We are now beginning to enter the stage of the war where Russia is unable to sustain a general offensive all the way up and down the frontline and must resort to terrorism to project fear and the illusion of unstoppable, corrupted power.
Expect more and more of this crap as Russia is less and less able to credibly fight a ground war.
Remember, acts of terrorism definitionally rely on propaganda creating mass panic for their power as if the perpetrators of the terrorism possessed true power they would have resorted to actual coordinated military action such as fighting on the frontline or taking territory.
In otherwords if Russia chooses to attempt something like this, it is by definition a sign of extreme weakness on their part as was the lazy attempt to claim Ukraine tried to assassinate Putin.
They might, if everything left is really really really dumb.
If Putin gains his own detached head, whoever comes after him will be politically much weaker. No matter who the leader will be, even if Putin, the Russia will very soon have to stop using mercenaries and must switch to conscripts. For a weak leader, it might be very difficult to squeeze people into the meat grinder. I’m not sure if such a follower-up would really have any way of continuing the war. No economy means no soldiers – except through conscription. And I don’t think Russians would accept a conscription. If the fledgeling autocrat cannot continue the war, what options does he really have other than the smart one? Let go of what must go so that at least a part of the Russia will stay together.
Soviet and Russian history has a lot of points where change of leadership was a linchpin that very suddenly turned the previous heroes into detested monsters. How Russians started talking about Jeltsin very soon after Putin rose to power is actually yet another example of that. There is precedence for putting all the blame to the predecessor and then going for big reforms.
Putin will eventually lose his place. The less Kremlin has that event under control, the better for everyone outside Kremlin. Therefore, better get rolling with it, asap!
It’s entirely possible that the replacement will really be as bad, but if Kremlin gets to decide on the follower, then the follower will definitely be as bad as Putin. Or worse. Because when it comes to war strategy, Putin is clueless, but micromanages all the time. If someone is otherwise the same but has some understanding of military strategy, things will only go south.