Canadians and Americans are distinctly hawkish when it comes to Ukraine, more willing to push back against Russia than almost all their NATO allies, including the United Kingdom, a major international survey confirms.

Barely 5 per cent of Canadians blame Ukraine for the festering conflict that has blurred its eastern borders, fewer than any other country in the Pew Research Centre’s Global Attitudes report, which drilled deep for public opinion from all sides of Ukraine, Russia and in eight NATO countries beyond.

The people beneath NATO’s military umbrella are sharply divided on the controversial question of arming Ukraine against Russia, the Pew survey found, with Canadians, Americans and Poles slightly in favour and UK respondents slightly against. Opposition to military aid is the majority opinion in France, Spain, Italy and Germany, where 19 per cent support sending arms versus 77 per cent opposed.

The 58-page report, based on more than 11,000 interviews, also found a generational divide in its sampling of attitudes of those nearest to the conflict, with younger Ukrainian respondents favouring closer ties with Europe versus older Russians nostalgic for the Soviet era.

Among the findings:

BLAME

Pew found a tale of two solitudes, with Russia bearing the brunt of blame for the violence in eastern Ukraine in every NATO country polled, with at least three times as many respondents pointing to Moscow over Kyiv. Only 2 per cent of Russians, meanwhile, found fault with Russia, with half of Russians instead blaming Western countries, 26 per cent pointing to the government in Kyiv and 4 per cent faulting pro-Russian rebels in the war-torn Luhansk and Donetsk regions.

HELPING UKRAINE

Beyond the divisive arms question, economic aid for Ukraine is supported by strong majorities throughout the trans-Atlantic alliance, including 75 per cent of Canadians. Only in Italy is the question close, with 44 per cent in favour versus 41 opposed.

HELPING EACH OTHER

NATO’s vaunted Article 5 pledge — in which an attack on any one member triggers a mandatory military response by all — fails the public sniff test in Europe, according to Pew. While majorities of respondents in Canada (53 per cent) and the U.S. (56 per cent) answered yes to a military response against Russia in the event of outbreak of war with a NATO ally, majorities in France, Italy and Germany said no. On the separate question of whether the United States would use military force regardless of what the rest of the alliance does, fully 68 per cent said they were confident of U.S. intervention.

A DIVIDED GERMANY

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The Pew Survey also detected vestigial Cold War divisions within Germany itself. Though Russia is viewed unfavourable on both sides of the long gone Berlin Wall, residents of the former East Germany were nevertheless twice as likely (40 per cent) to have confidence in President Vladimir Putin as their western counterparts (19 per cent).

AS PUTIN SOARS

Nearly nine in 10 Russians expressed confidence Putin’s handling of international affairs, a new high for the Russian leader, even though a plurality of Russians (37 per cent) now say the situation in Ukraine has worsened international opinion of the country. Coupled with high state approval and nostalgia for the Soviet era, Pew found that 61 per cent of Russians believe there are parts of neighbouring countries that rightfully belong to Russia.

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