I am following both sides propaganda to stay above it. Per Russian, the greatest problem of Russia is... fools and roads. As for the struggle, of course largest players in the world will try to beat each other - it's their existence at stake. USA and USSR did it all the time throughout XX century, bringing their ideologies. Russia is an underdog now, so quite objectively can't afford soft belly.

It's just evolutionary impossible to have Russia as a perfect democratic state any time soon, so wishing it would be one equals wanting it would not be at all. And that latter would mean a lot of loss of lives as Soviet Union collapse demonstrated.

And yes, life in Europe, especially, in the Nordic countries, is good (and materialistic side does not measure it). It's still stupid to expect that after all dramatic social experiments of last century Russia somehow become a tamed tiger, advanced in the human rights specifically.

I am not defending anyone. I just want to say propagandas can easily create enemies where the reality is objective evolutionary process. When you see people and understand each other, the war is less likely.