I have high confidence a at some point Putin will say he was misled and throw his Generals under the bus.
Putin has incredibly high approval with the Yeehaws (rural whites) out in the Sticks , so the Russian’s “European Vacation class” (Educated Elites) aren’t going to try to pin it on Putin (even though they know it was Putin).
We’ll know in the next few weeks if Putin personally doubles down, or looks for scapegoats. He knows if loses the Yeehaws, he is done. This war killed many Yeehaw kids, but The Poor’s (rural non whites & the whitish) did the majority of the dying.
There had been upheavals against Tsar Nicky since the loss to Japan in 1905, but he hung in there until 1917.
Well, blaming it on the generals works to appease the domestic population. But that will do nothing to appease the rest of the world. So unless they like being a hermit kingdom, I think they’ll hang Putin out to dry eventually.