Let’s say Biden calls up Putin, and says, “Hey man, get out, out of Ukraine. If you do, we and the rest of the west will drop all sanctions against you, give you back any prisoners or spies that you want freed, and remove these missile bases near your borders.”
Would that be betraying the Ukrainian people by cutting them out of the process?
IMHO? Yes.
ETA: If he asked Zelenskyy first if it was alright to make that call and got the okay? No problem.
ETA part II: Mind you, I’m not saying the US has to mindlessly support everything Ukraine does. It’s a free actor. If Zelenskyy says the war won’t end until Putin’s head is on a spike and every Russian soldier is blinded except for 1 in 100, I’d be fine with Biden saying “that’s a bit too much, you’re on your own with that.”
But in terms of anything having to do with how Ukraine re-arranges its borders within the scope of the pre-2014 boundaries, I think the US should only step in if asked.
Okay.
I think the Ukrainian people may feel differently when Russia leaves their lands.
Do you think that Zelensky would say no?
I didn’t say cut them out of the picture, just out of the actual process of negotiation, because they have nothing to bring to the table. When someone says that the conditions should be amenable to the people, that does mean that you ask if those are conditions they are amenable to.
Yeah, but that’s the only way the war ends if we refuse to negotiate. Well, unless we stop supporting Ukraine because it becomes the belligerent, in which case Russia comes back and crushes it.
Peace is, IMHO, preferable to either of those options.
Okay, say Putin calls Biden, and says, “We stop war and leave Crimea, if you end sanctions, give back my spies, and remove missile sites.”
Does Joe need to get permission from Zelenskyy to agree to those terms?
Permission? No. I mean this is in the realm of fantasy, as this wouldn’t happen. But Ukraine would be well within their right to say “no” as well and refuse to stop fighting. Not that they would - it would be a decent deal for everyone except Putin which is why Putin is so very unlikely to do it.
What I would expect Biden to do, more realistically in this fantasy scenario 
, is to tell Putin that he’ll get back to them in twenty minutes, call up Zelenskyy and excitedly explain the offer and have Zelenskyy to respond that Putin is obviously drunk, but sure as long as they retreat first.
I mean, it’s a win-win (except for Putin). But the folks fighting a defensive war shouldn’t be the subject to paternalistic demands by Big Brother to just do what they’re told like good little combatants. They have the right to self-determination. If, more realistically, Putin called Biden and said “hey, we’ll turn everything back to pre-2022, keeping Crimea and just the eastern halves of Luhansk and Donetsk”, Ukraine would be well within their rights to say “fuuuucccckkkk you” and the US should continue to back them on that (IMO, anyway).
It worked for Neville Chamberlain.
It’s unlikely to play out quite that simply, but at this point, Putin needs something to call a win in order to save face. If he can say he managed to get the West to give him all these great concessions, then he can withdrawal without looking weak.
They wouldn’t be told to do anything, other than possibly to not attack the Russian troops as they left Ukraine unless they showed any hostilities.
I’m mixed minds on Crimea. Ideally, I’d like Ukraine to get it back, but if they get everything back but Crimea… I don’t know how much more backing we should do there.
Other than that, the US certainly shouldn’t negotiate for anything less than a complete withdrawal from Ukraine.
Okay, here’s a hypothetical scenario. We have negotiated away quite a bit at this point, all the sanctions, spies and missile bases are offered. Russia agrees to leave Ukraine, except they are not willing to give back Crimea for any concessions.
Or lets say they will give back Crimea, but Zelenskyy demands reparations that Russia will never agree to, like extending Ukraine’s borders into current Russian territory.
If Zelenskyy refuses the deal, what obligations do you think that we have to continue to support their war against Russia? Can we tell him, “You need to take this deal, or we will no longer be sending you those sweet missiles you love so much.”? If so, at what point is that? Do we, as the ones actually providing the leverage, have a say in what deals we will support?
I really can’t answer that. I’m not even sure of my own opinion. Early in the war that is sorta what I expected Ukraine might be forced to settle on, just based on what I considered a realistic best case scenario for Ukraine and worst case for Russia. That might still be the case. Or it might not - like most I hadn’t really grasped the degree to which corruption and over-confidence (and high-quality Russian/Ukrainian air defenses) had gutted the effectiveness of the Russian military.
I feel the US for both moral reasons and sound political/military strategy should back Ukraine until it has either liberated itself back to its pre-2014 borders OR Ukraine itself decides to cut its losses and trade land for peace. Should that be completely open-ended? Possibly not. When would I call it quits? I don’t know. Not tomorrow or next month or the next after that. 2024? I dunno.
Elect me God-Emperor-for-Life and I guess I’d have to make a decision. Right now I simply don’t know.
So if Biden negotiated, in coordination with our partners in Ukraine, for a solution that would be acceptable for the Ukrainian people, you’d be OK with that?
More or less, sure. Maybe slightly less - UKRAINE should negotiate a solution, coordinating with and including Biden as they see fit. Or even deferring to Biden if they think that is more advantageous to their position. Or in other words Ukraine should be taking the lead on any negotiation, rather than the US doing so. They’re the one actually at war, after all.
Are you aware that I lifted “in coordination with our partners in Ukraine” and “acceptable to the Ukrainian people” directly from the Progressive Caucus letter?
You are more or less OK with Biden doing exactly what the letter asks him to do.
Uh, let me be clear here. I am in my own mind currently engaged in a lengthy semi-hijack about what I consider a side issue that arose out of discussion about that letter. I have not expressed any opinion about the (profoundly silly) OP.
If you want my opinion about the letter itself I think it was worthless political grandstanding (of course everyone wants peaceful negotiations dumbasses), but also utterly harmless political grandstanding (I didn’t see any calls to start pressuring Ukraine to surrender their newborns to Russian re-education camps in exchange for peace). Or in other words, a gigantic nothing-burger. dalej42 just hates progressive Democrats - always has, no doubt always will.
Also Discourse is now screaming at me to switch to DM’s or just get a blog for fuck’s sake 
.
Worthless but harmless political grandstanding seems like a pretty good description. Grandstanding might even be overstating things since many signatories didn’t even want the letter released.
End the peace?
Well, another possibility (not likely, but possible) is that China and India wake the hell up, and join the rest of the civilized world in a complete and utter economic blockade of Russia. Ukraine kicks Russia back to the pre- 2014 borders and reclaims all of their country. The Russian economy crumbles, and Putin falls out a window.
Was it mentioned upthread? I missed it if it was. So long as the House Progressive Caucus does not attempt to overthrow the elected governement of the United States like the republican party tried to do last year, nothing they say or do rises to the level of traitor.