You too exemplify the dangers of remote diagnosis. I don't hate Russia. I speak conversational Russian and just wished my 95 year old mother in law happy birthday in Russian. From 2015-2018 I visited Russia four times. I took my first Russian history course at Georgetown in 1972 as a 17 year old high school student.

So here's how to understand the essential difference between Russia and America:

America: rules above the rulers, obtain power through legitimacy.

Russia: the reverse. Ask the Prussian courtesan, Catherine the Great.

American: individual stupidity combined with collective genius.

Russia: the reverse.

The collective stupidity and narcissistic nationalism of Russians can be summed up in one phrase: its five century long marriage with empire is due for divorce.

Like the Ottoman, Austro-Hungarian, Japanese, German, Italian, British, French, Dutch, Italian, Belgian and Swedish people who divorced their dreams of empire before them, the Russian people need to end their marriage with empire and create an entirely voluntary federation with all the subjugated non-Russian peoples on their periphery. Russia has no viable centralized imperial path to peace and prosperity. Sovereignty only works when shared equitably.