Wars and military escalations spawn exclusive, yet elusive, clichés.

The best and brightest of the Vietnam War spent a decade pursuing their illusory “light at the end of the tunnel.” And today’s situation room strategists turn each other into nodding but ignorant bobbleheads every time they say empty words that someone just needs to create an “exit ramp.” for Vladimir Putin.

Everyone knows what everyone means: Just offer a ‘face-saving’ offer that the straight-faced Russian president can accept – and avoid making a mistake with the massive invasion of Ukraine he realizes now that it could become an easy but disastrous Russian victory.

But no one knows what this “exit ramp” may be. Or how to make it sufficiently meaningless but seemingly meaningful. Because everyone is going about it the wrong way. They’re all trying to build the wrong kind of exit ramp.

What really happened was that Putin discovered that his master plan – the reason he sent over 100,000 troops to encircle Ukraine on three sides – backfired. Highligths.

What he wanted above all was to drive a wedge between the United States and its NATO allies. And his reading of what he had seen of the United States and Europe in this century – the red line of Syria, the abandonment of Afghanistan, the isolationism of the Republican Party and the trampling of Britain – meant that America and NATO were ripe for exploitation.

Putin thought that by moving massively on Ukraine, the weakened West would become soft. He would divide the United States and NATO – his long-desired reward for the shame he felt when the Berlin Wall came down and the Soviet Union crumbled.

What he saw was President Joe Biden and European leaders showing strength and solidarity – militarily and diplomatically – in ways he never expected. America and Europe seemed to unite in a meaningful way behind a series of sanctions that Putin knows could do anything but shut Russia out of international banks and even the global economy.

With his massive move towards the invasion of Ukraine, which Putin proclaims to be Russian in essence, the Russian President wanted to pressure NATO to withdraw all offensive military forces from former European countries from East which were once Soviet satellites. And of course to promise that Ukraine will never be able to join NATO.

Vladimir Putin’s Stalinization was ugly no matter how you look at it. And from Putin’s point of view, this caused the opposite of what he expected. This brought the United States and NATO closer together and forced them to increase their military presence in Eastern Europe.

What did Putin expect? And now he must ask himself: Will Eastern Europe, the whole of NATO and the United States see Putin’s Russia again with a mind that is not predisposed to expect to a hostile adversary – and who will even one day be able to accept an economic and commercial partner?

And this is the ultimate “exit ramp” from the invasion of Ukraine that the West can sketch out for Putin. And Joe Biden can play a key role as a diplomatic cartoonist and world leader. Biden can go to the United Nations and, in a very different speech from the General Assembly, he could remind the world of an era we might all consider worthy of resurrecting. He can remind the world that just eight years ago Putin was on a very different path – a path in which he charted a costly and potentially effective way to make Russia a real player and partner in the global economy. .

By 2014, Putin had spent big to join the world in what was, in effect, Putin’s two-step Sochi. First, in Sochi he hosted the Winter Olympics – and won a world of praise for the facilities he built. A few months later, Putin was to host the economic summit of the G-8 nations. Yes, in Sochi. For the first time, the world would see Russia as never before – as a potential partner in the global economy.

But just as the 2014 Winter Olympics were winding down, Ukraine sought a trade relationship with the European Union, rejecting a deal with Russia. An enraged Putin militarily captured Crimea, which was part of Ukraine. Of course, the G-8 canceled its summit and ousted Russia from the group. Russia has suffered since as a non-player in the global economy.

If Russia now invades Ukraine, the Russian people will suffer the most from the massive banking sanctions that are likely to follow. But Biden can say that won’t happen if Putin doesn’t invade Ukraine. Experts believe the Russian people will get Biden’s message through social media, even if state media gets a little snipping.

Maybe, just maybe, the road that Putin built in 2014 can be revamped to become the diplomatic infrastructure “exit ramp” that Putin can turn to today.

And one day, Ukrainians might look back to 2022 as the year they first met good neighbor Vladimir.

Martin Schram, Opinion Columnist for Tribune News Service, is a veteran Washington journalist, writer, and television documentary filmmaker. He can be contacted at martin.schram@gmail.com.

Martin Schram, Opinion Columnist for Tribune News Service, is a veteran Washington journalist, writer, and television documentary filmmaker. He can be contacted at martin.schram@gmail.com.