I would say though there are differences between today’s Russia and The Soviet Union.
Russia is still a dictatorship and an aggressive country. The USSR might have been much larger, but, Russia still rules with the same hostile methods. The word communism is not much used to describe Russia, but, like it’s said, ‘a rose by any other name is still a rose’, or crap by any other name is still shit.
Russia is copying the U.S. democrats, where any opposition to Putin and the Kremlin, will be dealt with by very unlawful methods, including incarceration without due process or even by death.
Countries around Russia have good reasons to fear Russia, and anybody that tries to find benevolent reasons for how Russia behaves, is completely blind. There are no justifications for having Russia invade its neighbors or for threatening its neighbor.