Why is it so difficult for Ruzzia to understand? They lost. It is very simple. The USSR was as big and as influential as Ruzzia ever got, and it failed - they collapsed completely.
USSR lost, not Russia. It was a strategic mistake of the United States, when they collapsed the USSR in 1991 and won the Cold War, they relaxed and began to rest on their laurels. Apparently they thought that Russia would collapse on its own.
Is it really so difficult for the West to understand? The Union republics did not strengthen the Soviet Union, but rather drew vitality from Russia. Now Russia is much stronger than the USSR in the best years of its power.