MOSCOW – Agence France-Presse

More than 70 percent of Russians support Moscow’s bombing campaign against Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) in Syria but the danger of getting sucked into a protracted war is not lost on the public, a new poll showed Oct. 8.

The study conducted just days after President Vladimir Putin secured permission from parliament to launch air strikes in Syria found that most Russians approve of his latest decision to use force abroad.

The launch of strikes in Syria is Russia’s first major military involvement outside former Soviet Union territory since the invasion of Afghanistan in 1979.

Seventy two percent of respondents said they approved of the bombing campaign and 46 percent said they agreed with the decision of the rubber stamp parliament’s upper house to allow Putin to use force abroad, said the independent Levada Centre.