from the wets prospective a quick internal cue falloewed by regim change to a more western friendly pro democracy leader that ideally is afraid of china would be the best outcome.
Wonder what is the realistic incentive for that?
Russia is on its way to becoming hamstrung by China. Who else can Russia turn to?
China does not want Russia to implode and fracture, because that is an unstable situation for them. But if Russia was to fracture, you can be sure that China will want to control the pieces bordering China. They don't want chaos on their borders, or the power vacuum there somehow filled by western powers.
China's and Europe's attitudes and practices towards their let's say "dependent trade and strategic partners" is a different story, but EU can hardly boast on that front, judging e.g. by various African states.
Can't help but sad chuckle over this whole clash of rams battle of perspectives and the fact that Russia, Ukraine and other western countries had somewhat great relationships at the beginning of the century.
One could ask the same question from the Russian perspective when analyzing how Russia-West relations have deteriorated from Russia being in love with it, towards Russia having a lovecraftian fear of it (from Russian perspective, this is more of a proxy war with the West). This is actually the TLDR of Putin's Munich speech in late 2000-something.
I wonder what could be games theory solution here. Russia and the West don't trust each other and can't meet each-other expectations of peaceful coexistence - Ukraine got caught in the crossfire. What could hypothetically serve as a common ground for aligning the perspectives before it inertly escalates too far?