[shmerl]

You can't do it slowly, when they are actively attacking. Besides, their nuclear bluff got old and finally (as it should have been from the start) less and less allies pay attention to it. As Macron responded to that - France also has nuclear weapons. That's the way to shut Putin up.

[unclebucknasty]

Exactly this. The idea of "not escalating" means we are always responding to Russia's latest escalation, so are perpetually a step behind. No risk to Russia and no way to win a war.

And, falling for the gambit that Putin was a madman who would readily use nukes even if it meant mutually assured destruction was dumb from the start. If he was an irrational madman, so ready to destroy the world, then he could have done that from the start.

He can't be this crafty authoritarian, executing on a set of well-understood geopolitical strategic goals AND an irrational madman who doesn't care whether the world exists at all. You have to pick one.