I am not from the west, but rather from one of those countries russia/soviet union (but lets be honest here, it was always good old russia at its core and power) oppressed and destroyed over 4 decades during cold war, to have a nuclear battlefield with western Europe.
I know what I talk about when I bash russia and its society, I saw them destroy soul of not only my own nation but everything around, and legacy of that period is still doing massive damage back home. They have absolutely nothing in common with western values, rather run like mafia clans where power of stronger defines rules. Now of course I don't say every single russian citizen is like that, far from it, but society overall is, like it or not, just look at any news in past 30 years about them.
Absolutely nothing changed in that country since their house of cards collapsed, at least not for the better (list of things that got worse is way too long for posting here, but summary is endlessly greedy oligarchs and uber oligarch putin who is one of richest men in the world, and obviously not from his official salary but stolen from russian state and its citizens).
Look at how carefully Lukashenko dances around putin and whole war, this is how 'enemy of my enemy is my ally' looks like. Look at how russian troops were invited to help with unrests in Kazachstan to shoot few thousands of protesters, but then got very promptly kicked out of the country, and Tokayev shared his negative opinions on Russia many times. People don't forget murderous bullying, and so don't whole nations.