One of the goals for government takeover is to get the non-toady countries to legally recognize the Crimea takeover, which, alongside any other takeovers needs a rubberstamp from Kyiv to be even remotely doable.
Of course they didn't, the money for them disappeared
Having less objectives is not different objectives.
Probably more than you lol.
War in Syria still going on, keks open more wars regardless, they don't even learn from own history.
They know that they can bully tiny ex-colonies with populations in single digit millions but it turned out those methods work well only on appropriately bite sized snacks and using them on anything bigger risks choking.
The bulk of the VDV is in the south. And yes Russia would use the VDV for this purpose as a matter of historical and doctrinal reasons. Even then, the bulk of the VDV deployed for Kyiv Operations made it out and are now on the Kharkiv Front. They did the historical job they were meant for in accordance with doctrine born of WW2.
Yes, they never intended to land at Odessa, its mere threat served to tie down valuable UkA reserves and waste resources there. Kherson's fall made it more believable. Once the UkA realized it had been had, the Odessa Feint Forces unloaded and redeployed.
US Marines did the same in the First Gulf War.