For the sake of argument let's say that something occurs within Russia and the Russian forces are withdrawn from Ukraine and whomever is in charge claims "Victory" or at the very least that the aims had been achieved.
Now what?
Without a peace treaty with Ukraine, unilateral Russian withdrawal will lead to Ukrainian forces counter-attacking and retaking all previously occupied territories.
With a peace treaty, Ukraine likely regains those territories peacefully (among other conditions).
Either way, Ukraine returns to pre-2014 borders, and is likely way on its way to joining NATO, not far behind Finland and Sweden.
Pretty much, exactly the opposite outcome relative to what Putin desired.
Never mind what happens in Belarus after Belarusians who are currently fighting on the side of Ukraine, start heading home in a few spare captured tanks.
Ukraine is a mess that will take years and years and 100's-of-billions to rebuild. Millions of its citizens are refugees that cannot return because there is nothing to return too.
It's bad in Ukraine, but not THAT bad. Russian army never got to occupy and damage more than 20% of the country.
There are numerous reports of folks already rebuilding damaged apartment blocks in Kiev and Kharkiv.
Some of the worst damaged areas may not be easy to bring back to life, but that's likely way <5% of the total capacity.
Russians can write off $300B of frozen foreign reserves, as assets lost to future reparations to Ukraine.
Most of Russian oil and gas pipelines flow over Ukrainian territory, so the potential for Ukraine to extract reparation from hydro-carbon transit taxation is limitless.
That's the biggest puzzle.
Russia started this war.
Only Russia can decide to end it. And I don't see how Putin can turn-off all the hype and hysteria about anti-Nazi special operation that he has propagated to date. And even if he could, he has done enough damage for Ukrainians to not let him off the hook without extracting a major pound of flesh.
Basically, Russia is loosing by attrition now. Once all western arms arrive and Ukrainians are trained to put them to maximum effective use, Russia will start loosing on the battlefield. 0-6 months from now.
As Putin fully knows, Russian imperial leaders come to grief soon after they loose wars. It's not an outcome he can cherish, or avoid.
How will the world ever trust that nation again?
How can there ever be anything approaching "Normalized" relations between Russia and "The West"?
It wont, and there wont be. For a little while.
The West and Europe have "permanently" cut ties with Russia economically, politically, and strategically. They wont be going back for a few years to a decade.
After some period of disengagement, we'll forget, and return to doing business with Russia, looking for ways to make money in that market.
By that time Russia may, or may not be, anywhere close to a country that we would recognize either politically, or geographically.
Except for Ukrainians. Those folks wont forget about Russian brutality and genocidal tendencies for generations to come.
This is their 1776-1783, war of independence.
They only have one strategic path forward - into NATO, by all means necessary. However long it takes.
To one degree or another Russia must continue this war to completion, meaning the total subjugation of Ukraine as that is the only way they can bury the calls for War-crimes tribunals and reparations responsibility that a "victorious" Ukraine will demand of them.
Logically, this is a true statement. However, there is no, and there has never been, a path to victory for Russia via military occupation of Ukraine.
The entire invasion gamble was based on a delusion that Ukraine will roll over and capitulate in days. Once that failed to materialize, they really haven't had a solid Plan-B.
There in lies the idiocy and the tragedy of this war.
Even a partial occupation (of Donbas and Ukrainian sea-shore) appears beyond Russian military capability. And now that Ukrainian forces getting steady supply of superior offensive western weaponry, Russia is risking major battlefield reversals over this summer. Even if those could be hushed up on Russian TV, at some point pretty soon Russia will also run out of the manpower and military equipment to wage war.
Then what?
If Putin is half-as-smart and well informed as some give him credit, he will negotiate a fig-leaf peace settlement.
If he is not, he will escalate. Until he runs out of the few additional BTGs he can scrape together. Already, Russians are pulling forces from Syria, Georgia, and the entire perimeter of their borderland. If this goes for much longer, Chinese, Japanese, Fins, Georgians, and Turks will be able to reclaim parts of their landmass lost to Russia over the course of the 20th century by just bicycling over the undefended borders.
The end result will still be same - Russian forces will get kicked out of Ukrainian territory.
The only open question is with how many additional casualties from both sides, and in what time frame.
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