The rhetoric has largely been all or nothing so far: WW3 or continue with small reactive shipments/aid of arms and hope that Ukraine miraculously wins. There should be a better middle ground but exactly what could this be? It's tough to talk about "middle ground" when any proactive step into that terrain would be viewed as escalation by Russia. I don't think appeasing Putin is the strategy, such as just saying "you can have the Donbas and Crimea and other locales" as he doesn't deserve an off-ramp that assumes he is a rational leader who can still play on the world stage; that said, from a purely humanitarian perspective, that might be the only play to make in order to end all the murder/death/destruction, even if it isn't a sound geopolitical one. Territorial appeasement also sends a dangerous message to China, who's major interest in this conflict has been to see how this reshapes their Taiwan policy. My sense is that US/NATO diplomats should be working on China right now, more so than Russia. Putin hasn't shown any good-faith negotiating ability so why keep trying that route?—Putin just keeps doubling down. To me, only with a major player such as China will any headway be made. But of course no one wants to sacrifice Taiwan to save the Ukraine, as I suspect that every time China is petitioned for assistance, this is what they bring up.
I don't find the idea of Putin threatening other NATO countries tenable right now. I'm sure in Putin's mind, he fantasizes about revanchism and imagines himself shirtless riding a horse into an Estonian village valiantly gifting his gold watch to a cheering and hungry citizen, but this is probably less of a threat than initially feared given how poorly the Russian military has performed against countries 20x smaller. I can't imagine Russia trying to threaten a Baltic state--the military might and the resolve of the Russian people doesn't seem to be there (which doesn't necessarily prevent Putin from ordering this nevertheless).
