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You need to understand some history, and the bigger picture.

Ukraine isn't Putin's endgame. He wants to rebuild the USSR, which means after taking Ukraine he's coming for the Baltics and parts of Poland and Romania, and we now know his playbook: cause political instability in the area, replace the locals with Russians, then claim they need to be "liberated" from "Western Nazis"; that's what he's already done several times, and is also why Moldova need to be seriously concerned about Transnistria (I'm sure they already are).

The history you need to understand is that of appeasement. It was tried with Hitler. But it didn't stop his lust for more and more, and the millions of deaths from WWI and WWII were the results. Giving Ukraine to Russia increases the chance of nuclear war; it doesn't decrease it.

So Putin must be stopped in Ukraine. And he must be pushed completely out of Ukraine including Crimea because otherwise he'll just regroup and try again later. Which he might still do anyway, but he'll have had to deal with the fallout of the huge cost of the Ukraine invasion for zero benefit and the Russian reputation and economy in tatters. But appeasement doesn't work and doesn't stop wars.

We don't need to completely defeat Russia. We just need to push them out of Ukraine and hold them back. What Russians do in their own country is their business. And when they're ready to rejoin the civilised world we should be equally ready to welcome them back. We also need to strengthen our entire eastern flank: not aggressively sabre-rattling, just enough to make Putin think twice about launching an invasion or starting any funny business there.

There's a similar problem on the horizon with China, and Taiwan isn't Xi's endgame.

Main sources: Vlad Vexler, Peter Zeihan, China Uncensored.

The problem we are having: There is a person (Putin) who thinks that it's worth it to go to war against Ukraine.

The whole scenario of fighting at all cost just leads to one thing … more war

So, what would happen when we stop supporting Ukraine? 2 options:

1. The war will end for now and in a few years, Putin will start the next try.
2. Putin conquers the whole Ukraine.

Ukraine fights its way to the Russians and completely defeats them

You mean, Ukraine could occupy Russian territory? I think, that's not realistic. And Ukraine knows that the support of the West ends when they do that.

I have no love for Russia … I have no love for war … I support Ukrainian independence

Me, too...

But I think, what the history (Crimea 2014 + the next try in 2022) tells us, is that Putin thinks that war is worth it. And as long as he thinks that that's true, he will not stop. Yes, we could end this episode of the war now. And in 2026, Putin will try it again and again and again.

Putin acts a little bit like Hitler. Yes, you could have given him territory to "stop the war", but that person wanted the war.

We have 2 options:

1. We stop supporting Ukraine. This costs us money in the end.
2. We continue supporting Ukraine. This costs us money in the end.

My conclusion: I don't care how much money we spend: Our main goal should be making it as expensive for Putin as possible to fight this war to make him stop not just for a few years until his next try, but rather forever.

No, the president of Ukraine has asked Putin repeatedly to stop the war and withdraw. Tucson has refused and has ignored any offers to do so. He in fact gave a speech last year claiming that Ukraine is not a real country. He has authored a study to resurrect the Soviet Union by reconquering every country that was part of the USSR, including Poland and East Germany.

If Ukrainian were capitulate today, we would see Russian soldiers invading Poland and Germany. That's their goal. In fact their goal is to stretch Russia all the way to the Atlantic coast.