Sean Davis [The Federalist]:
In one of the dumbest geopolitical moves in history, Europe outsourced its energy industry to Russia, laughed at everyone who said that was moronic, and then proceeded to wage a proxy war against the country that now has a monopoly on the continent’s gas and electricity. What did you idiots think was going to happen? My word.
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The Associated Press
Russian energy giant Gazprom says it can’t resume the supply of natural gas through a key pipeline to Germany because of technical problems. German officials have called Russia’s previous reductions through Nord Stream 1 a political power play.
One more time.
“In one of the dumbest geopolitical moves in history, Europe outsourced its energy industry to Russia, laughed at everyone who said that was moronic, and then proceeded to wage a proxy war against the country that now has a monopoly on the continent’s gas and electricity. What did you idiots think was going to happen?”
It only became a ‘dumb’ move when Europe decide to ‘sanction’ the energy that they need from Russia. Until that point, Russia would have happily sold them all the energy they wanted, despite internal pressure to cut off those sales.
So what’s in it for Russia to keep selling oil had Europe not decided to ‘sanction’ Russia? ANSWER: Credibility with the other 80% of the world that is not sanctioning Russia - Russia wants to be seen a reliable trading partner, at least for now. So, while, it made short-term sense for Russia to quickly cut off Europe, ‘sanctions’ or no ‘sanctions’, it makes a lot more long-term sense to simply let Europe step in it with their ‘sanctions’ and use that the rationale to cut them off.
That’s a big factor in why Russia’s favorability numbers in the non-Western world went from about 30% just after the Ukraine invasion to 70% now.
Put Greata on a treadmill, she could run and generate some power