President Trump mused about supplying Tomahawk missiles to Ukraine, a dramatic step because Tomahawks could reach Moscow from Ukrainian territory. But now Trump has taken Tomahawks off the table.
Instead, the Treasury Department has imposed sanctions on Russia’s two largest oil companies. Treasury’s press release says:
Today’s action targets Russia’s two largest oil companies, Open Joint Stock Company Rosneft Oil Company (Rosneft) and Lukoil OAO (Lukoil), which are now designated.
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As a result of today’s action, all property and interests in property of the designated or blocked persons described above that are in the United States or in the possession or control of U.S. persons are blocked and must be reported to OFAC.
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In addition, foreign financial institutions that conduct or facilitate significant transactions or provide any service involving Russia’s military-industrial base, including any persons blocked pursuant to E.O. 14024, run the risk of being sanctioned by OFAC.
I don’t pretend to understand the intricacies of a sanctions regime, but I take it the point is to deter India and China from importing Russian oil. That may be working:
It has already prompted Chinese state oil majors to suspend Russian oil purchases in the short term, trade sources told Reuters. Refiners in India, the largest buyer of seaborne Russian oil, are set to sharply cut their crude imports.
I believe the history of sanctions as a foreign policy tool has generally been disappointing, but we can always hope. The Europeans have joined in with a new package of sanctions that includes a ban on imports of Russian liquefied natural gas.
Will all of this bring Russia to the negotiating table and end the Ukraine war? Russia’s dogged commitment to the war, which has imposed costs that seem vastly disproportionate to any Russian interest, is puzzling. It seems to me that any rational Russian leader, trying to advance his country’s best interests (whether legitimate or not) would be looking for a way out of the conflict. The fact that Putin has been willing to keep it up suggests, I think, that he doesn’t believe he can survive an end to the war that admits failure.
