Some could argue that NATO is more emboldend now than before from the slow pace of the Russian Juggernaut which is not churning very smoothly.
The west
underestimated the Iranian war machine and military planning.
They
overestimated the Russian war machine and military planning.
Difference is Iran stepped up and won when it counted in Syria with the chips stacked against it.
Russia waited and waited and then finally made its move to a Ukraine that was mobilized. After the color revolution, Russia should have moved in. At the time Ukraine military was basically non existent and in shambles due to purges and the revolution. Hence why they did so poorly in the East before Putin listened to the German Dyke Merkel and agreed to a peace deal.
I remember vividly reading an military article when Russia took control of Crimea and everyone was afraid of Russia and the “little green men”. The article accurately predicted the Russian underperformance ahead of time. It basically said Russian military was a mirage. Outside of spetnaz and a few niche special forces groups ( ex VDV) the average Russian officer and infantry troop was wholly undertrained vs their western counterpart.
Now it was easy at the time to dismiss the article as western propaganda when Russia was coming off Georgia war, Crimea capture, and smacking around Ukraine in eastern part of the country. But it was a very accurate foreshadowing.
Soviet doctrine relies on tactical nukes to level the playing field against the West. It realizes it’s a quantity vs quality military and that the West has superiority in terms of arm tech. Even Putin himself said that the gap between NATO and Russia is huge and they are clear about that. Then he added nuclear war is the response to protect Russia against this gap. Tactical nuke strikes on staging areas and airbases/barracks would largely break up large deployments and negate Western air advantage and level the playing field.
The only problem here is if you face an opponent that is stronger than Georgia, but not an all out war opponent like NATO or USA. This is what Ukraine was. Then your strategy is half baked because you unable to steam roll your opponent and you can’t use nukes either.
General mobilizations are tough to break thru. Just ask Saddam. He had one of the strongest military in the world and couldn’t break thru against volunteers and a just born IRGC.