Last week, Members of Congress took two votes on U.S. involvement in the war in Ukraine, and the outcomes were radically different. These votes illustrated something peculiar about the politics of war: while there is considerable room to challenge how humanely war is conducted, it remains politically fraught to work towards ending war itself. The first vote was a quite tepid proposal led by Representative Warren Davidson (R-OH) that would have required the Biden administration to submit a strategy to Congress that included potential diplomatic pathways to facilitate a negotiated settlement to the war.