In recent years, Russia’s relationship with Western countries, specifically with members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), has been on a roller-coaster ride. In 2010, U.S. President Barack Obama and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev signed a New START agreement that reduced the number of deployed strategic warheads on each side by roughly 30%. But Russian annexation of Crimea in 2014 and its ongoing support for separatist forces in eastern Ukraine has once more strained relations between Russia and Western nations.
Going forward, most NATO members are willing to provide economic aid to Ukraine and offer it NATO membership. But they generally shy away from sending arms to Kyiv or escalating economic sanctions against Moscow. And at least half in Germany, France and Italy are unwilling to use military force to defend other NATO allies against Russian aggression.
Russia, Putin in Disfavor
Russia’s current image problems are especially bad in Poland. Poland has had a long, painful relationship with Russia, having been invaded, dismembered and occupied by a series of Russian and Soviet regimes. Thus it is hardly surprising that just 15% of Poles have a favorable view of Russia. But the Poles have not always despaired of their ties with their neighbor. As recently as 2010, 45% of Poles had a favorable view of Russia – three times the current share. Just as striking, in 2010 only 11% had a very unfavorable opinion of Russia. Now more than three times that number, 40%, intensely dislike Russia.
The British have similarly turned against Russia. Only 18% in the United Kingdom voice a favorable view of the country. This is down from 25% of the British in 2014 and 50% in 2011. It is also notable that in 2011 only 7% of the British said they held very unfavorable views of Russia. In 2015, that proportion has quadrupled to 28%.
Only 22% of Americans express a favorable opinion of Russia. This is largely unchanged from last year, but down from 49% in both 2010 and 2011. At the same time, however, intense animosity toward Russia seems to be waning in the past year. The proportion of Americans holding very unfavorable views is down 11 percentage points, from 38% in 2014 to 27% in 2015. Still, older Americans are more than three times as likely as younger Americans (40% vs. 11%) to see Russia in a negative light.
Fewer than three-in-ten Germans (27%) hold a favorable view of Russia. This assessment has improved 8 points since last year. But it is down from a recent high of 50% in 2010. German men are twice as likely as women to have a positive opinion of Russia.
Views of Putin in NATO countries have historically been very low and have dropped even further in some countries in recent years. Putin’s peak popularity was in 2003, a heady time when 75% of Germans (rivaling the 76% of Russians with faith in Putin), 54% of Canadians, 53% of British, 48% of French, 44% of Italians and 41% of Americans had confidence in him to do the right thing regarding world affairs.
Putin has never again attained this level of trust in the West. Today, fewer than a quarter voice confidence in his leadership in any country, including just 9% in Poland and 6% in Spain. These attitudes are largely unchanged from 2014. It is older and more highly educated people in both the UK and the U.S. who are most likely to voice no confidence in Putin.
Russia Seen as Threat to Neighbors
Other actors in the Ukraine drama are seen as less culpable for the hostilities in eastern Ukraine. Three-in-ten French, 25% of Germans and 22% of Italians say pro-Russian Ukrainian separatists are responsible for the violence there. Few say the responsibility lies with the Ukrainian government itself. And only in Germany (12%) does a double-digit minority believe that the actions of Western governments in Europe and the U.S. are accountable for the hostilities.
Views of NATO Generally Favorable
The North Atlantic Treaty Organization is the Western alliance created in 1949 to provide collective security for its members in the face of the military threat then posed by the Soviet Union. NATO now includes 28 countries from Europe and North America. The eight NATO members surveyed by Pew Research Center in 2015 account for 78% of NATO countries’ population, 88% of their gross domestic product and 94% of their defense spending.
Given their contentious history with Russia and their proximity to the fighting in Ukraine, it is not surprising that 74% of Poles hold a favorable opinion of NATO and the security reassurance membership in it provides. Polish support for the alliance is up 10 percentage points from 2013. Six-in-ten or more French (64%), Italians (64%) and British (60%) also hold a favorable view of NATO. However, roughly a third of the French (34%) and about a quarter of Italians (26%) express an unfavorable attitude toward NATO.
The greatest change in support for NATO has been in Germany, where favorability of the alliance has fallen 18 points since 2009, from 73% to 55%. Germans living in the east are divided – 46% see it positively, 43% negatively.
What to Do about Ukraine
In response to the situation involving Russia and Ukraine, publics in NATO member countries were given options as to what, if anything, they wanted to do about it. The survey suggests they support economic aid for beleaguered Ukraine, but comparatively few favor doing much else.
