Very good points but I still get the feeling a lot of this has to do with that last election in Germany.
All of a sudden that new gas pipeline wasn't looking like a printing press for Rubles so Putin wound up painting himself into a corner.
Which is very ironic. Its now up to Russia to back down in order to avoid a war with NATO. I think Putin was betting that the rest of Europe would ignore Ukraine and would choose to "play nice" with the conquering army.
Instead, NATO told him politely to Stuff It.