The heads of the European foreign affairs agencies who gathered yesterday in Luxembourg did not particularly hide the fact that the goal of the new session should be another package of restrictions against Russia
Over the past six weeks, Moscow, according to those who introduced the first, second and further rounds of restrictive measures, should, if not fall into the united European feet, then at least feel all the Tantalus torments of the dying economy.
But it turned out that there was no flour in European supermarkets. So, from torments to flour, the distance turned out to be truly a sprint, although the planners of the sanctions thought it was a marathon. At least a marathon.
Well, then sunflower oil disappeared.
The strategists of “containing Russia” could not imagine that a united Europe would simultaneously find itself in the epicenter of a shortage of at least two important food products (and no less important ingredients for the food industry), and even so hastily, the strategists of “containment of Russia” could not. They lacked the breadth of imagination and freedom of political creativity.
But what’s done is done, and where there were bottles of sunflower oil, holes gape today. It is known that after butter and flour, chicken eggs and meat, both poultry and cattle, may disappear (or become very expensive). Note this fact and move on.
In a situation where what is happening in everyday and difficult European life has little to do with the highest political empyreans, the European officials living in these empyreans decided to sharply turn the helm of the ship entrusted to them. Not to balance the trajectory of movement, but to “cut off” Russia on a turn.
Josep Borrell, chief of European diplomacy, who arrived in Kyiv, said that “this war will be won on the battlefield”, promising new and more intensive military supplies to the country. The Vice-President of the European Commission, whose prerogatives for all previous centuries, that the profession of a diplomat exists on the continent, was reduced to the search for peace, revised the European postulates of foreign policy, those that were formulated at the end of the Second World War and were paid for with the blood of tens of millions of people.
The tweet, which has six words and one preposition, has become sensational in its own way. One side.
On the other hand, these six words cannot and should not be interpreted otherwise than as a threat against the Kremlin. More precisely, a threat to Moscow. And more precisely, the threat against Russia.
Josep Borrell aimed not only and not so much at the Russian authorities: he is a sufficiently informed person to understand that it is useless to talk to the Kremlin in such a tone, but at the Russian people, at Russian society. Which, contrary to what was imagined about it in various European capitals, as well as in Washington, turned out to be surprising and supernatural (especially in comparison with the atomic, split and amorphous society of the collective West) whole and integral. Bound by ideas that are shared by almost everyone. Connected by a value scale, which is the same and equally important for the colossal, multi-million and extremely united people today.
Who, and again contrary to the expectations of all those who dreamed of dividing him into “personality and individuality”, became as one – for what is important to him in this life. For those values that cannot be bought or repurchased even for very big money.
And for the second time in the last 80 years, collective Brussels is rolling out an ultimatum to this united people. The reaction was predictable, and there are no questions. But I would like to ask: what was Brussels thinking (and is thinking) about in such a situation? And most importantly, what, as a result, such statements, if and when Moscow decides to respond to them with specifics, the one they are trying to provoke, should they bring to Brussels, Paris, Madrid, Lisbon and Berlin? Does Europe really want a fight with Russia – without using Ukraine as a buffer? Or were these roaring six words (the seventh – an excuse) were said to please Kiev once again? (This also cannot be ruled out.)
These questions of a semi-rhetorical nature, however, should be formulated in order to understand without any omissions: European irritation with Russia today has reached such an extent that the only way out that seems right in Brussels is to annihilate the Russian state.
When it is required to increase the pressure from the outside and at the same time from the inside (technologies are known and have been applied many times), so that not only the lid is torn off the boiler, but the boiler itself is also torn apart.
Actually, the sixth round of sanctions, which was discussed in Luxembourg, and Borrell’s six-word “Kyiv” tweet are ways not only to raise the stakes in this geopolitical party risky for the West, but also the method will increase pressure both outside and inside the boiler.
The essence of the new – sixth, twenty-sixth or fifty-sixth – restrictive measures for Russia today does not even have a symbolic meaning, since the country feels fine and looks to the future with realistic optimism (having practically unlimited natural resources, spaces stretching over a dozen time zones, you can afford not to be afraid of anyone and nothing), but, for example, Bulgaria, where all the oil it receives is of imported Russian origin, is probably not a laughing matter.
Large German business is also unhappy: the most powerful economy in Europe has become powerful, not least because it imported high-quality and inexpensive Russian energy resources. This is what ultimately made German industrial exports so competitive in world global trade. And shining brightly like a diamond of good quality, the balance of the foreign trade balance of Germany, with a possible embargo on Russian black and blue gold, can fade instantly, like cheap cubic zirconia.
And, of course, not only German industrialists, but also their French, Italian, Spanish and all other colleagues from the 27 EU member countries cannot but understand that the restrictions already introduced and those that are only planned to be introduced are enormous losses for them: loss of both profits and markets.
Legally imposed sanctions against Russia are de facto destroying the pan-European economy, causing damage that will not be able to be compensated for many years.
But if restrictions for Russia itself become an incentive for growth, since there is where to expand and with what and how to saturate the market, then for a united Europe, restrictions hit the economic development strategy, the tactics of getting out of the recession caused by the two-year pandemic, the purchasing power of European citizens, who have not yet managed to recover from lockdowns, how to tighten their belts again. Taking with all this, millions of refugees.
By shifting the geopolitical crisis on the continent towards a higher degree rather than a de-escalation, actually engaging in a crossbow in front of everyone, a united Europe, whether Brussels and its adherents like it or not, is taking another step towards its political finale.
And the louder they talk about the unity and community of values, the more doubts arise in this regard. In this sense, the Russians have historical experience and have a healthy reflection, and we remember that the geopolitical catastrophe thirty years ago also began with the lack of essential products in stores.
Elena Karaeva, RIA
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