Quote Originally Posted by Dayuhan View Post
Indeed it does... and how did that work out? Was Europe overrun? Did US power collapse? Did the west fall?

No to all, of course. Despite initial concessions (appeasement, arguably), Europe and the US found a line they had the means and will to hold. That line was far enough from the Soviet core that holding it didn't provoke a potentially terminal war. Eventually, despite those early concessions, it's the Soviet Union, rotted out from the inside, that fell.

So why should we assume that if the Ukraine goes badly (it already has) or worse, that all is lost, or that the decline is irreversible? Given the overall threat of Russia (less than that of the Soviets in many ways) and the state of the Russian economy, why shouldn't it be possible to manage the conflict in much the same way, without resort to war?

Panic and woe seem hardly useful. All is not lost, there's a fair row to hoe before this is done, and given the precedents it would hardly be wise to count the West out on the basis of what happened and what's likely to happen in the Ukraine.
Holding that line took rather a lot of effort, millions of men, tens of thousands of small war machines like tanks and planes and thousands of large ones like ships and fleets of big bombers. It took decades and decades and it took on the part of the West a clear resolve to actually go to war with all those men and machines if the need arose. It also took demonstrations of that resolve through things like the Berlin Airlift, the Berlin Crisis, fielding the Pershing II missile whether the Soviets liked it or not, US and British submarines constantly on the back of Russian boats and on and on and on. It took Ron and Maggie and the Saudis agreeing to increase oil production to break the Soviet economy, Pope John Paul II carrying on after the Russians tried to have him killed, Solidarity and a lot of brave, brave Poles (we still may have those)and on and on again.

In short it took the West actually doing something and continuing to do something for a very long and expensive time. The reason we did all this was that we realized appeasement doesn't work. Appeasing just means you will have a much harder struggle on your hands later if you don't do what is needed to be done now. And that realization came after WWII when people realized that if only Hitler had been stood up to early very many innocent people would not have had to die.

That is the problem right now. There seems to be no resolve at all on the part of the West to do something while the problem is manageable. Just a vague hope that it will somehow resolve itself.

I always shake my head at blithe talk about appeasement. Those are real live breathing people with families and friends and goofy hobbies. Real live people that backs may be turned to when they ask for help. That means something.