Russia offers immediate cease fire
Quite simply, recognition of the separatist regions and Ukrainian neutrality enshrined in its constitution. It’s the best deal Ukraine can expect, and really nothing for Ukraine to lose it will not lose anyway.
Russia offer terms for peace
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Tidewater News and Opinion Forum 
So, this is how we achieve “Peace for our time?”
The people of Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Finland, and Sweden might wonder about that.
Total surrender has to be tempting. But is the offer a humanitarian gesture or is it Putin desperately trying to save himself? Since he does not have a humanitarian bone in his body, I think it might well be the later.
Whatever Ukraine decides to do, all current sanctions and more need to stay in place until Putin is removed from office and Russia has a legitimate government.
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Wow, you really just aren’t capable of minding your own business, and don’t think the country should either.
Unless you’re going to pick up a rifle, or send your daughter to do so, leave the choice to those with skin in the game.
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Are you just stupid?
Is this phrase too complicated for you?
“Whatever Ukraine decides to do. . .”
Unlike you people, I have not pushed a preferred course for Ukraine to follow.
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Coming from the same country that referred to its invasion as a “demilitarization operation”? The same country that has agreed to cease fires to allow for humanitarian evacuations and aid only to break it less than three hours later? The same country who is allowing evacuations, but ONLY to Russia and Belarus? (Where none of the refugees have a desire to go)
Talk about taking things with a grain of salt.
Two of the four appear acceptable. However, asking Ukraine to stop defending itself while Russians continue to attack is backwards. Demanding a country change its Constitution to meet Putin’s desires is questionable.
And what promises are there that Putin will not use the separatist areas to launch ANOTHER attack in the future to attempt to “reunite” Ukraine with Russia?
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What were our terms to the Germans and Japanese at the end ofWW2 other than immediate demilitarization?
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Uh, THEY attacked us. We did not attack them.
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Germany did not attack us. It declared war because of its mutual defense treaty with Japan.
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“Germany did not attack us”
Yeah, sure. Tell that to the families of American sailors and seaman who died in the Atlantic BEFORE December 7, 1941. For example, the “Ruben James,” a destroyer, was sunk by a U-Boat torpedo on October 31, 1941 with loss of 100 American sailors. It was protecting American cargo vessels which were also the targets of German attacks.
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Germany acted within the rules of war. It declared a proscribed zone in the Eastern North Atlantic where shipping to England would be regarded as carrying war supplies and would be sunk.
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“Germany acted within the rules of war.”
Without further quibbling about the legality of Germany attacking our ships, I will simply re-state the point. We were NOT the aggressors in World War 2. We were attacked. The Russians ARE the aggressors in this war. Your justifying their demands based on how we wrapped up WW2 is specious.
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What makes an aggressor?
Germany was certainly the aggressor in Europe.
But not against us. By providing arms and ammunition o England on credit, we became a part of England’s war. Sending those supplies was participation. Similarly, our arming of Ukraine and especially, backfilling Poland’s air defenses, are participation in that war.
This is dangerous. What happens when Russia shoots down a cargo plane delivering arms?
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“What happens when Russia shoots down a cargo plane delivering arms?”
Then they probably will have violated Polish airspace. Just a rhetorical answer to your rhetorical question.
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Not a rhetorical question.
Those planes are doing the same thing ships were doing prior to our entry into the war in Europe.
You’re a Navy guy, is my description of the German actions against shipping prior to Germany’s declaration of war against us not historically accurate?
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Not denying that. I just think your support for the invasion and subjugation of a free people is wrong.
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So? Does my opinion change the situation on the ground?
From another point of view(not necessarily one I accept) the people of the Crimea and Donbas were being oppressed and denied their freedom.
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“From another point of view(not necessarily one I accept) the people of the Crimea and Donbas were being oppressed and denied their freedom.”
Really? You don’t accept it but yet you continually used it as justification for the current invasion? Confused much, Don?
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I guess i didn’t make the point well.
Whether I personally accept the allegation or not is irrelevant to the issue. I don’t really know if the Ukrainians treated them badly or if they just didn’t think they were getting their fair share of the area’s resources.
Either way, they claim they were second class citizens and their claim should be considered.
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You have made the point clear on more than one occasion. Now you are trying to walk it back.
