Quote:
Originally Posted by Biodome
I mean, based on how EU politics work, there must have been some sort of debate and voting on this, so I'd expect there to exist some reasoning buried beneath it all.
I've heard that Crimea is a strategically and economically important location to Russia due to the naval ports and military bases located there, so I'd speculate that these sanctions weaken the region and put a larger burden on Russia to support it. Maybe they decided that extending those sanctions to the whole of Russia might not be feasible in some way or another? I have no idea why though. Perhaps some of the information is even classified.
Foreign policy is such a complicated field, and often with little to no transparency. It's interesting to think about how the whole conflict might develop, and if there will ever be a resolution to it. It seems sort of frozen right now. I haven't even checked how the military situation is in Eastern Ukraine. International/Mainstream media doesn't report on it anymore, from what I have seen, compared to when it all began.
|
I imagine it's difficult to have an open and transparent debate about foreign policy without also making concessions. Countries doesn't like imposing sanctions, because they - in most cases - hurt themselves as much as the adversary, and because sanctions are famed for their inefficiency.
At the same time, it's important to understand that the goal of sanctions is to "win an argument" and get current conditions fulfilled. The goal isn't to defeat an adversary. For this reason, one must also take care not to cause instability in excess of what would be proportionate to the object of the dispute - or (because again; sanctions work both ways) yourself!
For these reasons, I imagine that the applied reasoning could be such as; if we impose these sanctions on the entirety of Russia, rather than "only" Crimea and Sevastopol, then...
- ...we'll be damaging our export market
- ...we will risk destabilisation of Russia
- ...we will risk destabilisation of the EU (for example, if Russia turns of the supply of gas to Europe, while Europe is technically selfsufficient in gas, the prices of gas would rise dramatically, affecting domestic and commercial heating, production and mobility)
Finally, sanctions will also have to produce a tolerable outcome for both sides. That is to say; while sanctions may be imposed, noone wishes for that to turn into a war. The Japaneese Attack on Pearl Harbor, December 7th, 1941 is a good example on the consequences of sanctions, that were (intentionally or not) too strong to "work".
Russia was already struggling with macroeconomic challenges, particularly caused by a decline in oil prices in the later 2014. The sanctions combined with the decline in oil prices essentially sent Russia into recession with a GDP growth of -2,2% in Q1 2015. When Russia responded by banning the import of "western" food, in combination with the decline of the Rouble, the prices of food rose, and essentially the inflation was worsened.
I don't think the sanctions are at all related to military strategic value. While it's true that Russia has and have had naval bases in the region, sanctions would be largely ineffective against that.