russia has no soft or diplomatic power left
Basically a busted flush.
if it doesn't have the brute military force
Brute military force is not only what they specialise in, it's pretty well all they can do; Ukraine and the west even outsmart them in maskirovka now.
I was reading about the Second Chechen War. I remember at the time all the outrage when it was found that there was a slave market in Chechnya. What I didn't know is that most of the slaves were actually r*ssian conscripts sold to the Vhechens by their own commanders. That's the level of trash we're dealing with.