So “claims” of “possible” unfair treatment is reason enough to justify an invasion? What happened to the “genocide” you claimed to be occurring? Another walk back?
Your lack of condemnation continues to make me wonder what happened to the freedom loving Dr. Donald Tabor, DDS I enjoy sparring with.
By the way, BLM has their backs on the second class citizen claim. 😇
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Putin is in a serious bind. Pressure from his oligarchs, massive unrest among his citizens and crippling sanctions. Add in humiliating defeats on the battlefield and it seems to be face-saving time in Moscow.
Perhaps Crimea is a chip the Ukrainians can lose. Non-alignment can be negotiated. Donbas as puppets might be doable with the promise of a vote to secede or not.
The sticking point is probably the demand to stop fighting unilaterally. The counter would be contingent upon Russia withdrawal. Trouble is the same logistical nightmare would impede the movement of tanks, armored vehicles, artillery and men in the opposite direction.
Putin can lie to his people but for so long. At least if he told them they “won” with concessions, he might save face, a huge deal for autocrats.
A delicate dance that involves realpolitik as much as power.
News at 11.
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Zalensky should accept the offer.
More importantly, the U.S. should accept it.
Ending the suffering of the Ukrainian people is the most important objective. The cease fire terms are not so onerous as to justify continued suffering.
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“More importantly, the U.S. should accept it.”
Only IF Ukraine accepts it.
And whether they do or not, extreme sanctions against Russia and its rulers should stay in place until Putin is removed from office and replaced by a legitimate government. Criminal behavior – whether a “success” or not – should be severely punished.
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RE: “extreme sanctions against Russia and its rulers should stay in place until Putin is removed from office and replaced by a legitimate government.”
I don’t support that. Let the Russian people decide Putin’s fate for themselves.
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Seeing as Putin has this really bad habit of arresting or attempting to assassinate his political opponents, what would you have the Russian people do?
Besides, they are fed the lies and propaganda daily and don’t even believe that Ukraine is is being bombed towards oblivion.
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RE: “what would you have the Russian people do?”
It is not for me to say or to fantasize about.
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“It is not for me to say or to fantasize about.”
But you can tell the Ukrainians they should accept the current offer from Russia (Putin) without condition?
DO you realize how hypocritical that is? Or am I just staing the obvious?
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RE: “DO you realize how hypocritical that is?”
Where is the hypocrisy? The U.S. has a stake in the resolution of this conflict.
Besides, calling me a hypocrite is to engage in irrelevancy.
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You tell the Ukrainians what to do, but not the same for the Russians. It is obvious which side of this invasion you fall on.
I answered your “fantasy” question and then pointed out the hypocrisy in your answer.
Whether or not it is relevant is what is truly irrelevant. You spoke out of both sides and your keyboard. My pointing out the obvious is just a reminder to you that people pay attention to what you say. And call you out for it.
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“Let the Russian people decide Putin’s fate for themselves.”
I am all for that.
They should have the choice – be pariahs and an autarky or keep Putin as their dictator. It is up to them.
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“More importantly, the U.S. should accept it.”
It is not an offer to the US; we are not involved on the battlefield.
Maybe to you the terms are not onerous. But you are not Ukrainian, nor are you in a position to decide what is best for them.
As I said in my original reply to the post: Some is doable. Trusting Putin to follow-thru is dangerous to living things in Ukraine.
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RE: “It is not an offer to the US; we are not involved on the battlefield.”
I think we are, although not officially.
I believe Zelensky is a CIA stooge. He should stop listening to his American contacts and think for himself with the interests of his people being the foremost consideration. Barring that, the U.S. should accept the terms on offer and counsel Zelensky to accept them.
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“I believe Zelensky is a CIA stooge.”
Hmmm. Interesting.
You also believe. . .
Team Trump did not collude with Russia in 2016.
Donald Trump had the 2020 election stolen from him.
Covid vaccines are killing people by the hundreds of thousands.
The attempted violent overthrow of the election did not happen.
President Biden is secretly wealthy from corrupt earnings.
I could go on, but you get the idea.
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That’s too funny: You are stating your own beliefs, not mine.
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Really? You have indicated EVERYTHIING that Paul listed and more. SO calling your belief of Zelensky being a “stooge” for anyone is laughable.
