It was Boris Yeltsin who ended communist rule in the former Soviet Union and made Russia an independent country, not the United States or the West. The US takes too much credit. Yeltsin did right. But he disappointed in the subsequent years in power.
Democracy did not deliver. But it was Putin who did not let the democracy delivery happen. Democracy was not allowed to take root. Putin is an autocrat by instinct. Putin is the reason there is no democracy in Russia.
A country the size of Russia is and will continue to be a world power. That Russia will have a sphere of influence just makes sense. But that "influence" needs to respect the sovereignty of other countries, especially the small countries in the neighborhood.
The Cold War ended and Russia lost. It is unrealistic for Putin to expect Russia to have the same stature as the former Soviet Union. Ends up even that stature was hollow.
The logical thing to do was to accept the new reality and build the Russian economy. Putin instead is going in the other direction. He is hurting the Russian economy left and right. Italy is a bigger economy than Russia and Italy is not even that big.
Russia's return to greatness will be through democracy, rule of law, and a free-market economy, and Putin stands in the way.
