> What does Russia hope to gain from this?
This also highlights why the US/European strategy of playing chicken and focusing on "de-escalation" is fundamentally flawed: it gives adversaries the initiative and the lever for controlling the temperature. Whenever it gets too hot for them, they can dial it down, whereas the "de-escalation" camp has to dance to the tune of their adversaries.
It's the very same mistake that was made with Hitler.