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To me normalizing the defeatist attitude you espouse is more problematic for NATO. Are you suggesting that the west/NATO can never again win a conventional war? Because whether it is the Iranians , the Russians or the Chinese they will always hold the nuclear stick over our head. What happens if the Russians invade NATO territory in a couple of years? Are we allowed to take back anything they take ? Or will they call it Russian and hold nuclear war as the ultimate card. Do you agree that at some point , if it comes to it, people in Dallas or Manchester WILL have to risk being incinerated over towns nobody can even name? Maybe these towns will not be in donetsk ok let's agree to that but certainly at some point you have to draw a line and risk getting nuked , correct? I hope you see the issue , the dichotomy of strategy A and B you mentioned will exist whether its NATO territory or not, it's just that I assume when it comes to NATO territory you will be ok with the risk? If your answer is no then I hope you are ready to always be bullied by autocrats and their absolute control over the population.
When it comes to Ukraine, the only thing I said is that we should have given them more from the start instead of half-assing it. If we had done that I believe they would have been fully more capable in destroying Russian forces during the early counteroffensives instead of stalling out and letting the Russians off to fight another day. At that point I seriously doubt Putin would have nuked ukrainian forces , let alone ukrainian civilians and certainly no way he nukes western capitals over a conventional loss by his actual enemy. If he did actually nuke (tactically , the other two situations I consider almost impossible ) them I believe even the Chinese would have been on his ass to end it. But in any case it would have been moot , nukes as I said are strategic weapons and offer no real tactical advantages so no point using them as a result of a conventional loss. The ground you lost is still lost and your army no more capable then before. You just made yourself an international pariah.
There's a huge distinction between a country invading an ally and a country invading a non-ally. That's the whole point of alliances. Russia doesn't throw a massive tantrum when the US invades or bombs countries that aren't Russian allies, even with borderline Russian allies like Syria they show a level of restraint. They didn't give the Syrian government Smerch or Kalibr missiles and encourage them to kill all the US troops based in Syria. They didn't start handing out Manpads in Iraq and tell them to kill every Coalition soldier they saw.
Nukes are literally just big bombs, the 'nuclear taboo' is a social construct designed to keep the little countries servile before the big powers. The US seriously considered using nukes in Korea and Vietnam, wars that were very far from the US, wars the US could afford to lose. Even then they incinerated North Korea such that the entire country was wrecked and all cities were razed, via incendiaries rather than nukes. They wrecked much of Laos and Cambodia in the Vietnam War. Yet the US is not an international pariah because the US is a strong power and has things people want.
Russia isn't a pariah today outside the world of US allies. Even amongst them trade continues just via Azerbaijan or various stans. It doesn't matter whether you kill people with 155mm shells, drones, small arms or H-bombs, it's the same outcome. Russia still has oil and people want energy, minerals, food - even in China.
There are of course disadvantages to using nuclear weapons and various risks (Ukraine assembling a dirty bomb or launching various radiological attacks amongst other things) but it's not unthinkable that Russia would go nuclear over a high-intensity conventional war right next door to them if they judged that conventional victory was unattainable. They could be used for signalling purposes to compel immediate negotiations or en masse tactically to smash offensives, wipe airfields off the map, destroy command and control or logistics hubs, for the EMP effect... These are the ultimate weapons for a reason.
The US doesn't have a monopoly on massacring people and razing cities when easy victory becomes elusive, that's not how it works.
Furthermore, it's unlikely that 'maximum aid' could even achieve that outcome. It takes a long time to train people to use Patriots, tanks, F-16s and so on. Russia could assemble large new formations and try again, just as we've seen in 2023 and 2024.
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