Forty Percent of Ukrainians Say Conflict in Donbass a War Between Russia and Ukraine, Razumkov Poll Finds

Paul Goble

            Staunton, October 11 – Since the Russian invasion and Anschluss of Crimea in 2014, it has been a fundamental proposition among Western analysts and government officials that Western countries will never be more willing than Ukrainians to view the conflict as a war between Russia and Ukraine and to resist Moscow’s aggression on that basis.

            That makes the results of a new Razumkov poll of 2015 Ukrainians in all oblasts except those occupied by Russian forces important (razumkov.org.ua/napriamky/sotsiologichni-doslidzhennia/gromadska-dumka-pro-sytuatsiiu-na-donbasi-ta-shliakhy-vidnovlennia-suverenitetu-ukrainy-nad-okupovanymy-terytoriiamy).

            They show the following:

·         40 percent of Ukrainians view the conflict in the Donbass as a war between Ukraine and the Russian Federation.

·         20 percent say that what is going on there is a separatist “rising supported by Russia.”

·         15 percent agree with the view that a civil war is taking place between pro-Ukrainian and pro-Russian citizens of Ukraine.

·         Seven percent say that the conflict in the Donbass is a war between Russia and the US.

·         6.6 percent say that the fighting is part of a struggle for independence by the Donetsk and Luhansk people’s republics.

·         11 percent had difficulty in responding.

Those figures show that by a factor of more than two to one Ukrainians reject Moscow’s arguments that it is now a war between Ukraine and Russia or Russian surrogates, a far tougher position than that held by many Western politicians who have implicitly or even explicitly accepted the Kremlin line.