Posted on 09/16/2025 6:46:21 AM PDT by Mariner
US President Donald Trump has demanded that allies stop buying Russian oil before he moves on punishing Moscow, and told them to hit China with tariffs.
But Trump's requests do not seem feasible, and the EU notes that it has already hammered the Kremlin with sanctions.
Meanwhile, diplomats fear it could be a ploy by Trump to again stall on taking a tough stance against Russia himself.
- Stopping oil purchases? -
snip
If Trump is serious about getting all NATO countries to turn off the taps, then the bigger issue could be non-EU member Turkey.
snip
- Tariffs on China? -
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By demanding something he knows the EU is not willing to do, officials worry that Trump could be looking to justify not going after Russia himself.
(Excerpt) Read more at yahoo.com ...
Europe will have to bear all economic costs of their virtue signalling.
That frustrates them.
Stumped and stupid Euros. Trump needs to dump NATO.
Diaper Diplomacy on twitter has a cute video of the russian oil speech. If you havent seen these you should take a look. They are a hoot.
As this is Agence France-Presse, it should be jiggered differently to show their messaging. Paraphrasing -- "If the EU is serious about getting all NATO countries...."
The article asks: "So what is the EU doing?" They are repetitively politicking President Trump to do their bidding, while not wanting to pay for the job. How so?
First, NATO member Turkey:
"Tupras, Türkiye's largest oil refiner, has resumed purchases of Russian Urals crude oil, trading sources said, marking a shift from its earlier halt on imports following strengthened U.S. sanctions.Second, the EU:According to three trading sources speaking to Reuters and shipping data reviewed once again by Reuters, Tupras restarted imports in April after Urals crude prices dropped to their lowest levels since 2023—comfortably below the G7 nations' price cap of $60 per barrel.
Source: Türkiye's largest oil refiner Tupras resumes Russian crude imports as prices fall below G7 cap Türkiye Today, April 17, 2025
Additional links:
Key Turkish Refinery Gets Back Into Russian Oil Oil Price, 16 April 2025
Exclusive: Top Turkish refiner Tupras resumes buying Russian Urals crude, sources say Reuters, 16 April 2025
Turkey Resumes Oil Imports from Russia Amid Sanctions Finway, Ukraine, 18 April 2025
"The EU will gradually and effectively stop the import of Russian gas and oil by the end of 2027, under a legislative proposal put forward by the European Commission today. "To answer then the AFP question, "So what is the EU doing?" The answer is -- get President Trump to do what they are UNWILLING and UNABLE to do. Next one sees Rutte as current head of NATO, one should think of NATO member, Erdoğan, and think also that Turkey is the second-largest military in NATO after the US. So the EU? What do they want?Commission proposes gradual phase-out of Russian gas and oil imports into the EU European Commisson, 16 June 2025.
To kick the can down the road to "the end of 2027." Verified in their own words.
They are stumped alright, Trump knows exactly what he is doing. They are used to rolling our Presidents. We’re done with that sh*t too.
The EU simply can not stop buying cheap Russian energy. Trump knows they continue to buy Russian energy (and metals) through the back door. Western MSM will have you believe they have stopped, a lie.
Their manufacturing is collapsing, notably Germany. Their energy has already risen 4 x….and will go up further with US supplied NG and energy….tankering US energy across an ocean is never going to be cheaper than pipelined Russian energy.
The best part? The recent SOC Russia and China meeting inked the Siberian pipeline 30 year deal, to be up and running within two years. The EU has now lost ALL hopes of cheap energy, unless they beg and rebuild the Nordstream they blew up.
Fools, and deceivers. The EU is toast, by their own hands. No tears.
Trump is seeking the work around...and he's absolutely right. Don't punish India...they resell ALL OF IT to the EU.
This was truly Trump’s best foreign policy move ever.
The top destinations were China ($129B), India ($66.1B), Turkey ($31B), Kazakhstan ($16.1B), and Brazil ($11.1B)".
There's no confusion here: the way to hurt Russia is through Oil and all oil-related products. Period.
“There’s no confusion here”
Agreed.
The only folks that are confused are those who think there will be additional tariffs/sanctions by the US against those still buying Russian energy.
“There will be no more secondary sanctions.”
There already are. President Trump imposed them on India. Russia was forced to discount an additional 3-4 dollars per barrel for India as a result.
“The EU will gradually and effectively stop the import of Russian gas and oil by the end of 2027, under a legislative proposal put forward by the European Commission today. “
2027? LOL.
Europe isn’t serious about cutting Ruzzian Oil.
Trump knows that. Hopefully, this is a way to force the EU and Zelensky into taking any peace deal he can negotiate.
“There will be no more secondary sanctions.”
Did you read that statement...in the context of now?
Besides those tariffs on India were warranted for many other reasons.
Nor any scenario where Trump is going to implement secondary sanctions that cripple our economy.
All the blathering about Russian oil is meaningless.
And, the EU citizens are being forced to pay at least that much more for Russian oil and that is one of the factors driving inflation in the EU and crippling European economies.
What is the source for this manure you're spreading?
Trump’s message to Russian-oil addict Orban of Hungary and Slovakia’s Fico is very clear.
Hungary is directly importing 90% of its oil needs from Russia. Slovakia is directly importing 80% of its oil needs from Russia. While the rest of Europe has nearly stopped all direct imports of Russian oil - it’s down to a trickle, less than 9%.
Thus, Trump is evidently targeting the two pro-Russain bandits of Europe: Hungary and Slovakia.
However...
America STILL imports from Russia 20% of its Uranium needs for its civil nuclear energy production... pretty massive. Thus, Trump is saying (without saying it...) as long as America needs Russian Uranium, we can’t put new sanctions or tariffs on Russia.
That’s is the harsh reality.
Turkey, which luckily isn’t part of the EU, but part of NATO though... is heavily dependent on Russian oil. And has said it will never limit oil imports from Russia.
Thus, Trump must find a way to end America’s dependency on Russian Uranium, including Islamic Turkey’s and pro Russian Slovakia and Hungary’s addiction to Russian oil.
Thus, there will be no tariffs on Russia. Because We need Russian Uranium.
It would be more FairPlay and less hypocritical to say this out loud though...
One drop and no support doctrine. As far as I know Hungary and Slovakia still provides a lot precious electricity to your beloved Ukraine.
In other words, they are cowards.
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