US experts for The Hill: “Crimea in Ukraine’s hands, and ultimately under NATO’s Article 5 security umbrella, would be a generational strategic game-changer in the Black Sea region”

Mark Toth is a retired economist and entrepreneur and former board member of the World Trade Center in St. Louis, and Jonathan Sweet, a retired Army colonel, served as a military intelligence officer for 30 years and was the head of the Intelligence Division of U.S. European Command from 2012 to 2014, for The Hill: https://thehill.com/opinion/national-security/4166675-for-ukraine-its-crimea-or-bust/

Quotes

1. Crimea, if allowed to remain under Russian control, would live on as a double-edged dagger, with one side militarily aiming at the heart of Ukraine, and the other economically dominating the Black Sea and nearby Ukrainian ports in Odesa and Mariupol in the Sea of Azov. Both vulnerabilities are existential in nature. This is why Ukraine cannot secure a lasting peace without retaking Crimea. 
2. Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said, “I do think it’s very, very possible…for the Ukrainians to run a significant tactical [or] even operational-level offensive operation to liberate as much Ukrainian territory as possible.” Then, last week, he suggested Ukraine “achieve those objectives — maybe, possibly — through some sort of diplomatic means.” Milley conveniently left out two unspoken realities. First, Ukraine is being forced into that possibility only because of the White House’s dithering on giving Kyiv what it needs to win. Second, treaties with Moscow are worthless, as Ukraine has repeatedly discovered the hard way. 
3. In pursuing an end to the war based on diplomacy or negotiation, the Biden administration is chasing fool’s gold. Putin will not negotiate under present circumstances on terms other than complete Ukrainian capitulation. Ukraine, needless to say, is nowhere near willing to oblige — and will not. Zelensky made his conditions clear in a 10-point peace plan; two of his non-negotiable conditions are the restoration of Ukraine’s territorial integrity, including Crimea, and the removal of all Russian troops.
4. Russia only respects blunt force. In its absence, Putin will continue to take as much as he can. When he can take no more, he will attempt to freeze the conflict until he can fight another day, as he did in Ukraine in 2014 — and prior to that repeatedly in Nagorno-Karabakh, South Ossetia, Abkhazia and Transnistria.
5. [Lt. Gen. Ben] Hodges has stated repeatedly that Crimea is “decisive terrain.” Zelensky gets it; and it is time Washington and Brussels get it too. The Crimean Peninsula in Ukraine’s hands, and ultimately under NATO’s Article 5 security umbrella, would be a generational strategic game-changer in the Black Sea region. Biden deserves great credit for what he has done to date to defend Ukraine and to maintain a broad international coalition of support for Kyiv. But defending into perpetuity is not winning. Nor is it a winning strategy to keep repeating that the U.S. will support Ukraine “for as long as it may take.” Rather, it is a recipe for another “forever war” that risks losing the support of the American public. And indeed, this is exactly what Putin is counting on.