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“That’s too funny?”
Are you losing it? Long COVID maybe?
Each of these cockamamie beliefs are things you have stated repeatedly and defended strongly. Or have you forgotten?
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RE: “Each of these cockamamie beliefs are things you have stated repeatedly and defended strongly.”
No, they are YOUR interpretations of things I have written, which makes it doubly useless to continue trading comments with you. Your beliefs about my beliefs are of no interest to me.
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You don’t like how people interpret your words? Too bad. Unless you can defend them, then maybe you should rethink them,
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Isn’t that the whole point of debate on a forum like this? State a position, support it after rebuttal. If the rebuttal is in error, it can either be your description being vague or puzzling or the reader misunderstanding. Or a disputed fact or position by some other source.
Whenever I state my point, responses don’t always reflect what I thought I wrote.
But, I might be wrong. Been there before and I’m sure I will be there again.
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RE: “Isn’t that the whole point of debate on a forum like this?”
No, it isn’t.
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Interesting. So what is the point of a forum like this one?
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For him to tell all of us how wrong we are?
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Criticism of U.S. policy towards Russia does not mean that Zelensky is a CIA stooge. Just another slander that you cannot back up.
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RE: “So what is the point of a forum like this one?”
I’d like to think the point is to debate in a reasonable manner. For example, I stated an opinion that Zelensky is a “CIA stooge.” It would have been reasonable to ask what I meant by that, or to counter with an opinion that Zelensky is something else. Mr. Murphy chose the unreasonable option of attacking all my past opinions.
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You think incorrectly. It is not a choice for the US to make.
But you keep up your “stooge” fantasy. Larry, Moe, Curly (and even Shemp) are happy to be remembered.
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If you want to understand why I think Zelensky is a CIA stooge, here’s a video you can watch.
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Deja vu. Most of I listened to was a reapeat of an earlier post I wrote on another thread. The current situation is a result of a US ba c ked coup agsinst a Russisn leaning lead r r of Ukraine.
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Since when is a democratic election a coup? The Ukrainian people voted out a Putin puppet freely and fairly. US support of leadership that wants to be more Western that Russian is not a bad thing. How many times has the US supported certain leadership in Israel?
Unless you are Putin who has delusions that a truly DEFENSIVE alliance is some sort of threat to his power.
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If the US keeps up its current stance and follows the hard left demand to keep sanctions in place no matter what, Biden had better open the Keystone pipeline and withdraw all gas and oil moratoriums ASAP. Even California and the entire west coast will flip to Republican if gas continues its climb past $7/gal over there. Biden and the Dems are really in a pickle right now…
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Russian provides about 3% of our imported oil. Oil is a global commodity. We both export and import oil for a variety of reasons. One of them is that all oil is not the same. Texas benchmark crude is sweet and clean, Canadian is not, for example. We are still exploring and leasing and I believe our oil production has increased in the last year.
In 2008, gas reached $5.50 in today’s dollars. Last price I saw here yesterday was $3.79 at Costco. No one like to pay more for anything, but the whole world is going through the same as us, worse in many cases.
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All exploration on federal land and seas has been cut off by Biden. That means ZERO exploration in the ocean. If we are so independent of Russian oil, why the extreme price hikes? According to you we should be immune from the loss of Russian oil.
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Oil is a global commodity. We don’t set prices, we export and import.
Last November, Biden opened 80 million acres in the Gulf for new leases.
https://www.cnn.com/2021/11/17/politics/biden-oil-gas-leasing-gulf-of-mexico-climate/index.html
The Keystone Pipeline XL, the final phase from Canada would not have been finished until 2023 at the earliest. Biden may have halted that part, but money was also an issue for the investors.
In other words, it made zero difference in our current gas supplies.
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In other words, Mr. Smith is wrong. Again.
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One of the much maligned Robert E Lee’s greatest acts was knowing when to quit.
When Petersburg fell, Jefferson Davis wanted Lee to fall back to the Shenandoah and fight a guerilla war. Instead, Lee surrendered at Appomattox, seeing that after Petersburg, there was no longer any hope of victory and it was then immoral to continue the killing on both sides.
Zelensky should follow that wisdom.
