I think one of the most timeless themes of war is folks talking about war, sometimes endorsing it, who will never go to war themselves. How would folks perspective's change, if their skin was in the game? It's a question that will never be answered.
I listened to a podcast about a potential analogous path to an end to the Ukraine conflict that would be a good-case-scenario, and they used the Finnish Winter War as their model. During those months of war, the Finns never stopped pleading for peace with the Soviet Union. They never closed the lines of communication. In the end, they ceded over 10% of their territory, and history largely views them as the victors of that conflict - in particular the moral victors.
As long as the bankroll is unlimited, and rhetoric is that of "absolute" victory of full Russian withdrawal on Ukraine's behalf, which by the way will never happen, the establishment is narrating itself toward a rock and a hard place.