Anne Applebaum

I mean, we know what would happen.

Nothing would happen because that's what took place early this year.

And I just think Americans have lost the ability to be shocked or the ability to absorb the ways in which this is different.

And so, as I say, all I can think of to do right now is to explain it to people as much as possible.

There are a couple central pieces of it.

I mean, I think the most controversial piece is that the U.S.

is promising to recognize all or most of them.

There are now several versions of this kicking around, so I'm going to be a little vague.

But all are some of Russia's, of the occupied territories of Ukraine.

So that's Crimea, that's eastern Ukraine, Donbass, Luhansk, and maybe some of the other territories too.

But more than that, it asks the Ukrainians to give up Ukraine.

territory that has not been conquered.

So this is a part of Donetsk.

Donetsk is a province of Ukraine.

The Russians have conquered part of it.

In fact, they conquered a lot of it in 2014 as a part of a surprise attack right after they occupied Crimea.

And they've really been trying to conquer this whole province since then, so 11 years.

And they haven't been able to do it.

And they're now losing, again, I spoke to someone last night who reminded me of these numbers.

They're now losing 15,000 to 20,000 people a month trying to conquer Donetsk.