In 2.2 at least, the Soviets have been in combat in various areas since 1991.
Quote:
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Ethnic and religious violence in the central Asian republics of the Soviet Union escalates, and the Soviet Union increases it's troop withdrawal schedule in order to use the forces inside its own borders.
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Note this was already occurring
before the coup.
Reading through the background material, the fighting only increased as time went by with more and more units called up, trained, and sent into the fight. By 2000, it's very likely a large number of older Soviet troops could have nearly a decade of combat experience on three or more fronts.
Meanwhile, (in 2.2) Iraqi invades Kuwait with the RL result. After Iraqi is booted out the west (less Germany) sees no further combat until December 1996, and besides Germany has not seen any significant reason to build up forces. The Germany-Poland situation is really the only reason I can see that the west is even at war in the first place (the east is a completely different situation with what looks like continuing a rolling internal revolts and political instability).