“...their government seems oblivious to reality in terms of perhaps accepting a reasonable compromise and end to this crisis”
Our media seem oblivious to the fact that Putin made his 2014 move on Crimea after gas and oil possibilities were found around Crimea and in eastern Ukraine around 2012, Exploration contracts were signed with US oil majors that year, and were promptly canceled when Putin took Crimea. What sort of compromise is reasonable in a war fought to prevent theft of Ukraine resources, or to permanently and forever seize Ukraine’s resources? How would you react if Mexico moved to seize Arizona and New Mexico because important resources were suddenly identified there?
I would react differently, of course, but the situations are not quite analogous. Ukraine got Crimea as a sort of feel-good present from the Soviet Union’s politburo in the 1960s, prior to that it was a part of the Russian federation. A large portion of the population identifies as Russian. It was a military hub in the formerly unified USSR when there were no issues about the transfer. After 1992 there was an agreement that Russia could continue to use the naval bases and Ukraine agreed to relinquish their part of the nuclear arsenal.
So the history is somewhat different. Russia had a claim to Crimea and Ukraine is not a world power like the USA, perhaps it would have been wise to settle the issue when it became contentious (as it did by 2014). I don’t want to give in to bullying either, but Ukraine has to take a more realistic view of world politics and not look at everything as strictly a matter of national sovereignty. Their own self interest would be served by a compromise settlement. The USA could just boot Mexico out of the analogous territory without much effort and nobody around the world would take their side. So the two things are not quite the same.
I would love to see an outcome where Russia was fully punished and pushed out of all these territories, but I don’t think that is a very likely outcome, therefore I am looking for the second best outcome which preserves some good things for Ukraine, rather than consigning them to five years of conflict and economic ruin that has wider impacts around the world. This is certainly what a responsible NATO country leadership should be pushing for, not encouraging Ukraine to keep going with this for years and years with no good result evident.