Not my assertion - Russia's.
If the West wants to play the grain card again, Russia would be wise to force that grain across the replacement bridge that the West pays to rebuild.
That's not a stupidly bald assertion. It's the same one used for any chokepoint such as the Panama Canal, the Suez Canal, and fuel pipelines. You want to ship your merchandise; you're going to use our rail, trucks, pipeline, canal, or bridge.
John Kerry and his cronies have been cashing in on millions decades by forcing natural gas shipments by tanker to Massachusetts instead of by pipeline. They stop any push to have a pipeline built. They get all the usual Leftists out front: https://ma.mothersoutfront.org/what_we_need_to_know_about_the_pipeline_fight
“Not my assertion - Russia’s.”
I didn’t say it was your assertion, I said it was a stupid, bald assertion. It doesn’t matter who makes the assertion. It remains stupid and bald to state that the US blew up a bridge that Ukraine is perfectly capable of blowing itself. Show me the evidence that it was the US.
“If the West wants to play the grain card again, Russia would be wise to force that grain across the replacement bridge that the West pays to rebuild.”
Russia would be utterly stupid to attempt to force that grain across any putative replacement bridge for the following reasons already stated.
1. The grain can and is being shipped via Odessa Port, which Russia does not control, and passes through Turkey, which is part of NATO. He can continue attacking grain shipments bound for Africa and the Middle East, but that runs the risk of a full-blown war with NATO under Article V.
2. There are rail lines and highways between Ukraine and Poland, Bulgaria, Moldova, Slovakia, Hungary, and, yes, Bialarussia (presently harboring Yevgeny Prigozhin from Putin’s wrath). And via the Black Sea Ukrainian shipping can also reach Georgia.
There is no way that Putin can “force the grain” across any bridge to Crimea, even he wanted to, without going to war with some or all of those countries, and probably also NATO. But he doesn’t and won’t, because he does not have a death wish. He’s not crazy, just farting higher than his own a@@-hole, because he believed the lies his sycophants told him about how powerful his military is, when in fact it was rusting away due to theft and neglect, and the fantasies in his own head about how easy it would be to conquer Ukraine. 500 days and counting.