The same way anyone starts negotiating with anyone: open a dialogue and exchange demands, and then work to make concessions and compromises. They won’t do that, though, because then the infinite money spigot from the US will shut off because America doesn’t want this war to ever end.

I doubt Ukraine will demand anything less than Russia pulling out of previous held lands. Russia will doubtless demand all lands it currently occupies (and maybe even ones it claims but does not occupy). Russia's demand could be cast as peace, though really it involves giving a massive portion of Ukraine to Russia. And if you're thinking that might be temporary... well, just ask Finland, which lost 9% of its territory to a peace agreement in the Winter War.

They’d each have their own demands, and then negotiations would be finding a middle ground between “Ukraine gets everything it wants” and “Russia gets everything it wants”

Russia is contractually obligated to shoot itself in the head right now, according to a treaty they signed declaring they are bound to Ukraine’s defense should an armed force invade it. I’m not really sure what Russia plans to bring to the table when they have broken every promise they have made and stolen from Ukraine.

You’re asking Ukraine to barter with the armed robber who claims ownership of your house.

They were bound to Ukraine’s defense before it had a coup lol

Yanukovych wasn't strung up by protestors, he was removed from power by a huge majority of the Ukrainian parliament, including members of Yanukovych's own party, and they held an election later that year. For what you're saying to make sense, any large protest in a country would have to potentially void any international treaty that country is party to. Russia doesn't get to invade and annex land just because there was a big protest and then the parliament kicked the president out.

They removed him illegally! They didn’t impeach him because he didn’t actually commit an impeachable offense, they just voted to get rid of him. It was an unconstitutional move that had the fullthroated support and backing of the EU and NATO, hence, a Western-backed coup. Russia saw a Western backed coup on its boarder and saw its geopolitical rivals getting ready to plant their flag right against its border, so it reacted in an extreme and unjustified (though understandable) way. Russia was provoked into overextending itself and now the US/NATO strategy is to bleed Russia dry by forcing them to spend all of their resources on this war while hitting them with sanctions.

Except that isn’t happening, and now the war could last for years. Decades. Maybe forever, and it’ll be like the Korean War with a demilitarized zone but no peace agreement.

How many Ukrainians are you willing to sacrifice to defeat Russia?

They did have the votes and the power to impeach, but yes the procedure was iffy. To be noted though is that Yanukovych already had fled to Russia when he was removed from office. I don’t know the legal details but I guess fleeing into the arms of a belligerent state should, in my book, be an impeachable offence.

And in any case that’s irrelevant. There have been multiple presidential elections since then. Calling the whole thing a Putsch when it didn’t involve the military taking over, or the cessation of democracy, or anything of the sort, is very very disingenuous.

Big picture what happened is that the people wanted to get rid of a president who reneged on election promises (EU ties) and turn the country autocratic, they wanted to have themselves some early elections for a new one. And they got that. Call it a special electoral operation.

It’s not irrelevant - he was illegally removed from power, meaning it was literally a coup. Then, after he was removed, the people against the coup government refused to participate in the elections. Democracy collapsed after Euromaidan