Recovering the territory they lost in 2004 always seemed so far fetched considering they are defending from an attack that tried to grab even more land. I don’t know much about Ukraine but it didn’t look like they had any hope of getting that land back before this attack so if they could go back to the 2004 borders with some assurance of peace it would in theory be a victory for them here. Of course who knows how long this peace would last though.
All I know is, if my country had lost part of its territory and I had had nearly 20 years to put my life around after that, I probably wouldn’t want to risk all my friends and family’s lifes into trying to get it back. Defending from further aggression is one thing, but have people fight to restore land that was lost before they were born is another.