The whole "rule of law" is always used when it favors one's talking points. Did the unarmed black man who resisted arrest and was shot and killed as a result because he wasn't following the "rule of law" deserve it? Use conveniently as you see fit.
If we had a chance to stop Hitler before he murdered 6 million Jews, would that have been acceptable?
Last thing first: no one knows for sure what twist or turn history would have taken if not for some particular person or some event seen as precipitated by that person. It's not as clear-cut as in the proverb:
For the want of a nail the shoe was lost,
For the want of a shoe the horse was lost,
For the want of a horse the rider was lost,
For the want of a rider the battle was lost,
For the want of a battle the kingdom was lost,
And all for the want of a horseshoe-nail.
Moving on: It's not right to suggest that the west is not doing enough or not doing anything regarding Putin's unwarranted invasion of Ukraine. So far we're not crazy enough to try to put up a no fly zone. That would say "
to hell with Ukraine, this is between you and me now. buddy," i.e. between Putin and Biden. No one in right mind wants that escalation.
So then, what instead? Yeah, poor old tired "rule of law". Help without engaging directly. Don't assassinate, offer to facilitate negotiations, find honest brokers acceptable to Russia -- France, Turkey, Israel, the Vatican... And meanwhile arm the hell out of the Ukrainians trying to defend their country. Publicize the facts on the ground as we find and verify them.
We're doing all that... The USA has been moving heaven and earth along with more and more EU and other European countries to try to get Ukraine's defenses bolstered, all without ending up having triggered a wider war via giving Putin an excuse to roll on to wherever else strikes his fancy... maybe this revanchist wacko would like to go all the way back out to his old KGB era stomping ground in Dresden?
I'm sure Putin still regards "East Germany" as part of his personal map of the Russian Empire. What we don't know is how sound of mind Putin really is, and how much support or potential resistance there is for his "project" of roping all of Ukraine back into his sphere of influence.
The USA and NATO have been helping train Ukrainian defense for months now, supplying weapons, talking up sanctions with Europe, engaging in diplomacy up the kazoo with anyone who wants to talk or might have an in with Putin, and also being transparent about intel gathered on what Putin has been up to, which info Biden has been declassifying a lot of in almost real time.
All that --and more, e.g. cyberwatchfulness, social media etc,-- and all to the point of waking people up and building interest in presenting Putin with the one thing he didn't figure on, namely a united front from the west and neutral countries all saying "Don't do this, don't figure on this, turn around, this is not how it works now."
People think of the UN as toothless, and in a way it is, but it SAYS SOMETHING when all but a tiny handful of the world's nations stood up for territorial integrity of Ukraine the other day in the General Assembly vote. Those delegates can't agree on the time of day but they all understand they don't want some neighbor barging into their turf with intent to acquire it.
So all in all, what has been accomplished regarding Ukraine v Russia so far, without nukes being launched, is pretty impressive. if you ask me. Is it enough? No. It's tragic what's happening now, beyond tragic, and so unnecessary. But the USA and Russia are not minor players, we do have a fraught history, and we both do have nukes and so do some other countries.
The first point is not to use the nukes, not over Ukraine, not over anything. The idea of a mutally assured destruction counts on no one suddenly deciding they don't care and so going to launch anyway,..
So the other point is not to make the other guy so angry he forgets the first point. All we really have there is to remember to act under rule of law.
Mistakes can be made, are being made right now: the destruction in Ukraine being wreaked by Putin's doubling-down reaction to his own miscalculation is horrendous. Human rights violations and war crimes are clearly taking place. But the one mistake the planet can't absorb is two nuclear-armed powers engaging in nuclear warfare over geopolitical grievances that cannot in fact be resolved by force. We can't keep Putin from using nuclear weapons but we need to stay clear of being stupid enough to provoke him into going first.
