This effort itself is more like a FEMA disaster preparedness set of tools for the public. Whether it’s power outages, bad weather, or actual war, the steps make each citizen less of a liability to the overwhelmed emergency responders. Having reserve water, backup communication, and a family plan is not “remilitarizing”, it is just common sense.

I recently vacationed in Germany and the immigration polizei agent asked me, in English, “what’s the purpose of your visit here?” and I said something like “Urlaub machen und Bier trinken, naturlich!” He applied the stamp and waved me through without incident.

So… Thanks for being cool, Germans!

I mean, this is true that the offramp was always going to be Russia keeping Crimea and the Donbas, and Ukraine getting some kind of security guarantees that fall short of NATO membership. Unfortunately we took the stupidest, most deadly, most costly way to get to this conclusion.