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RE: “Zelensky should follow that wisdom.”
Exactly right.
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So Zelensky should just give it all up and let Putin have his way with Ukraine?
I am of the opinion that ANY offer of peace from Putin should be treated with a grain of salt. Let him show the world how benevolent he is by ordering the withdrawal of all of his troops from the undisputed territories. Then we’ll see how peaceful he really wants to be.
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Not so sure that Putin has the whip hand in this invasion.
When we invaded Iraq, generals told Bush that he would need three times as many men as Rumsfeld was allotting. Not to defeat the Iraqi military, but to occupy the nation. We know how that went.
When Hitler invaded France, about the same size as Ukraine in population today, he did it with 3 million men.
(NB: My numbers are not exact, but the point still holds, IMO.)
The Russians have failed pretty miserably to achieve their objectives. And it does not look like they ever will. Hard to negotiate with a man who lies. Three times he has “offered” safe passage routes, only to bomb them as refugees started to leave. Why should anyone trust him, negotiate with him, believe him?
Lee and Grant were officers with a tradition of glory and loyalty with regards to warfare. Lee could trust Grant not to shoot him in the back after surrender.
This situation in Ukraine is just a power grab by a autocrat that has absolute power in his Mother Russia. Putin is sending his army, its conscripts and professionals into a meat grinder of present day Ukrainian seasoned warriors (they have been fighting Russians in Donbas for 8 years) as well as future insurgents. The top Russian general (Sergey Shoygu, a Defense Minister by title, but general in a uniform) in charge of this invasion was not even a soldier, but an appointed bureaucrat. He did secure Crimea through stealth and surprise. That was lost in this war.
Gulliver was a giant in the land of the Lilliputians, and he still lost.
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So far, the Russians have been careful to avoid high Ukranian casualties.
That forty mile convoy is still sitting on the highway. That is a lot of power held in check. If Russia starts to think it might lose, they will turn that lose. Absent air support, unrestricted tank warfare scrapes the land clean.
All this Pollyanna cheer leading is going to get a lot people killed for no gain.
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The forty mile convoy is bogged down for now.
The Russians may have avoided civilian targets the first few days, but they have been bombing and shooting apartment complexes and residential areas regularly for a week at least.
Then they “agree to a safe passage” and when folks take them for their word, they shoot them down.
You think surrender will save lives? Hardly. The insurgency will be a bloody mess. We’ve been there and Russia has too with both Afghanistan and Chechnya. Body bags from Kabul is what turned the tide at home for the then Soviet Union.
You think NATO nations that border Russia and Ukraine want to honor Putin’s intentions? Why should they? The Baltic states, along with Hungary, Poland, etc. know Putin and the old Soviet guard. They suffered under them for decades.
The US has not had the pleasure of entertaining foreign armies marching through our lands. We are pretty complacent about that, too. Europe knows war at the most brutal levels. I would at least concede expertise to them.
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Are Russia’s offered terms in any way worse than what all-out war there would bring?
Your speculation of what might happen there is just that.
Ukraine is not Vietnam, smothered in jungle, it is not Afghanistan with impenetrable mountain staging areas. It is cities and open fields. It is not a place for guerilla war.
Your cheerleading for continued war is going to get a lot of young men on both sides sent home to their mothers in bags.
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It is urban warfare, much more difficult than you imagine. Russia has looked into, and may already have done recruiting, to get Syrian mercenaries who have been doing urban battles for years.
PS: My “cheerleading” won’t result in any deaths or injuries. What kind of influence do you think I have? My opinion won’t affect Putin or Zelensky or Sam Magee. You are trying to blame me for deaths, but, sorry to disillusion, I have no power.
Again, we are so fortunate to have a country with only two borders and 4000 miles of ocean from the hotspots of the world. We have no clue what it is like to have armies marching through every few decades.
You want Ukraine to just lay down and give a megalomaniac his stepping stone to the rest of Eastern Europe. The folks who live over there are not like our phony militias. They have real history, real battles and real patriotism. And real enemies.
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Urban Warfare?
If Putin decides he could lose, he can just surround the cities with tanks and starve them out or if he’s in a hurry, level them with artillery.
There is no winning option for Ukraine.
