Quote Originally Posted by Philippus Flavius Homovallumus View Post
Well- what's the point of sanctions?

We know they don't deliver regime change, so they're basically there to express our annoyance - which they have done. At some point persecuting Russia starts to benefit Putin's policy. Any constant enforced by one party in diplomacy ends up being turned to the advantage of the target in some way eventually because it's a constant.

At this point we should arguably be lifting all non arms-related sanctions. That will greatly reduce Putin's ability to blame Russia's systemic problems on the West whilst also forcing Russia to pay for all it's own military R&D and driving up the per-capita cost of their new equipment by reducing their ability to sell it oversees and thereby economise their production lines.
Sanctions are essentially economic violence. We arent going to go to war with Russia over Ukraine so this is the next best thing. True, the impact of sanctions on Russia haven't been much when compared to the impact of falling oil prices (most economists think that the Russian economy has been impacted three times more by falling oil prices than by sanctions). But they havent made it easy either. The arms embargo has certainly hurt, as the sale of the French Mistral carriers was cancelled. Limiting sanctions to just arms sales would definitely make it easier for their economy to recover. Im skeptical that sanctions have caused the anti-west sentiment, they have been blaming the west on their troubles for years before all this happened. And mind you, sanctions by the EU didnt really begin until the MH17 disaster, a disaster which the evidence solidly points to Russian implication.