Russia stated three years ago its two objectives.
Eliminate army of The Ukraine, no quarter to the Azov creeps
Eliminate the Government installed by Nuland and the Azoz creeps
I do not know if Mr. Z simply lied to the voters or lost control to the nationalists once in power.
He used the fact that he grew up as a Russian native speaker to get support by the ethnic Russians, but now often pretends like he can't speak Russian well to distance himself.
However, it soon became evident, that the agenda morphed into something other than peace when he was in power. I think he's a weak leader, chained down by those that put him in office. The antithesis of a Trump that is an unbridled beast (what makes him dangerous to the political establishment, bureaucracy, and oligarchs).
In Mr. Z's defense, the guy had zero political experience, had no real money, nor political connections, is younger, has no military, intel, foreign affairs experience... IMHO, he is the classic “popular face” politician that is backed by some prominent Ukrainian oligarchs (Kolomoyskyi) and the US who we knew could be controlled.
I do not think this is an entirely unique / unusual scenario. Like a boy band, these sort of politicians are really just a show, a marionette that other people control from the background. He probably was owned by outside forces from day one. I'm not sure if everything he did was truly out of conviction.
“Eliminate army of The Ukraine, no quarter to the Azov creeps”
This was the main goal that the media and others never understood, the taking of land was incidental, the destruction of Ukraine’s army was the main goal. Once the army is destroyed, land can be taken easily if wanted. Right or wrong, Putin felt threatened by the existence of a large army on his border and was angered by the shelling of Russian speaking civilians. Putin is closer to accepting peace now that Ukraine’s army is decimated, Europe is out of weapons to send, and Trump knows it’s over.