If you blame Merkel for helping engineer the Minsk agreements, if you compare her with Chamberlain in Munich, you must have been born after 2015. If those deals hadn't been made, the Russian military would have steamrolled over a nearly defenseless Ukraine back then.
The Ukrainian leadership of the time was frightened, lost, inexperienced. It had just given up Crimea in a helpless panic. The Ukrainian military had been destroyed by years of underfunding and corruption. It suffered a few horrible defeats.
Those of us who watched the talks saw, and wrote, that the deals would be extremely hard to implement. Putin must have seen it, too, but back then, he still believed in deals. That saved Ukraine. Merkel & Hollande bought it time to establish a working statehood, build a military.
I should probably add something re Nord Stream 2. It was offered to Putin as a carrot for good behavior (i.e., not attacking again). The carrot was easy to withdraw, and it was withdrawn in a matter of days when Putin attacked. It also never pumped a single cubic meter of gas.
What I wrote at the time, btw: bloomberg.com/opinion/articl…
I know it has also been argued that in Muncih Chamberlain bought valuable time for Britain. But he only bought a year. Merkel bought seven -- quite enough for Ukraine to have become the military power it is today.
Another key difference is that during the Munich talks, there was no urgency to stop an invasion already under way; during the Minsk talks, the Ukrainian military was being butchered and Russian/pro-Russian forces were making daily gains.
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