Empathizing

THE RUSSIAN VIEWPOINT is that the United States and NATO want to dominate and control Ukraine, and fill it with weapons and military, missiles and bombs, to expand NATO power and influence ever eastward, thereatening Russia. If you think about it, you can understand this viewpoint. It an understandable point of view. It shouldn't be all that difficult for the United States and NATO to promise never to put foreign troops or weapons into Ukraine, to never invite nor encourage Ukraine to join NATO, while pledging to open mindedly and fairly giving due consideration to applications for NATO membership to Russia, Ukraine, or any other country. Russia in return could promise to neither attack, invade, harm, or threaten Ukraine, nor any member of NATO, and to demonstrate peaceful intentions by downgrading the Russian military presence near Ukraine, by moving its military back and farther away from Ukraine. Limits to future military deployment in NATO countries and Ukraine could be bargained for limits to the same thing in western Russia, near Ukraine. From this computer screen to the world's eyes and ears. By Valentine's Day, Russia's behavior seemed for all the world to indicate that the decision to attack and invade had been made before the military buildup ever began, and that an attack was therefore imminent. By suddenly promising to never place foreign (NATO or American) military or weapons in Ukraine, and to neither encourage nor invite Ukraine to join Nato, but to merely give due consideration to applications for NATO membership, with conditions, to Russia, Ukraine, or any other country applying for NATO membership, in exchange for a clear demonstration of Russia's peaceful intentions consisting of a removal of its military forces from Ukraine's border, the United State and NATO could keep the logistical advantages they already enjoy geo-politically, assuming that the NATO alliance is indeed, as all concerned have always and forever proclaimed, purely defensive. The eternal difficulty in establishing and maintaining peace among humans is of course, that true and stated intentions are usually not the same. Put another way, actions seldom match words. For the sake of present day European peace and security, we must hope that this time its different; that this time words and actions are the same, to wit, that Russia has no plans to invade, and NATO has no ambitions other than the preservation of defensive security.