“Putin happens to be a Communist, trying to restore the Soviet Union.”
Link please. He has talked out restoring Russia, which is significantly less than the Soviet Union, but I don’t know of him ever saying anything about restoring the Soviet Union.
He said the collapse of the Soviet Union was the greatest geopolitical tragedy of the 20th Century. Since ascending to the presidency, he has been adding back pieces from that Union. One can logically deduce his mindset and intentions from there.
Lenins body is still on display in Moscow, the Russians hold Soviet throwback parades every year, outside Moscow and Saint Petersburg it still looks like the USSR, and your friends are hanging up Soviet flags and restoring Lenin statues in occupied Ukraine.