amai
Ukraine wanted to rearm with nuclear weapons already in 2021: https://www.aljazeera.com/amp/news/2021/4/16/ukraine-may-see...

I think it is time to think about that again. Give Ukraine a few thermonuclear bombs that can reach Moscow. Maybe this could convince the Russian government that it is better to stop the offensive and go back to diplomacy.

deepfriedchokes
They should have and now they should put boots on the ground to rectify the mistake.
tim333
Yeah it's all been a bit wishy washy. The west should have stood up for the principle that you can't just invade democracies and take their land because your army is bigger.
alephnerd
> “I think we all have to admit, we should have given them more weapons pre-invasion.”

Absolutely.

Pre-2022, it was largely US, Canada, UK, and Turkiye taking unilateral action in helping Ukraine rebuild military capacity, along with Poroshenko's reforms.

The rest of NATO remained aloof of Ukraine until 2022

Germany especially did too little by placing irrationally high expectations about Poroshenko's ability to reform Ukraine [0] while ignoring the strides he made in building administrative capacity within Ukraine [1].

Furthermore, it might be heresy on HN/Reddit, but Zelensky's administration is extremely lackluster (even before the war began), and most of the recent missteps that Ukraine has done recently are due to Zelensky and his cabinet (eg. UKR-PL relations being lead by a UKR AgBusiness oligarch, politicization of upper levels of the military administration, active procurement corruption scandals, not arresting Ihor Kolomoisky until arm-twisted by the US, Pandora Papers).

Once this war is over, Ukraine will need to work hard to build it's institutions. They have the capacity, but it will require having to finally end the oligarch model, which will be extremely difficult politically.

If it does not, it will stagnate like Serbia and BH - which is something the oligarchs might gladly accept.

[0] - https://www.dw.com/en/poroshenkos-promises-merkels-disappoin...

[1] - https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/ukrainealert/how-histo...

nikolay
Russia would have had more decisive steps, then too. Most Russians criticize Putin for not taking this too seriously. Just like America in Iraq, Russia could've destroyed all energy infrastructure on day one, all airport fields, etc. Russia has a lot more capacity unlike Ukraine.