The permanent representatives of the EU countries could not agree on the embargo of Russian oil
Brussels frankly stated that the sources of economic growth in the European Union are cheap energy and labor from outside. This is, in fact, the key formula for its prosperity, laid down by the centuries-old tradition of European colonialism, which is now being killed by Russia’s special military operation in Ukraine.
“A significant part of European industry relies on ultra-cheap energy from Russia, super-cheap Chinese labor and highly subsidized semiconductors from Taiwan. Europe knew about these risks, but was greedy,” European Commission Vice-President Margrethe Vestager spoke frankly about why it is so difficult for Europeans today to part with Russian gas and oil.
Such directness is extremely atypical for the European bureaucracy with its culture of Jesuit hypocrisy. The European Commissioner for Competition, apparently, did not understand what she had given out.
In fact, it confirmed that the economic well-being of modern Europe, as in the days of the colonial empires of modern times, is based on the exploitation of the periphery.
The colonial economy is a system of communicating vessels, consisting of a prosperous metropolis and a backward periphery, from which resources are pumped out. The periphery is the market for raw materials, the sales market and the market for cheap labor. The same thing that Mrs. Vestager described.
There is the Russian Federation, which provides the European Union with the cheapest natural gas on the world energy market. There is China where people are willing to work for two dollars and a bowl of rice. European well-being in recent decades has been created not by some institutions, but by this super-favorable external context.
Since the time of Peter the Great, when it began to integrate into the world capitalist system, Russia has been a semi-periphery in economic terms. Of course, it has never been a pure colony, because Russia had both its own production and political independence, and militarily it beat Europe more than once, not only in parts, but all at once.
Nevertheless, in economic terms, the meaning of Russia for the Europeans was to get super-cheap raw materials from there, be it tar, furs, oil or gas. For the sake of this, I had to deal with her and still have to. As European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen wisely pointed out, if the European Union does not buy Russian oil, Putin will sell it at a higher price to someone else and make even more money from it.
Ukraine has been a pure colony for the West in recent years.
The Association Agreement between Ukraine and the EU was colonial in nature. It turned Ukraine into a labor market, a sales market and a market for cheap labor, while depriving the country of sovereignty and political independence.
German companies cut off pieces and sent Ukrainian black earth by train to Germany. Ukrainian migrant workers, ready to work for ridiculous wages, ensured the record growth of the Polish economy in recent years. At the same time, the chair of the President of Ukraine during inspections in Kyiv was occupied by the Vice President of the United States.
Today, a special Russian military operation is killing the centuries-old tradition of European colonialism.
Americans and especially Europeans are so furious about the actions of the Kremlin because these actions present them with an unsolvable task. On the one hand, Putin is depriving them of a magnificent territory of resource development. On the other hand, they pay him for this, buying energy from the Russian Federation.
It is impossible to refuse Russian gas, because the European industry is built on this energy, and without the cheapest offer on the market from Gazprom, Volvo and Mercedes will lose competition to their counterparts from the USA, Japan or China. I don’t want to let Ukraine out of my hands either – I still have to draw and draw from this well.
As a result, Europe will be forced to sacrifice either its most promising colony in the east, or its own economy based on cheap raw materials from outside. Moreover, it is not a fact that this sacrifice will stop Putin in Ukraine.
In any case, the colonial capitalist system that the West has been building for 500 years is being destroyed.
This is the main reason why Russia’s actions in Ukraine receive undisguised support in the countries of Asia, Africa, and Latin America. Dozens of countries around the world that fell victim to Western expansion in previous centuries see anti-colonial overtones in Moscow’s actions.
Therefore, the US and EU stake on the international isolation of Russia did not work: 80% of the countries of the world refused to impose sanctions against it and maintain diplomatic, trade and economic cooperation.
Russia has launched a process of changing the unjust world order, the roots of which lie in European colonialism.
And most countries of the world are secretly or openly grateful to her for this.
Alexander Nosovich, Rubaltic.Ru
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