No, that is not nearly as scary. Not even in the same order of magnitude. Why? Because the Soviets have had those for years - actually, make that decades - and was there any thermonuclear war between the West and the Soviets? No. They have had thousands upon thousands of nuclear warheads, many hundreds of delivery systems of every sort and type ranging from boomers prowling under the arctic, ICBMs on railways, even nuclear landmines. Soviet military doctrine was to quickly move to the nuclear option the moment their conventional forces started to get overwhelmed. At the time when the USSR was at its most powerful and could (at least theoretically) be considered a superpower, when the Warsaw Pact faced off against NATO, when the world came very close to nuclear warfare a couple of times (ranging from the Cuban missile crisis when things got a tad bit dicey, to even more closer calls when the Soviets thought they were under attack due to glitches in their early warning system - and still did not launch). Yet, no nuclear war. Why? Because MAD existed, and no matter how crazy the Russians are they are not stupid.
Comparing the nuclear arsenal of the Russians to the new and increasing nuclear arsenal of the Chinese, and saying that it is 'scarier,' is like someone commenting that some lion in Africa is 'scarier' than the mass-murderer-pedophile-arsonist who just moved in next door! Logically plausible (yes, the lion is 'scarier' in technical terms), but functionally stupid (yes, stupid - the lion is thousands of miles away, yet the perp is bl@@dy next door!).
The Russian nuclear stockpile is indeed larger than the Chinese stockpile, but it has been large for decades without anyone lighting off, and even when the Soviets had some semblance of power, and during periods when things were looking hairy, nothing atomic happened. The Chinese stockpile is growing quickly, and while this doesn't mean there will be nuclear war (like the Russians, the Chinese are not stupid), what it does mean is that the Chinese will have growing influence and the ability to do things without anyone having much to do about it. For instance, if I was a Taiwanese legislator or Vietnamese general or any number of countries that have a political (e.g. the Taiwanese 'breakaway province' per China) and/or economic (e.g. the oil rich reserves in the South China sea that are claimed by several nations, including China) I would be ensuring that I build up my defensive options (preferably something survivable but cheap enough to get in sizeable numbers - maybe a dozen plus advanced AIP-DE submarines armed with anti-ship cruise missiles). Why? Because when China is able to move about at will in a couple of years, there is nothing that the US will do about it.
By the way, continuing down the spectrum. In the same way I rank the Russian nuclear stockpile MUCH lower (in terms of threat) than the fast-growing Chinese nuclear stockpile, I also rank the Chinese nuclear stockpile MUCH MUCH lower than ONE NUCLEAR BOMB in the hands of Al Queda.
Same logic as before. A murderer-arsonist-pedophile next door is not as bad as a murderer-arsonist-pedophile in your bedroom, standing over you sleeping, holding a knife and having visions of smearing your bloody viscera over his face.
But, the Russians have been working diligently to keep their arsenal up to date. They have an effective nuclear triad, and are the only country to have an effective road ICBM. And, yes, they can put these into other CIS countries without violating any treaties as long as they remain under Russian control.
And the same thing goes for Russia and the CIS going into Georgia or Eastern Europe (Poland, Czech Republic, ect). NATO won’t go to their aid because it will be too weak to do so.