Newsletters / Mikhail Khodorkovsky: Sanctions alone will never stop Putin
If the West really wants to force Russia to stop the war, it needs to focus on military build-up — not just economic action.
Dear Friends and Colleagues,
Snatching a glass of scotch away from a drunk isn’t going to make them sober. This is an obvious truth of human nature, yet one the West is seemingly oblivious to when it comes to sanctioning Russia.
The truth is, there is not — and never will be — an answer to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s aggression that lies in economic action alone.
What’s required is a demonstrable ability not merely to punish but to deter. Sanctions that are unbalanced by the required investment in, and preparedness to use, defensive force will never succeed — as can be seen with Russian drones now boldly testing NATO defenses.
But the West is as addicted to seeking answers in imposing and enforcing energy sanctions as the drunk is to his scotch. And its approach reflects a fundamental misunderstanding, not only of Putin’s goals but of his mindset.
Fundamentally, the war in Ukraine is not about economic control over a productive country. It is a strategic and ideological play against the notion of thriving democratic nations in Russia’s neighborhood, and for reasserting the dominance Moscow enjoyed during most of the 20th century.
Still, in response, the EU has pursued energy sanctions against Russia along three main lines: reducing imports, imposing a price cap and secondary sanctions. But the effect has been negligible at best — never mind the fact that sanctions have no moral authority when Western governments continue to pay billions for Russian gas annually.
The belief that the Kremlin’s war machine can be gradually bankrupted via energy sanctions doesn’t stack up. It is a conceit borne of Western leaders perceiving Putin’s motives through the lens of their own democratic values and misunderstanding the global oil market.
Europe’s leaders have made the choice of accommodating their domestic political audiences as much as possible, but Putin takes the opposite view. To him, national imperatives completely outweigh any concessions to public opinion.
In the media
Mikhail Khodorkovsky told TVP World that “only force” can bring a solution to Russia’s war in Ukraine, speaking in an exclusive interview on the sidelines of the GLOBSEC security forum in Prague: ‘Only force’ can end Russia’s war on Ukraine, exiled Kremlin oppositionist tells TVP World
Mikhail Khodorkovsky, explains in an interview with HN: ‘Fico has played a very dangerous game by supporting the Kremlin’
Mikhail Khodorkovsky in an interview with Lukáš Cigánek for CNN Prima NEWS: ‘The war in Ukraine will end within a year. But then Putin will start another one’
Mikhail Khodorkovsky in an interview with Lisa Haseldine for the Spectator: ‘The West isn’t ready for Putin’s hybrid war’
