Most Ukrainians didn't defect. Most Ukrainians knew then what we all know now. No hindsight bias here.

In fact there were even analysts outside Ukraine that did listen to Ukrainians and who also knew what was going on.

Here you can listen to Anders Puck Nielsen explain in jan 2022 what we all understand now, that it would be a large and terrible war: https://youtu.be/23JYPb_jHpg?si=6lMedJpEkeuPRuhv https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=krhmeUkfhu4