i think we are all missing an important point here: fia spent MONTHS in negotiation with several stakeholders trying to decide the 'best way to go' and the final veredict was that 'something like the R5s' would be the way to go. especially due to its incredible sucessful formula.
PLUS (since wrc27 will be "at the same level" in terms of general power), they could count on all the two thousand R5s out there to compete already in monte carlo 2027. they probably never counted on 'having new participants flooding in for 2027 and 2028 with new machines.
sure, we all hope we would have them (i mean... MONTHS spent on negotiations for just toyota to show up with the new car??? wtf??), but the general plan was probably a move to the sucessful R5 formula.
that way all the racers complaining they cant compete in WRC because of the cost and all fans complaining that "only 8 cars in just boring" would both cease.

does this thought makes sense?