I see Russia as not having taken the opportunity to become a modern nation when it had so many chances, JB.

I fully embrace the Enlightenment as a good thing for people and the planet. We need to learn to see the truth as it really exists and have the power to act on that information.

In the West, uncontrolled neoliberal ideology put pressures on the world that were damaging in the past, and some nations still embrace that position that are damaging still. In the West in general today, and particularly with the happiest nations in the world, we see a very strong social-democratic essence, empowering the people, trying to make this a better world (partly succeeding, not fully).

The EU, for instance, gives corporations a decent push back; the horse jockey controls the horse better than anywhere else in the world, benefiting society, benefiting the world.

In the USA, the horse jockey does not control the horse all that well.

When viewing Russia, the people are still so much in a medieval state of mind. It is a backward nation in many respects. The Russians do not own Russia; the elite owns Russia and all other Russians. The elite took Russia to war, not the people, who are nevertheless fighting and dying in this war.