Neither Enemy nor Friend

The greatest enemy of the U.S. is considered to be Iran. When asked without a prompt, 25 percent of American respondents named Iran as the greatest enemy. Russia is in this rating, but it doesn’t top this list, much like its position in any other American public opinion poll.

For Americans, Russia is a country that bears little importance and is hardly noticeable.

It is not good that Russia has been listed among the top 20 countries that Americans perceive as being their enemies. On the other hand, only 3 percent of the Gallup respondents called Russia America’s enemy, so this couldn’t be considered a worrying result. Within the limits of statistical error, it’s about 30 people out of 30,000 overall respondents.

Iran is mentioned first, while North Korea and China received 16 percent and take second and third place respectively. They are followed by — which is interesting — Iraq and Afghanistan, which are actually under control of the U.S. army. Then, Russia shows up with its modest result.

During one of its latest polls, Gallup was interested in finding out whether events taking place in one country or another is “vitally important” for the Americans. The list has included 12 countries that sociologists, for some reason or other, consider worth paying attention to. Russia takes second to last place in the rating, leaving India at the bottom: 36 percent of respondents think that what happens in Russia is vitally important for America. It’s a little bit less compared to the 2007 results (40 percent) and to 2000 (46 percent). The leader is China: Events happening in China are thought to be of vital importance by 70 percent of Americans (58 percent in 2007 and 48 percent in 2000, respectively).

The poll shows that Russia and China had approximately equal importance for the average American. But for the past 10 years, China has become — figuratively speaking — two times more important than Russia. The U.S. attitude toward Russia is more friendly than hostile, but hardly anybody has strong sympathy towards Russia, either. According to the February Gallup poll, 51 percent had positive opinions about Russia (only 5 percent were “very positive”), while 42 percent replied negative (10 percent were “extremely negative”).

Polls by another large agency, the Pew Research Center, show that Russia is still perceived as a superpower by a small number of Americans. But nobody thinks of Russia as economically strong (in this rating, China leaves the U.S. behind!). Also, Americans are not interested at all as to what happens in Russia (China takes first place again).

The bottom line is that American society is indifferent toward Russia; they do not think anything about us, either good or bad. In general, they do not think of or have feelings toward us at all. It’s very pleasing for the country that is quite noticeable on the world map and claims to play a major role in the world politics. Certainly, the events taking place within their own country are much more important to Americans than world events (and this is a very normal thing), but everything that gets on CNN and other programs, they notice and follow. In the mirror of American polls, Russia is reflected no stronger than Mexico or Pakistan; this does tell something about relative political weight and influence of the countries. It also reveals the capability to propose world-important initiatives and incite admiration for achievements. We could choose the way of South Korea, for instance, to get America’s attention — but in this case, obscurity is better.