In reality these assertions about the 1990s are not so much about what actually happened - not about the past but the present and maybe the future. It is hard to escape the suspicion that they are an effort to create an alternative historical reality that justifies a more authoritarian line of politics at home and an antiwestern foreign policy abroad. This wouldn't be the first time in Russian history that the enemy at the gate was invoked in order to justify the iron fist. Does it matter? Can we not just leave this debate to historians and get on with it? With a slight thaw in the air in relations between Russia and the west, shouldn't we look forward and not backwards? Well, it does matter. So long as Moscow rewrites this history to demonise the west, one must wonder if it is now honestly interested in cooperating with us. Perhaps we will know that the Kremlin is getting serious about opening up to the west when this fictitious account of the 1990s stops becoming official history and starts to be replaced with a more accurate and nuanced narrative.
Don't hold your breath waiting for Russian paranoia and opportunistic demonization of the West to end any time soon. I think it is an effort of tremendous optimism to assume that this Russian view of the West is deliberately used for other devious purposes, but that the Russian rulers actually understand that the harsh view of the 1990s is a distortion. I think Russia's rulers sincerely believe the line that they are peddling. It is natural for Westerners to think that Russia's rulers couldn't possibly actually believe that crud, but that is really the simplest explanation rather than rationalizing an argument that they think like us.
So don't become confused and believe that concessions to Russia, like New START, have any effect on Russia's views of the West. They believe what they believe, and facts be damned. Any lessening of tensions is a tactical reset by Moscow to get more from the West while they can get it.
Not to worry, however. The real threat to Russia will eventually deprive the Russians of their fantasy-based fiction of their victimhood at the hands of the West. Then there may be a real strategic reset with the West.
Of course, by the time it is obvious to even the most paranoid NATO-focused Russian that they've been ignoring the real threat of China, nobody in NATO will want to let Russia join NATO and push the alliance's front line all the way to the Amur River. Shoot, a lot weren't all that happy about pushing it east of the Elbe.
