If the Russian people are unhappy enough, regimes change from within. We can see that with some of the Russian soldiers surrendering.send me to Ukraine? OK, I'll just surrender so I don't have to fight and die for a bogus cause.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Ym9e7ot4t-JVBDqtK0m4n6iYPqd...
Hopefully that makes a difference. I do think it's smart to do everything we can to sanction Russia's rich. Those people have power. They're the ones backing Putin. If they start to feel the pinch, feel that the party is getting ruined because of Putin's mood and his thirst for power, they might do something about it.
Thus, over time, you can gradually create a bubble, lie by lie. I remember the early 00s - freedom of press wasn't gone overnight, they went after the more popular stuff first, and then gradually it became more and more marginalized, with the last vestiges being swiped away only now. But with every independent TV channel or newspaper erased, more and more people ended up in the bubble.
How? The oligarchs had a head's up regarding the start of the war and no doubt took measures to secure their wealth abroad and even get dual citizenship so the west can't touch them.
Well yes, sure, if we're talking about some dumb corrupt politician who blew his illicit gains frivolously on luxuries, out in the open, the second he landed on piles of cash, then yes, same how we have lottery winners who lose everything in a year and crypto speculators who also were left holding the bag, etc.
My point is that stupid and financially irresponsible people are easily parted with their money, especially if it's from illicit gains and have no knowledge how to launder it or invest it, but I can assure you that the smart money took enough timely precautions to keep their dirty wealth intact.
Apart from when the US got the UK and France to kneel and kiss the ring in 1956 with Suez when hav sanctions worked? Grenada? North Korea and Iran have been under crippling sanctions for a long time. It leads to plenty of civilian suffering but there’s not much record of success in forcing governments to do what the sanctioners want.
They don’t have to topple the government to be effective.
That said, I do think there’s not enough public recognition of how hostile and damaging sanctions are to innocent normal people.
Not just Trump, but the entire Republican Party and its voter base. And not for no reason: the reason is that it's easier to keep Iran as a public punching bag than try to deal with real and far more difficult strategic problems like North Korea, Russia, or China, all three of which seized the opportunity to pursue their strategic goals while the U.S. was distracted in Iraq and Afghanistan. Iran took that opportunity, too--the wars provided both the impetus and the time to pursue a nuclear program.
I'm curious, what strategic goals did North Korea, Russia, and China achieve during that time that the US should have dealt with, and what could be have done that we haven't already?
That's one opinion.
I think people on both sides are calling the others shortsighted.
For example, what enforcement is there after the 10 year period expires? They weren't forced to forfeit or destroy their Arak facility. This means they could just start using it again.
In my view, the deal could be beneficial, but could also end poorly. The deal doesn't seem to embrace a systems thinking mindset of how all the pieces fit together. The downside is that if we allow the economy to expand and for Iran to accumulate resources during a 10 year period, then reimposing the sanctions will be less impactful (we can only hope that the people would be upset enough to pressure them goverment). In theory, the deal will benefit Iran in the power dynamics, and only benefit us if they decide to follow through in the long term. So the outcome is almost completely at the discretion of Iran, and provides them guaranteed benefit, with no guarantee to the others.
In my general experience, focusing on a single issue, or component of an issue, is the way we come to short sighted solutions. This doesn't mean that we can't do things in an iterative fashion, but we need to have a plan and vision for how that policy will work long term in relation to a variety of other policies and potential events. I don't see that type of strategic thinking with this agreement, and that's even ignoring the terrorist ties.
[Edit] Also, I don't think the Russian people have the power to overthrow their rulers. Russia is quite good at repressing dissent. My guess would be that any leadership change in Russia would come about because military leadership decided it had to happen.
We all hope that, but it's not been effective for north korea and basically everywhere else. Waiting 70 years as for the Soviet does not seem an ideal outcome.
Anecdotally, there's been an HN commenter around who claims to be Russian and who buys Putin's line that something had to be done about NATO. Apparently they are not alone:
https://www.cnn.com/2022/03/03/europe/russia-reaction-war-uk...
> But Arina's mother sees it completely differently: "My mom believes everything she sees on TV," Arina says.
> "She believes that it was a necessary measure by Putin because there are weapons surrounding the country...there's a threat from the West, which is why Putin is doing this."
Sanctions may be indiscriminate, but not as indiscriminate nor as final as shelling apartment buildings. There seems to be a significant slice of the Russian population who are entirely too content with the current state of affairs, and who need to be woken up to the ungodly horror being unleashed in their name.
Maybe a rapid decline in quality of life will be enough to turn things around in Russia. Or maybe just enough people are so used to struggles there that nothing will change. North Koreans went through decades of wars and invasions—the people there haven’t known that life can be better, so they don’t feel a reason to revolt. People in Russia who were alive during pre-Putin era struggles most likely do really see him as lifting the country to a higher level. The possibility for Russia becoming a new NK-style state isn’t completely impossible.
[1] https://akarlin.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/life-expectan...
The end of the USSR is widely considered a humanitarian catastrophe because after the economy colapsed, people had no food, no medicines, no order, it was a wild west for several years (my wife was there, she tells me all about it)... where the hell did you "learn" that people's lives improved after the USSR fell??
Unfortunately, we have to resort to economic pain, which is quite grim even if it's not having your leg blown off and your home reduced to rubble: businesses ruined, working class populations impoverished, massive uncertainty...
It's also not guaranteed to work, as aggressors and oppressors are adept at wallowing in self-pity and inventing victimization narratives.
What's changed for me is that I've come to believe that the Russian population is a bit more at fault here for buying Putin's bullshit.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2022/03/03/putin-will-live-...
Sadly paywalled.
Most despotic leaders are not well liked by the people. There are so few examples of the people rising up to depose a despot. I actually can't even think of one that would apply in this situation.
He is probably insulated with layers of old Soviet/KGB true believers/cronies.
Somehow the common person is going to penetrate that? I just don't see it.
Are you sure? This is not at all obvious to me.