On Feb. 28, 2022, the Smith College Provost Office released a statement titled “Responding to the Invasion of Ukraine.” The letter unequivocally labeled the events of Feb. 24, 2022 an invasion, which was urgently condemned and its “humanitarian consequences” recognized. The statement was clear; there was no potential ambiguity, no room for doubt or misinterpretation. In this case, history didn’t seem complicated and the conversations weren’t difficult. The discourse was not a mere clash or the latest episode in the convoluted conflict between Russia and Ukraine; it was unmistakably an invasion.