However, these articles spell out what Russia wanted - Ukraine neutrality in exchange for security guaranties:
The Scheerpost quotes Fiona Hill, of all people:
“According to multiple former senior US officials we spoke with, in April 2022, Russian and Ukrainian negotiators appeared to have tentatively agreed on the outlines of a negotiated interim settlement.”
A lot of faith is put into Russia's motives being pure, right after their botched initial invasion. After becoming the laughing stock of the entire world, Putin would have just rolled up and gone home, and left Ukraine to prosper so long as they signed a paper saying they wouldn't join NATO? We can never know for sure, right? So what might have been can always be a card played with the most unrealistic bright-eyed optimism and nobody can say for sure otherwise.
According to Fiona, who Scheerpost is quoting, within a couple of months, everything changed, and Russia wants it all, or at least everything they thought they could ask for to that point, and so this peace offering from Russia that was a one-time deal, take it or leave it, must be believed to have been completely reputable and the West totally ruined it; even though there is this alternative explanation that is just as likely (which Fiona of course believes) that "Putin’s goal is not negotiation but Ukrainian capitulation" -- from the same article Scheerpost quotes from.
I'm seeing more commentary that Trump might not be able to stop the war. If Zelenskiy is right, then they've only seen 6 billion of the US aid, and in that time, they've ramped up their own manufacturing capabilities substantially, especially in regard to their drone production. The point is being made that the US withdrawing their help would certainly hurt Ukraine, it wouldn't necessarily end them. Our help has been significant, but not as much as imagined. And the tradeoff would be if the US isn't helping, then Ukraine's restriction on attacking inside Russia vanish. It might be a wash, as the restrictions have allowed Russia as goliath to use guerilla tactics while David is stuck playing by the rule book of an international power.
We can't take farmers and take all their people and send them back because they don't have maybe what they're supposed to have. They get rid of some of the people who have been there for 25 years and they work great and then you throw them out and they're replaced by criminals.