Eesti ajateenijate hoiakute muutus enne ja pärast täiemahulise sõja algust Ukrainas

Abstract

The dissertation aimed to identify the change in attitudes of Estonian conscripts before and after the beginning of the full-scale war in Ukraine. The current international security situation has brought many changes to Estonia's national defense stance, focusing on the increase in defense willingness and threat perception among conscripts. Estonia's national defense relies on a reserve army, including conscripts, and NATO membership. Understanding conscripts’ attitudes towards security and the service makes it crucial to know their national defense stance. The thesis begins with a theoretical overview of conscription and its development, highlighting the attitudes towards conscription in the Baltic states in recent history. It then discusses the security situation in Ukraine, Russia’s behavior, and the impact of the military situation on individual threat perception. The final theoretical chapter addresses the relevance of defense willingness in the context of the war and the attitudes of conscripts, presenting different approaches to the concept. The attitudes of conscripts were examined through frequency distributions and a binary logistic regression analysis, with variables divided into attitudes toward defense willingness and threat perception. The time context was the year 2020/21 before the war began, and 2022/23 after the war began. The results illustrate the relationship between conscripts’ attitudes towards defense willingness and threat perception, with the primary statistically significant demographic factor being the native language. The perception of threat among conscripts has increased following the outbreak of the war in Ukraine, raising societal anxiety and stress. Increased threat perception has influenced defense willingness, which has risen since the beginning of the war. The rise in defense willingness is reflected in the changing attitudes of conscripts, who now place a higher value on the necessity of conscription for Estonia's national defense, and are more inclined to volunteer for service. However, while defense willingness has increased, conscripts still value individual freedom of choice in their lives, and most do not want to engage in active service after conscription.