> Arguably, if the pre-requisites to the Ukraine conflict had analogs then, Hitler would have stopped expanding, on his own.

I’m not sure. Rationally, Putin shouldn’t have started the war; he was told Russia will get sanctioned to oblivion, which it did and is genuinely hurting Russia, and he should have known his forces aren’t up to scratch. Due to some kind of delusion he pressed ahead. Hitler may have done so too. For example, hoping that the western powers won’t risk MAD over a bit of Central Europe, much as they didn’t care much for Western Czechoslovakia.

Of course sanctions aren’t MAD; but then nothing is, and no analogy is very close.