I think you can make a rational argument for the war from many perspectives. As I have aged, I have become more cynical about such things and just say this:
It’s about Money.
The Uniparty had a money laundering scheme in Ukraine, and they wanted to protect it. The Russians saw the resources, food, titanium, and oil and gas (new discoveries) and saw profit if they could control them.
My theory ignores things like: state security, NAZI’s, CIA,
Confusing American politics with the Russian need for an assault buffer is basically historical ignorance
very well stated.
Attrubuting such large enterprises as war to leading individuals dismisses consideration of the agency for those that drive the enterprise. Assigning leading individual culpability for a war enterprise in itself is a propaganda function.
I have always looked at attributing great shifts in socioeconomic power or war to a "great leader" as lazy scholarship. Great leaders are just self promoting opportunists that have succeeded in promoting their brand. Focus on the individual crowds out the examination of the opportunity they exploited.