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I'm not going to disagree with your overall point, but Gaddafi was engaged in direct military conflict with the Reagan administration several times (almost dying in a 1986 US airstrike), but managed to rule for almost two more decades before the bayonet incident. Saddam Hussein survived the overwhelming loss in the Gulf War and ruled for at least another decade. Castro died of old age, despite the Missile Crisis and the Bay of Pigs fiascos. Kim Jung Un and Khomeini still rule their anti-American fiefdoms.
Being a tinpot dictator isn't alone sufficient to guarantee a bad outcome, although you're correct that there are plenty of examples of it happening. In this particular instance, I expect either Putin loses power (either violently or through some sort of brokered exile) or Russia continues its current path towards irrelevant North Korean-style dictatorship.
Gaddafi's downfall came after a deal was struck where he agreed not to pursue nuclear weapons and America agreed not to interfere in Libya.
The subsequent NATO intervention in Libya was a message to the world that the best way to hold on to your sovereignty is to have a plausibly functioning nuclear weapons program. North Korea was prescient in its nuclear ambitions. Its territorial integrity has not been violated save for some shenanigans at border crossings that aren't reflections of state policy.
Snow Crash is fiction, but it seems to have understood this concept as well. The world's only remaining sovereign tows around a nuclear weapon that is wired to go off in the event of his untimely death.
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Despite? The Bay of Pigs was not a fiasco for Castro but the United States. It was a victory for Castro.
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