That’s right. I generally agree with what everyone is saying and I’m not trying to peddle some pro-Russia narrative here. But I also think that sanctions are by necessity crude instruments. I think there’s a lot of reasonable anger about the atrocities in Ukraine that is causing people to hand wave away the complexities of trying to use sanctions to achieve policy ends, and some (IMO) dangerous attempts to sidestep the complexities all together by assuming all Russians deserve to suffer.
We must use sanctions because we can’t do something more precise, like assassinate Putin. (But that should be on the table.)
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Once again, I am not opposing sanctions. I am opposing the narrative that vengeful sanctions with no policy purpose are good as long as Russian citizens are made to suffer.
Who is supporting this narrative?
I am not accusing anyone specifically of it. But it is absolutely adjacent to many of the calls for sanctions.
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The USA has an abundance of just about everything and we’d collapse in a month if the world put sanctions on us. All that grain doesn’t grow and distribute itself without an infrastructure that depends on foreign trade.
As far as ample resources, your average Russian isn’t getting the benefit of any of that. Median per capita wealth is less than Iraq. These aren’t people who are living the high life.
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I just can’t bring myself to care much about the suffering of the Russian people while their soldiers are raping and pillaging their war across Ukraine, especially when economic hardship is apparently the only thing that actually gets through to them (we know it’s not their media).
When Ukrainian civilians aren’t being raped, tortured and murdered, then I’ll be more receptive to talk of when is appropriate to ease sanctions.
https://twitter.com/olex_scherba/status/1512488613820649473
This guy’s wife is probably loving the war right now.
I think sanctions may be a lesser evil but let’s not pretend it’s okay to collectively punish a bunch of people with no power just because some gopnik is doing war crimes.
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There’s a difference between a nuclear-armed superpower and a smaller country ruled by a despot with outside support, to whom the people really do not matter.
By all accounts, the opinion of the Russian populace ultimately matters. Look how much effort the govt puts into propaganda. This isn’t a situation like Belarus where the despot leader mostly cares about support from his benefactor (Putin).
If economic suffering is what it takes to get through to the populace, then I think it’s justified in the case of Russia.
Also it really feels really unseemly to me to be even talking about empty grocery shelves in Russia when its troops are Rape of Nanking-ing their way across Ukraine, with a healthy majority of support back home.
Just scroll this list for a few minutes then tell me we should be fretting over Russian people facing economic hardships: https://twitter.com/i/lists/1467909429534380034
https://twitter.com/DmytroKuleba/status/1512498956365877255
These were recorded by the ombudsman of Ukraine, whoever that is. I’ve seen it a few times but obviously they aren’t confirmed.
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Collapse in some ways, sure. But hardly all. The rough argument as I understand it is that sanctions should be felt, but not to the point of genuine suffering of everyday citizens. Russia’s biggest exports are oil, gas, grain, fertilizer, lumber. Their biggest imports, which they buy with money from export sales, are phones, cars, computers, and pharmaceuticals. Their only major food imports are fruits and nuts.
I’m going to assume we aren’t sanctioning the pharmaceuticals, but everything else seems to be precisely the sort of things we should be targeting. They can’t get money from selling their commodities, and they can’t use the money they have to buy finished western goods. Not being able to buy a new phone or an Audi is exactly what I want everyday Russians to experience.
Using your US analogy, there would certainly be immediate hardships if it was sanctioned the way Russia is. Most Walmart shelves would be empty. I probably couldn’t get next day delivery of dumb shit from Amazon. But nobody would starve. The power wouldn’t go out. There’d surely be weird knock-on effects in some areas similar to what we’re already experiencing with the supply chain crunch, but there wouldn’t be widespread humanitarian disaster.
We obviously don’t want to cause the latter in Russia - we don’t want to be responsible for humanitarian disaster. And I don’t think we will, or even could without actually attacking the country. But am I ok with all the department stores in Moscow being closed because they can’t get any products delivered? Yes, absolutely.
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https://twitter.com/ukraine_world/status/1512419496602083337
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I would set fire to their wheat fields.
You would stay home and tell other people that was a thing that should be done.
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https://twitter.com/JeremyCliffe/status/1512355505234227200
Lol at “Putin must be popular because he keeps winning elections.” Just couldn’t be more dead wrong, and still almost winning. People suck.
Do you think there should be sanctions on North Korea?
Sure, but I’m not going to pretend the sanctions aren’t also harming lots of civilians.
North Korea is a great example of a country that is rich in resources and has an economy deliberately designed to be self-sufficient and it’s still a hellhole. The idea that any modern country can cut off trade with the rest of the world and basically be okay is a fantasy we’re telling to comfort ourselves.
Unfortunately there is no other way to punish Putin but to punish everything around him, including indirectly or partially directly his population.
The harder you make it for him to govern a collapsing economy, the harder you make it for him to continue waging war in Ukraine.
I always envisioned most of the sanctions would be lifted if the war is concluded to Ukraine’s satisfaction. In particular, Zelensky should be allowed to dangle sanction relief in peace talks.