I've been saying since the days of the collapse, that what they provided was a necessary foil against which democracy and the ideal thereof was enhanced. Without this foil, we have seen our ideals of freedom...particularly individual freedom...degraded, and we have moved strongly toward a more socialistic existence. In other words, the Soviet Union made more inroads against us by failing than they ever hoped to do by succeeding; because the dimwits among us can't grasp the relationship between individual freedom and collective success, and because of the natural, mindless sentiment of liberal morons that everyone should have the same, even if that means having nothing.
Reagan gets credit for the collapse, but the Afghanistan fiasco was really what broke the back...and Carter was who made things tough for the Soviets by supporting the Soviet opposition in Afghanistan, the Mujahideen. Reagan carried on the policy and built it up, but only after seeing how successfully the Soviets could be frustrated by well-supported guerilla tactics. For my part, I would restore the USSR minus its domination of those countries that would choose sovereignty over a Soviet umbrella. It was good for us.
I also said that the USSR was really a shell for Russian nationalism. I was right. Now that we no longer have the USSR to kick around, we have Russia to kick Biden around.