As we now know from Jens Stoltenberg (NATO Secretary General) the Russian invasion in Ukraine is explicitly about NATO expansion.

If NATO had not agressively surrounded Russia, there would be no Russian invasion.

If NATO would have pledged NOT to include Ukraine, there would have been no invasion.

So the repeated statements that "all that has to happen is for Russia to leave" = "All Russia has to do is to lie down and never respond to NATO aggression." As we see, Ukraine was the final straw for Russia, and they made it explicit with NATO.