No, your cheerleading alone isn’t going to do harm, but you and millions of others on both sides of the aisle who have watched “Red Dawn” too many times collectively are doing exactly that.
You keep Zelensky thinking that if he holds on a little longer we will come to his rescue. That false hope will at some point kill enough Russians that Putin will stop caring about the optics and treat this like a real war.
Ukraine is not a stepping stone, it’s a buffer between Russia and NATO. Putin wants a neutral Ukraine. He didn’t ask for an alliance with Russia, he asked for a constitutional commitment from Ukraine to not join any alliance.
There is no reason to think he wants to invade the NATO members on the other side of Ukraine. That would be insane, and Putin is a thug but a sane thug
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Red Dawn?? Movie? Video game?
What does it have to do with Ukraine? What is it for that matter.
I watched the interview with MacGregor on FOX. Either he is parroting you or you him. Almost word for word.
He has been on RT bolstering Putin since 2014.
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“Red Dawn” is a Patrick Swayze fantasy movie about a bunch of plucky teenagers driving off invading Cuban paratroopers.
Of course, paratroopers lack artillery and tanks.
No parroting. Any rational adult looking at the facts and not the spin would come to the same conclusion.
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You should go back and watch the movie again, seeing as it has been your go-to reference form early on wrt to reporting of the invasion. There was also Russian leadership and armor involved; it was not just the Cuban paratroopers.
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Yeah, the Cuban commander was trying to restrain the Russians. Not the point,
The idea that civilians who have a week’s training are going to go out and defeat the Russian military in set piece battles is just a fantasy that will get a lot of people killed to no advantage.
Romanticizing the Ukrainian resistance into superheroes is juvenile andn deadly.
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Not superheroes; just heroes defending their homeland from invaders. I would expect you to do the same if it were the US under attack.
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Big difference. US militia types(not just active members) have their own arms and are proficient with them, the Ukrainian civilians had never touched a rifle until they turned in their wooden training weapons for a real one.
Bravery only takes you so far.
Even in the US, we could not repel a mechanized invasion with civilians alone, we could just make the occupation really expensive.
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…”we could just make the occupation really expensive.”
You mean like the Ukrainians are doing now?
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Obstructing an invasion(which they claim to be doing) is not the same as harassing an occupation.
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It appears they will be quite capable of doing that if and when the times comes.
I have a lot more faith in my Ukrainian brothers and sisters than you do.
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…”the Ukrainian civilians had never touched a rifle until they turned in their wooden training weapons for a real ones”
And yet they are fighting like hell to protect their homeland. I wonder if the militia types in this country would be as rabid in the defense if they had tanks coming down their streets.
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…”he asked for a constitutional commitment from Ukraine to not join any alliance.”
And you believe him? And you expect Ukraine to believe him.
As I said yesterday, any offer from Putin really needs to be taken with a grain of salt (and possibly a lime and a shot of Patron)
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The only way to know is to accept the inevitable. Either Zelensky will accept or a puppet government installed after he and thousands of others are dead will.
Do I believe Putin? In this case, yes as it is in his best interests. He wants a buffer to NATO, not a war with it.
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Whether or not Zelensky accepts will not deter Putin form getting a puppet government installed, similar to the one the Ukrainian voters removed from power via the ballot box.
He wants a buffer from NATO for what reason? So he can rule over those countries that are not under the protection of the alliance. His goal is to rebuild the Russian empire to its former greatness. The people of the countries threatened by HIS expansion attempts want nothing to do with the failed Russian/Soviet history
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I did not know you knew Putin’s heart of hearts. Your analysis is based on?
I see no evidence he wants to control all of Ukraine in the long term.
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190,000 troops on the border to start an invasion is not evidence enough for you? I though all Putin wanted was to protect the ethnic Russians inn the disputed territories?
Didn’t need to surround the country on all sides possible to do and include his Belarusian friends in the party to accomplish what you said he wanted to do.
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“So far, the Russians have been careful to avoid high Ukranian casualties.”
That is pure Putin spin.
The fact is they sent relatively light units charging ahead on the misguided assumption that Ukraine would immediately collapse.
If you think that 40 mile convoy is some kind of military formation, then you are dead wrong. It is the result of incompetent military leadership where too much was committed to one route and too little thought given to supply. Again, the errors were based on the wrong belief that there would be little opposition.
