Do what the US does, declare victory and leave. Have a big parade honoring the hero’s of Donbas. Who cares? Russia has embarrassed itself enough, no saving face on this mess!
Your idea is very Russian and maybe that is the end game.
However, the real power in Russia is found in the Oligarch class. The 500 or so people who own 98% of the wealth in the nation. A parade and state media claiming victory will NOT recoup their losses and they are more focused on the West (where the money is) than internally.
This is a dangerous situation on so many levels and the internal turmoil of the Russian Federation has only begun regardless of what happens with Putin. History shows a “strong man” will emerge and history also shows that the “friends and allies” of the previous strong man suffer similar fates.
It is fair to say that any populist leader that emerges in the coming vacuum will be militaristic AND will seek to seize the wealth of his corrupt predecessors.
That is history over there. Consider one possible scenario......... IF Putin falls will there be be nuclear weapons on the black market again? What better way to assure your peace and security if you are an oligarch or corrupt senior government official? They cannot flee to the West so where will they run with their money and what is the price of shelter?
It's all about timing. You have to declare victory when you have actually won. In the first gulf war, we declared victory with no occupation and no annexed territory, and there was zero doubt who won the war. We could have done the same in Gulf War 2. But Bush Jr chose "De-Baathification", where anyone who was a member of Saddam's Baath party was to be arrested (Baath = Arab Nazi), and changing their entire form of government from Baathist to western style democracy.
Russia has decided to follow our model of Gulf War 2, and are doing it far worse that Bush 43 did.