Peace

It is time for some serious discussions about Ukraine. Putin has proposed that Ukraine cede 18% of its land in the Donbas area along with a guarantee that Ukraine will not be invited to join NATO and in return he will pull out of Ukraine. The West has proposed to spend the next ten years sending aid to Ukraine and an invitation to join NATO. The stage is set for a negotiated peace. Russia gets the Russian speaking areas in Ukraine (Donbas is 9% of Ukraine) and the West agrees not to allow Ukraine into NATO and Putin ends the war. This is the same deal that could have been the day the war started. In the past two years Ukraine has sustained $152 billion dollars in damage to the infrastructure including 210,000 buildings, 19,100 multifamily units and 142,800 single family homes. Additional damage to transportation, industry, energy and agriculture. The Ukrainian people have suffered 125,000 casualties while 6.5 million have left the country. 50% of Americans want to send aid to Ukraine, 70% want a negotiated settlement and 80% do not want to send troops to Ukraine and therein lies the rub. NATO started helping Ukraine because they feared that if Putin wasn't stopped he would bring back the old Soviet Union and take over all of Eastern Europe. However these same Americans do not want to sent US troops to Ukraine. The war has exposed the ineptness of the Russian military and cost them many lives and Putin is 71 and his country is in a serious demographic decline with 1.8 children per woman when 2.1 is needed to replace those who die. In addition 70,000 young men have died and 100,000 have been injured and 300,000 have left the country. It will be generation, if ever, before Russia recovers from this fiasco. NATO negotiators must set aside their ego's and get down the business of peace.