Issue: 2/2019

NATO’S Aggression on FR Yugoslavia as a crucial element in Russian public oppinion’s attitude toward the West

Authors:
Georgi Engelhardt

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Analysis of results of fifteen 1992‐2004 public opinion polls (1 – ISPI RAN, 2 – VCIOM, 12 ‐ FOM) in the Russian Federation on the attitude towards wars in the former Yugoslavia with an emphasis on the 1999 NATO attack on Yugoslavia shows that by the mid‐1990s the traditional pro‐Serb sympathies had been revived in Russian society (it rose from 7,5 per cent in early 1993 to 31 per cent in mid‐1995). The earliest known text by Vladimir Putin on Yugoslav issues (April 1999) is an example of this attitude. This trend was followed by an increase in anti‐American and anti‐NATO sentiment. NATO aggression on the FR Yugoslavia in 1999 had the critical impact on the formation of anti‐American perceptions in Russian society and among elites. In the long term, it became the base of such views due to the generally shared attitude towards it as an utterly immoral action. Therefore, Russian society and the Russian elite significantly differ from the Western mainstream approach towards the crisis in the former Yugoslavia, and thus the insufficient support of Serbia has been widely perceived as one of symbols of Russia’s crisis and weakness of the 1990s.