After the dismantling of the Soviet Union, Russia under Yeltsin was a friend. At the same time the nation's economy was carved up between local oligarchs and foreign multinationals.
Then the change to Putin, that goes after said oligarchs to wrest back control. Now all of a sudden Russia is the big scary bear to the east.
I don't see a big scary aggressor. I am looking at a nation and leader that wants some degree of self-determination, and is being vilified and boxed in as a response.
You missed the shooting down of the civilian airliner and the destabilisation of Ukraine.
But of course you could apply tu quoque here as well. The entire area from Vilnius to Islamabad has both US and Russian proxy forces, influence-purchasers, spies and propagandists active in it. That's where the carve-up is going on.
Do you think him doing something obviously stupid like this is more likely than just supplying serious weapons to incompetent "soldiers"?
The incursion into Ukraine was presumably supposed to be deniable, unlike the Iraqui invasion of Kuwait.
it's very easy to say "Don't trust him, he's a liar"- but if the two that are saying not to trust each other are historically feuding, then perhaps you should believe neither and check facts while attempting to avoid biased sources.