I recommend to you this Wall Street Journal article about Russia, written by Daniel Pipes. He has some insights you may find helpful. His main point is that, as the world's largest country, Russia sees itself as a Great Power.
Many of the objective facts about Russia today do not support this view: declining population, weak military, internal problems with their Islamic provinces, and declining influence with adjacent states that were formerly members of the Soviet Union. Nevertheless, Russian citizens want to believe their nation a Great Power, much as France cannot accept that it is no longer a great empire.
Pipes' notion that it hurts nothing to treat the Russians as a Great Power is less solid. See what you think.
