How enlightening, great beacon of knowledge from the Great White North deigning to bless us humble Americans with our heads in the sand with your knowledge. Were you even alive then? I was living in Europe at the time. How about you?
And to your trenchant historical note, I would say "Thank God". As would the hundreds of millions of people liberated by that event. But you can understand why for many Europeans and Asians the Soviet Union was viewed as Russian imperialism writ large. And with a former KGB agent in the Kremlin, they remain wary of their paranoid neighbor.
I will agree that economically Putin has been much better for Russia than Yeltsin and he deserves his domestic popularity. The US and the world benefit from a strong and prosperous Russia. But his stated view that the collapse of the Soviet Union was one of the greatest tragedies of the 20th Century makes his neighbors a little nervous. How about you?
His statement about the collapse wasn’t a lament about the system but rather about Russia’s standing in the world. Hey, few were happier than my family and I that the USSR collapsed. But for Russians it is still a bitter pill to swallow to know that they’ve lost (and rightfully so) Empire. But being a Russian leader, Putin has to be sensitive to those feelings.