Our cause in Ukraine is inspiring. It probably won't stay that way.

[mia]

Will Zelensky be pressured into accepting an unjust negotiated settlement?

Biden will and must reject any measure that threatens to put U.S. troops in direct conflict with the Russians. The planet might not survive a World War III.

Past American presidents have enabled repressive regimes in the cause of containing Communism, tolerating assassinations and undercutting democracies along the way.

...In retrospect, it’s easy to see these allowances as misguided and shameful. But from the end of World War II to the fall of Communism, East and West did not come to all-out war, and not a single nuclear-armed missile was fired. You might say we avoided Armageddon at the cost of our collective conscience.

...It would be nice if Ukraine required no such painful calculations — if Putin would simply put his tanks in reverse and plead for economic mercy. But Biden must know that he needs to prepare the country for a more agonizing endgame. His job, in the best case, will be to make a negotiated outcome palatable abroad and at home.

If he does, count on this: Our much-needed sense of unity will be shattered overnight. Republicans will scream that Biden is the new Neville Chamberlain, while internationalists in the president’s party will complain that he walked away from human rights.

In that event, though, Biden will have checked Russian aggression without letting NATO get drawn into another world war. History tells us that in a showdown between nuclear powers, that’s what leadership is.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/03/13/biden-us-ukraine-lessons-cold-war/

[Walleye]

1. I'm really glad we have a president that doesn't basis decision on the whims of the populace

I doubt his popularity is ever any consideration in any of his decisions

[lees1975]

2. There's a lot of ignorance in this country

about the realities of international politics, as well as about how our own government and constitution operates. We are also a long way down the road from the horrors of World War 2, which we largely experienced from a distance. But it's only the older generation in Ukraine that still has childhood memories of being in the vortex of the worst part of the land war.

I wonder, really, how many people actually understand that if there's a nuclear conflict between Russia and the West, the government requiring them to wear a mask and get vaccinated won't matter.