I have said it before-the times of intellectuals opining about the current affairs-and ‘ordinary people’ listening in awe- are truly over. Who needs intellectuals to interpret and ‘mansplain’ situations, preferences and the ‘actual truth’ when there are opinion polls? There, people speak for themselves. And whoever is interested in what people actually think, can look at the results of these polls-nothing added and nothing taken away, or very little… Here I present, in translation into English, the results of the opinion poll taken in Moscow on 11-14 March 2022. (Sample size of 1,000). The Russian public was asked about the way they see the Russian ‘military operation in Ukraine’, as the war in Ukraine is called in Russia. The results came my way via a fellow Russian demographer Dmirty Zakotyansky who did the world a favour by publishing them in his blog in Russian. ‘Russian Field’ was a polling agency conducting the poll at the request of Roman Yuneman, a Russian politician.
So, not an insignificant proportion of Russians actually support the military operation in Ukraine. This should come as no surprise really. Vladimir Putin is a very popular politician in Russia, as evidenced by series of polls conducted by Levada Center, for example, and the annexation of Crimea was a popular move that boosted him further. His normal levels of approval are around 70%-levels that Obama, Trump and Biden can only dream about. The annexation took him to 80%.
There is an age gradient in the degree of support given to the operation, as we see so often in relation to political preferences, Brexit etc in the UK and the West in general. Still, a majority of those aged 16-29 years support the military operation at least somewhat. Over 80% of Russians aged 60 years and over support it. And the level of education matters only very little: a solid majority of university-educated Russians support the military operation.
Can Russia develop, having severed its ties with the West? Again, a majority says YES, with an age gradient, as observed earlier, and a very little educational gradient. (I will translate from English to English=they are not afraid).
What is the most important goal of the operation? De-Nazification of Ukrainian governing structures -the Russian public says. Conquest of Ukraine is a low priority.
Last thing: one third of the respondents indicated that they have friends and relatives in Ukraine. The patterns of support for military operation did not reveal any correlation with the fact of presence, or absence, of significant connections with Ukraine.
It is not a Putin’s war. It is a Russian war, really. I said this many times. The obsession of the Western commentary with all things Putin misleads and mistakens the matter badly. But I will shut up. Who needs intellectuals… who indeed? The polls are here. And now you can judge for yourself. Do not thank me.