Quote:
Originally Posted by CliffFletcher
One sobering lesson from this conflict is that the West does not dominate the globe the way it did 30 years ago. Most of the world is not onboard with the sanctions against Russia, and for all the levers at our disposal, the West no longer has the means to bring everyone else into line.
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That's true, but at the same time, I don't think there's a lot of indication that the US and its allies even want stronger effects from sanctions because of how it'd negatively affect their own economies.
For instance, sanctions against Russian energy aren't designed to prevent their exports; that would just reduce world supply and drive up everyone's energy prices. They're designed to reduce the amount of revenue going into Russia as much as possible without disrupting the flow too much, and on the whole they've been pretty successful at that.
Sure, everyone talks a big game to make it look like the West is doing everything it can, but ultimately they're happy to buy re-packaged Russian oil as long as they know Russia isn't getting market rates for it.