Ukraine: My Current Half-Assed Guess

Current half-assed opinion/guess: a ceasefire is the least worst way forward (?).

   I guess conservatives were right again--they've been railing against this since nearly the beginning. I was and am skeptical of many of their reasons...but I now think that, ultimately, their preferred policy has turned out to be--or at least seem--right: get out.

   I can't agree with either the "fight to the last Ukrainian" position (though I was tempted by it for awhile. In the end, it's just too brutal.), nor the quasi-pro-Russian position on the right. I think we had to support Ukraine for awhile in order to raise the cost to Putin/Russia to intolerable levels. But, in the end, we can't afford any more $$, and Ukraine can't afford any more people. We raised the cost. Russia will think three times before trying such a thing again. But once Ukraine let Russia dig in, the thing was probably over. In fact, I'm not sure why, given all their years to prepare, Ukraine doesn't seem to have constructed the kinds of defensive lines that the Russians seemed to throw up in a few weeks or months...

   JMO.