I grew up in the US as a child of the 70s. Back then, the NRA was all about gun safety. Once the NRA started getting money from armaments firms, they morphed into the group they are today which (IMHO) is a lunatic fringe of gun owners.

Note this started a decade or so before the USSR collapsed, and about 40 years before the 2016 election.

Everything is not about God damned Russia. Is Russia a competitor/adversary of the US? Sure. But the source of the main problems in the US are the US oligarchs, not Russian oligarchs.