On December 1, 1991, the people of Ukraine voted overwhelmingly 92% to 8% to be an independent country, no longer a part of the Soviet Union (which soon dissolved on December 26, 1991).

From December 2, 1991, onwards countries around the world recognized Ukraine as an independent state.

For over 30 years the world recognized Ukraine (which had been the second largest Republic in the USSR) as an independent and sovereign nation before Russian President Putin’s invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. Putin alleged that Ukraine, in fact, was not a nation but an historic possession of Russia.

2026 will mark 250 years since the 13 American colonies voted for independence from England, the world’s greatest military power of the time

The King of England’s refusal to recognize American Independence resulted in a bloody 7-year war until the Americans finally prevailed.

Of all the nations on earth the United States should identify with and stand with Ukraine in defending its independence from its former Soviet/Russian master, now ruled by Putin

80 years ago, Jamestown’s own Robert H. Jackson, as Chief Prosecutor, began the Nuremburg trial accusing certain high-level Nazis of being war criminals. Jackson charged some of them with the international law crime of waging “aggressive war.”

The Russian invasion of Ukraine was illegal under Jackson’s definition of “aggressive war.”

Republican President Ronald Reagan in 1983 labeled the Soviet Union the “Evil Empire” and ‘the focus of evil in the modern world.” In stark contrast to Reagan’s view, Russia’s Putin in 2005 called the collapse of the Soviet empire in 1991 “the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the century.”

Putin’s invasion of Ukraine is just the first step in his demonic dream of putting the “evil Empire” back together in Eastern and Central Europe.

The democratic countries of Western Europe, most notably Sweden and Finland are largely united in their view of the threat to them by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Sweden and Finland responded to the Russian invasion of Ukraine by successfully seeking membership in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). NATO was formed under American leadership in 1949 to contain Soviet military aggression in Western Europe.

Former President George W. Bush made it clear that America must stand with Ukraine. Bush stated: “The American government and people must stand in solidarity with Ukraine and the Ukrainian people as they seek freedom and the right to chase their own future. We cannot tolerate the authoritarian bullying and danger that Putin poses. Ukraine is our friend and democratic ally and deserves full support during this most difficult time.”

Republican Presidents Reagan and Bush would have been incredulous that many Republicans in the House of Representatives would have been so reluctant to fully support Ukraine in the face of Russia’s illegal aggressive war.

Now the Administration of President Trump has proposed a peace plan. The origins of this peace plan to end the Russian war against Ukraine are not clear. There is some indication that Putin and the Russians are behind several of the provisions in the plan.

United States Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the longest serving Republican Senate Majority leader in history, on November 25 attacked President Trump’s team for an approach that would appease Putin.

McConnell said: “A deal that rewards aggression would not be worth the paper it’s written on.” He added, “America isn’t a neutral arbiter, and we shouldn’t act like one.”

On November 21 McConnell had written that Putin had “spent the entire year trying to play President Trump for a fool,” and added that if Mr. Trump’s top negotiators were “more concerned with appeasing Putin than seeing real peace, then the President ought to find new advisers.”

McConnell expresses the traditional hawkish Republican positions of Regan and Bush; that the Soviet Union and now Putin’s Russia are evil and that the United States and the rest of the Western free-world democracies must not engage in appeasement. A significant number of Republicans in the House of Representatives, however, are not so committed to standing up to Putin.

In all likelihood Putin’s illegal aggressive war against Ukraine will end with a cease fire that will effectively, if not legally under international law, give him control of those parts of Ukraine that Russian forces currently hold.

A United States backed peace plan that would give Putin more of Ukraine than he has been able to take by force, however, would be appeasement of the highest degree.

A United States backed peace plan that reduces and then caps the size of Ukraine’s military while imposing no such limits on Russia’s military would be a tragedy for the entire free world.

From the beginning of the illegal Russian invasion, Ukraine has not asked for a single member of the American military to fight for and risk dying for Ukraine’s continued independence. All Ukraine has asked for are the weapons and military intelligence to defend itself against its much larger enemy.

Of course, the long-suffering Ukrainian people want this illegal war to stop, but not at the expense of appeasing Putin and Russia. The lesson of the awful result of appeasing Hitler in the late 1930s, is not lost on Europeans. Let the awful result of appeasement not be lost on those who are in our White House and House of Representatives.

Fred Larson is a graduate of the Princeton University Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs and Yale Law School. He is also a retired Jamestown City Court judge.