's like solving the gay marriage debate by just taking away gay marriage.

    • MarxMadness@lemmygrad.ml
      ·
      5 months ago

      Any settlement Russia will take is one that will be favorable to Russia, because Russia is winning. They've been winning for a while and there's no likely way that will change. Ukraine will lose some now or lose more later.

      Insisting on even a neutral settlement (much less one that will punish Russia, which is Zelensky's stance) is not a serious negotiating position. It'd be like Germany in 1917 insisting on a favorable outcome; if you lose a war you don't get to win the peace.

      • HakFoo@lemmy.sdf.org
        ·
        5 months ago

        The Western/UA policy always read to me like the highly evolved philosophical and political understanding you'd see in a second-grade classroom.

        It doesn't matter how impractical it might be, or how much long term resentment it stokes: we have to punish Timmy Putin for stealing Steven's toy truck reclaiming the Donbass and Crimea because bullying territorial realignment is Inherently Wrong.

        I suspect any non-military attempt to move the line would have been equally rebuffed; any vote to secede would be "rigged", any buyout offer rejected.

        The West seems to be profoundly terrified of moving lines on the map in the modern era. Look how long it took to deliver South Sudan, and how Somaliland struggles for legitimacy. Their ability to arbitrate the borders is a symbol of their dominance; once they no longer call the shots, everything is on the table, like fixing an Africa and Middle East full of arbitrary caprice, or finally telling the pipsqueaks in Taipei to stuff it.

      • FunkyStuff [he/him]
        ·
        5 months ago

        Putin is a Nazi memorial collector and he knows he can easily get the most impressive collection of statues of SS war criminals if he just takes all of Ukraine's land.

    • edge [he/him]
      ·
      edit-2
      5 months ago

      What kind of peace deal would you not count as “just give everything to Putin”?

      What kind of peace deal do you think should happen?

      What kind of peace deal do you think is realistically possible at this point?

    • ThomasMuentzner [he/him, comrade/them]
      ·
      edit-2
      5 months ago

      i post you some pictures to be first confused about .

      Show
      Show
      Show

      Then i will ask you if you Recognice the USA as independent or as a Subjekt of the Crown of Britian ?