Ukraine’s relationship with NATO has long been the topic of contentious debate, both within the country and among the members of the Western security pact. Since the end of the Cold War, governments in Kyiv have wavered between a desire to eventually join the alliance and a desire to remain nonaligned.
NATO membership for Ukraine is backed more by older (66%) than younger Americans (55%). Conversely, younger Germans (51%), French and Poles (both 64%) favor it more than their elders (32% of Germans, 52% of French and 54% of Poles).
Notably, despite recent developments, support for Ukrainian membership in NATO is relatively unchanged in a number of alliance countries – France, Germany, Italy, Poland – compared with attitudes expressed in 2009, when Pew Research Center asked publics a standalone question: if they favored Ukraine joining NATO in the next decade. Among the nations surveyed, support for Ukrainian membership in the defense alliance has increased by double digits in the U.S., the UK and Spain.
There is relatively little support among NATO members for sending arms to the Ukrainian government. A median of only 41% back such action. Despite Poles’ general antipathy toward Russia, their concern about the military threat posed by Russia and their blaming Moscow for the current violence in Ukraine, only half (50%) want NATO to give arms to Kyiv. Americans are divided on the issue: 46% support sending weaponry, 43% oppose it. A majority of older Americans (56%) favor arming the Ukrainians, while more than half of younger Americans (54%) oppose it. And majorities in four of the eight nations are against helping arm the Ukrainians. The strongest opposition is in Germany (77%), Spain (66%) and Italy (65%).
In a related question concerning the situation involving Russia and Ukraine, Americans, Canadians and publics in the six EU member states in the survey were asked if they thought that the economic sanctions imposed on Russia by the EU and the U.S. should be increased, decreased or kept about the same as they are now. Outside of Poland, there is little appetite for escalating financial penalties. About half of Poles (49%) back ratcheting up economic sanctions. Roughly three-in-ten Italians (30%), Canadians (28%) and Americans (28%) agree. But only about a quarter of the French (25%) and the Spanish (24%) go along. Only one-in-five Germans want more economic pressure applied to Moscow. There is also relatively little interest in decreasing sanctions, except in Germany (29%). Most publics – including 53% of both Americans and British – want to keep the penalties about where they are now.
Mixed Views on Coming to the Aid of NATO Allies
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Roughly half or fewer in six of the eight countries surveyed say their country should use military force if Russia attacks a neighboring country that is a NATO ally. And at least half in three of the eight NATO countries say that their government should not use military force in such circumstances. The strongest opposition to responding with armed force is in Germany (58%), followed by France (53%) and Italy (51%). Germans (65%) and French (59%) ages 50 and older are more opposed to the use of military force against Russia than are their younger counterparts ages 18 to 29 (Germans 50%, French 48%). German, British and Spanish women are particularly against a military response.
More than half of Americans (56%) and Canadians (53%) are willing to respond to Russian military aggression against a fellow NATO country. A plurality of the British (49%) and Poles (48%) would also live up to their Article 5 commitment. And the Spanish are divided on the issue: 48% support it, 47% oppose.
Germany: Old Divisions over Russia and NATO Remain
There is also internal German disagreement on what to do about Ukraine and Russia. German reunification has not closed the east-west divide in that country, a division that has its origins in the Cold War.
Major Partisan Split in the U.S.
Republicans and Democrats in the U.S. are strongly divided on the situation in Ukraine and what to do about it. Members of both parties see Russia as a major military threat to neighboring countries, but to a different degree. Two-thirds of the GOP sees Russia in that light, but only 56% of Democrats share their fear. And while half of Republicans say Russia is to blame for the violence in eastern Ukraine, just 39% of Democrats agree.
With regard to U.S. and EU economic sanctions on Russia, substantial percentages of both parties favor keeping them about the same (44% of GOP and 54% of Democrats). However, 40% of Republicans would increase those sanctions, but only 23% of Democrats approve of such action.
Members of both parties support NATO membership for Ukraine. Such support is greater among the GOP (71%) than among Democrats (59%). Moreover, there is a partisan difference about U.S. obligations to come to the military assistance of other NATO members. Nearly seven-in-ten Republicans (69%) say that Washington should come to the aid of its allies in the event of Russian aggression. But only 47% of Democrats back that long-standing U.S. treaty obligation, while 48% oppose it.