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Sure.
The Russians are incompetent in open field tank warfare.
One thing is true, that convoy would not be there if Russia had not been confident they would eliminate Ukrainian air support in about an hour.
I don’t think you have any idea what Russia COULD be doing if it chose to.
Once again, no jungles, no mountains, Ukraine is not the place for a guerilla war. That’s why what is left of the Ukrainian military is hiding among the civilian population, they are totally defeated in the field.
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“The Russians are incompetent in open field tank warfare.”
Apparently, you are behind the times. Here in the 21st century, tanks are now death traps for determined infantry armed with anti-tank missiles. NATO has provided 17,000 of them including American Javelins and Swedish NLAW systems. In the last week alone.
Putin is busy spinning the Russian failure to achieve a quick and easy victory as being due to humanitarian restraint. It is an obvious LIE, but you have bought it or pretend to. Very odd.
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Tanks do not operate alone. They are supported by air reconnaissance using thermal imaging and air and artillery support. The shoulder fired ground to air missiles we provided have made helicopter support problematic and forced air support to drop from higher, but cluster munitions and thermobaric bombs make that effective and the Russians are big believers in artillery.
They know how to do this.
That’s why the Ukranian military is hiding among civilians, a war crime.
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“That’s why the Ukranian military is hiding among civilians, a war crime.”
More Putin propaganda. While he drops cluster bombs on civilians to intimidate the Ukrainian people, you help spread even more of his falsehoods. The war criminals are the Ukrainians. Wow! The first casualty of war is the truth as you demonstrate every day.
Even the WSJ is not buying this bullshit, but you do.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/russia-pummels-ukrainian-civilian-targets-ahead-of-talks-11646645852
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Are you denying that sheltering troops among civilians is a war crime?
Refer to the Col Macgregor interview.
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“That’s why the Ukranian military is hiding among civilians, a war crime.”
Hiding or there because that is where the fighting is? Not to mention all of the volunteers that have taken up arms (supplied by the government, by the way. You know the whole “well-regulated militia” thing) in defense of their homeland.
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Russia has been bypassing and isolating population centers. It has not yet attacked cities other than as a response to attacks from those locations.
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So Ukrainians should not be defending their country?
And I also think you have it backwards. Russians have been firing on population centers and in return receiving defending fire back.
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Who really knows? Both sides lie.
Ukrainians have been offered terms that are the best they are going to get. What can they gain by sending their own sons and Russian sons home in bags if the outcome is preordained?
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“Ukrainians have been offered terms that are the best they are going to get.”
Which should not be the case. The illegal and immoral invasion of a sovereign country is a despicable act of a delusional megalomaniac.
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Should or should not don’t really matter much.
How many die before the inevitable is accepted does.
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As many as They feel is necessary. Fighting to the bitter end may be counterproductive but it beats the hell out of being under the rule of a madman.
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“Are you denying that sheltering troops among civilians is a war crime?”
This a very gray area. Obviously. Unlike the indiscriminate bombardment of purely civilian targets as reported in the WSJ and others.
If a body of soldiers overpowered on the battlefield escapes to a city, is that a war crime? If civilians take up arms in a city to defend it, is that a war crime?
Maybe you should re-visit how Putin dealt with civilians in Chechnya before trying to blame others of war crimes based on very shaky interpretations?
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There is nothing shaky about it.
The Geneva Conventions require combatants to wear a distinctive uniform and to segregate themselves from civilian populations to spare them becoming legitimate collateral targets.
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“The Geneva Conventions”…
You mean the conventions that are being ignored by Putin and his army of the unwilling?
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Where has Russia violated the Geneva Conventions?
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Firing into to civilian areas. Bombing evacuation routes and humanitarian aid routes that they agreed to and then attacked.
Why is it you think only the Ukrainians, who did not ask for this war, are the ones violating conventions? Putin’s invasion is an affront to EVERY convention of the international order. But only the Ukrainians receive your wrath. Da, comrade?
Oh, right. Putin can do it because he’s Putin.
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…”Putin is sending his army, its conscripts and professionals”
Apparently he is also recruiting Syrians to help because they know urban warfare better tha2 Russian troops.
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Correct, Doctor.
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