Well that's worth it, I guess.
Amplifying on the original point, from an interview with Anatol Lieven:
Link to this interview:
Worse Than a Crime; It’s a Blunder
I think this is the core sentence:
in other words, basically propose the Minsk agreement for the Donbas, but into a kind of confederal state in which pro-Russian areas would have de facto control over Ukraine’s international alignment. And accompanying that with a treaty of neutrality.
Minsk, in the implementation and interpretation used by Russia was always a camouflage net. What was hidden in it?
All the propositions given are just different ways to describe the same thing - a puppet state Ukraine. They can call it federalization, they can call it neutrality, they can call it denazification, but it always boils down to the same end effect, with merely different legal mechanisms behind and PR cover in front.
The same applies to the demands to NATO. Don't listen to what they say they are doing, doubly so don't listen to what their fanboys say they are doing. Look at what they are doing, and what they aren't doing, which is just as informative.
The specific choice of demands, through either intent or incompetence, was meant to be dead on arrival, being in effect a demand to give Russia veto powers over NATO membership and internal affairs, which is an internal NATO matter, but that's in line with Russia's general attitude towards other nation's sovereignty. Long story short, this was both politically and legally untenable for NATO, accepting it would hurt the credibility of the alliance.
Meanwhile, what wasn't mentioned, at least not by Russian side, was that any of the more reasonable security controversies could also be addressed by minor adjustments to conventional forces, missile treaties, and ABC weapon treaties, some of which are even still in force despite all the NATO-Russia relations downturn.
NATO countries have specifically stated that they are open to discussion in these areas, but Russia didn't consider that nearly good enough, and insisted on wanting its big and unaffordable cake. Why? Either because the negotiations were meant to fail to just create a grievance cover for incoming actions, or because contrary to the more reasonable arguments about missile threats and such, the real thorn in Russia's side that this was meant to eliminate were the mere article 5 guarantees and their strength (tripwire forces?) to current and potential eastern NATO members, which Russia could not afford to state out openly, which in turn meant the whole offer was a half-hearted attempt from Russian side just to say they tried.
Which obviously raises the question, why would anyone have a problem with defense only alliance guarantees for other countries?
Since a few days, we have the answer. They would get in the way of something they were planning on doing, and we know what kind of thing defensive alliances get in the way of.