Seeing the footage of civilians being targeted on the news it's clear no Russian soldier should be able to argue they didn't know what they were doing or they were just following orders.
You have to remember that rule 101 of being caught is to say those exact things, the Ukrainian will have it drilled into them the same (although it is slightly different with them being the defender), anyone further up the chain of command keeps this up for a few days and then spills their mission hoping that it has already been carried out etc, what you are seeing online is not just an indication of Russian military being illinformed etc (although wider footage shows it is falling apart with the recent footage of Russia shipping over non military vehicles to be used as logistics, chinese knock off tyres and even the Belerusian knock of tyres of the chinese version causing issues). It is a standard response.
Like it or not, this is a proxy war being fought with Ukraine as its locus. I can't tell whether Putin realises he's made a major fuck-up and feels his only option is to act as scary as possible, or whether he's priming the stage for some manufactured excuse to spread this to other countries. I fear the latter. I hope there are some sane higher-ups in Russia who just won't go along with him.
It is a new proxy war for sure, and it won't end at a Russian or Ukrainian victory, only this time the ones raising it do have nuclear weapons and its why it has spooked the EU into more military spending, putin has surrounded himself with yes men during the past couple of decades but this will turn into a cold war 2.0 not ww3.