(EDM) The sharp escalation in artillery battles in the Donbas (eastern Ukraine) war zone one day after the January 28 telephone conversation between United States President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin was certainly not a coincidence. No leaks about the content of the 45-minute-long exchange have appeared in the Russian media, and the official summary amounts to mere platitudes. But the anticipation had been extraordinarily intense (see EDM, January 30). Commentaries about a possible lifting of sanctions came so thick that for the first time in years, it was not Putin’s name that was mentioned most often in the Russian media but the name of a foreign leader (Interfax, February 1; see EDM, January 2). Public opinion surveys have duly registered the quick decline in Russians’ negative attitudes toward the US, from the peak of 81 percent in early 2015, down to 49 percent now. Of these unfavorably inclined Russians, only 9 percent expressed a strongly negative attitude, compared with 39 percent two years ago (Levada.ru, February 2). Ukraine is presently seen in Russia in a darker light than the US, with 15 percent expressing a strongly negative attitude; and this perception quite possibly informs the behavior of the combatants enduring a harsh winter in the Donbas trenches. […]
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