Of course, there are differencies. But I asked you to focus on the similarities.
At this point Russians are a small ethnos without a nation, living often in emigration and taking on features of the host nation.
If so, you can forget about those Russians, they're doomed to die out. Taking features, living abroad. There are more than 140 mln people living in the Russian Federation, they matter, the others - don't.
to repent of the sin of Communism and earn the forgiveness of the peoples of Eastern Europe.
No, an idea like that is too "Eastern-European" for a Russian national idea. It gives neither self-identification, nor emotional drive. Just a wet dream of some Eastern-Europeans. Imposing such ideas requires a revolver as Al Capone might say. Eastern Europe lack one today.
If you measure the success by being a menace to the rest of the world, yes. It is a tragedy that the Soviet period is not seen as Dark Age by the neo-Soviet people.
No, I measure quality of the country's public life and don't include anything from international relationships.
The public life in the USSR consisted of ruthless suppression of anyone with a conscience, and frightening military parades. Nor can the life of a nation be separated from the damage that nation does to others.
If the Russian nation does not come to repentance, it will perish. Like any penance, it is for the sake of the guilty party more than for the sake of other nations, which all, even Ukraine, managed to move on.