It's fairly self-evident that the Empire has sought to erase Russia from the world, one needs only to watch any western movie to recognize their bias at "Russ man stupid, Russ man baddie". Only the smooth brained would swallow that blatant propaganda. The only way for an idiot to break out of the brainwashing is when their hero is exposed as a fraud, until then they will do just about anything to defend their programming. As the saying goes, it's easier to fool someone than to convince them that they've been fooled.