and often the exact same people who helped accelerate the catastrophic fall of the USSR
You mean America and NATO? You know, the guys who actually did that…
No. I mean the robber baron oligarchs who got rich from corruption, stole national industries from ordinary Russians, ensured the USSR bled to death, parked vast sums of ill gotten gains in foreign accounts, and sold their country and countrymen to the highest bidder.
The ‘elite’ who now run Russia, claiming the fall of the USSR was a great tragedy and pretending to be its last defenders, while minimizing their role in its downfall from the safety of palaces, foreign residences and mansions which would make the Tsars blush at their vulgarity.
People like Putin, who goes on about how tragic it was that the Soviet Union fell, while wearing a million dollar watch and conveniently forgetting his ties to the oligarchs and Yeltsin.