Will Trump lift sanctions on Russia?
And if so, why?
Commenter “mkent” offers this idea:
Trump has said as a part of the ceasefire he’ll lift Western sanctions against Russia. It’s these sanctions which have ground Russian war production to a halt. They are having great difficulty building new tanks, helicopters, drones, and satellites because of the sanctions. Their tanks use Western radios, optics, and targeting computers. Ditto their drones, helicopters, and satellites.
For example, while the Russians can build older (pre-1990s) C-band communication satellites, they need Western parts like Traveling Wave Tube Amplifiers (TWTAs) to build modern (1990s and beyond) Ku and Ka-band comsats. Even consumer sats like DirecTV and XM satellite radio are beyond them. Their Glonass (GPS equivalent) satellites use Western rad-hard chips. Their Glonass system (used for glide bomb guidance) is slowly degrading because they don’t have access to them. Similarly their oil pipelines and refineries are degrading because of the lack of spare parts.
Right now Russia’s military is big and dumb. It’s why Ukraine can hold it off. But if Russia can build modern comsats and glide bombs (among other things) at scale, its military becomes big and smart. At that point only America would be able to stop it, and it would cost us dearly.
I know next to nothing about weaponry, so let’s just assume the military details are correct or at least mostly correct.
I couldn’t recall what Trump said in the past about Russia and sanctions. But when I looked, I was surprised to find that he’d spoken about it quite a bit during the 2024 campaign – for example this:
Trump decided to address the issue of sanctions on 5 September at the Economic Club of New York, an NGO that has been studying US economic policy for over a century.
Trump expressed doubts about the effectiveness of sanctions for one specific reason: they undermine the status of the dollar as the global currency. The former president cited Iran, Russia and China as examples of sanctions that, in his opinion, have not worked.
Moreover, he believes that greater influence can be achieved not through sanctions but through tariffs, although he emphasised that he used them to prevent conflicts and wars.
But did Trump really talk about lifting sanctions on Russia, as Harris’s team claimed?
One would need to be very creative in interpreting his words to draw such a conclusion. At the very least, Trump mentioned “lifting” sanctions just once – in a hypothetical situation where he would impose “strong” restrictive measures first. …
This may indicate that Trump is willing to use sanctions as a tool in negotiations with Russia, although it’s unclear how. Even in the event of a theoretical victory, he wouldn’t immediately have the authority to lift sanctions on Russia.
Moreover, the sanctions “infrastructure” opposing Russia involves not only the US but also its European allies. A decision by Trump alone wouldn’t dismantle it overnight.
European Pravda, the origin of that article, is apparently a Ukrainian publication focusng on Europe.
But what is Trump saying now about sanctions on Russia in connection with peace talks on the Ukraine war? Let’s take a look at this from SOS Rubio:
Well, sanctions are all the result of this conflict. There are sanctions that were imposed as a result of this conflict. And so I would say to you that in order to bring an end to any conflict there has to be concessions made by all sides. We’re not going to predetermine what those are. We’re certainly not going to negotiate this today or in a press conference for that matter. But – and there are other parties that have sanctions. The European Union is going to have to be at the table at some point because they have sanctions as well that have been imposed.
This is from Waltz, although it’s not about sanctions:
If you’re going to bring both sides together, you have to talk to both sides. And we’ll continue to remind everyone literally within minutes of President Trump hanging up with President Putin he called and spoke with President Zelenskyy. So shuttle diplomacy has happened throughout history, it’s happened all over the world. We are absolutely talking to both sides. The Secretary of State just met with President Zelenskyy days ago, along with the Vice President, seven Cabinet members in Europe at the same time – really showing the importance of engaging our allies. President Trump spoke with President Macron just yesterday. Prime Minister Starmer is coming to Washington next week.
So I think we’ll – the facts – we’ll continue to push back on this notion that our allies haven’t been consulted. They’re being – they are being consulted literally almost on a daily basis. And we’ll continue to do so.
I also found this article, from a curious group that appears to be from the somewhat-isolationist segment of the right:
In a co-authored paper from April 2024, Keith Kellogg, President-elect Trump’s Ukraine envoy, said “the United States and its allies would pledge to only fully lift sanctions against Russia and normalize relations after it signs a peace agreement acceptable to Ukraine.” …
Detailed thinking is needed on how future sanctions relief for Russia might be phased in as part of a longer-term peace plan for Ukraine. That should include realistic and achievable milestones for Russian compliance to avoid the trap of the failed Minsk II agreement.
Any U.S.-brokered future ceasefire in Ukraine may end the fighting but it won’t represent a just peace without a longer-term strategy. Nor will it represent a normalization of relations. …
it also seems clear that negotiations to end the fighting will stall unless Vladimir Putin knows there is a realistic prospect of some sanctions relief. And he will be wary of any draft peace agreement that de facto makes sanctions permanent. That would repeat the same mistakes that made the Minsk II agreement fail. …
And although the Russian economy is overheating from the colossal injection of government war spending, it is more resilient than Ukraine’s economy, with low debt, respectable growth, and still considerable reserves. Ukraine is hugely indebted and kept afloat by Western aid, which accounts for almost half of government spending.
So, while he can’t fight forever, Putin can choose to stall. And European states know the financial burden of an already unaffordable war will increasingly fall on them with Trump in the Oval Office. …
So, we need more granular thinking on what sanctions relief means in the wide gulf between the status quo and no sanctions at all. Russia is subject to more than 20,000 sanctions that extend into the political, social and cultural realm as well as the economic sphere. …
Most sanctions have zero impact. No less than 92% of individual UK sanctions are against persons who have never traveled to Britain or held assets here. The picture is the same for 77% of sanctioned Russian companies and is mirrored across the EU, U.S. and elsewhere.
Upon the agreement of a peace deal for Ukraine, 16,000 zero-impact Russian sanctions could be struck down in a grand gesture brokered by the U.S., EU and UK. This would offer no economic relief to Russia but give Putin something concrete to sell to his public.
Letting Russia compete once more in international sporting and cultural events such as the Olympics would offer a hugely symbolic gesture that the West was seeking to normalize relations, with no economic relief attached.
To avoid a repeat of Minsk II, the hardest-hitting “economic” sanctions would need to be included in a roadmap for the peace process with realistic milestones that it was in Russia’s power to achieve.
Is this what Trump has in mind? Doesn’t sound so bad to me. But unfortunately, I don’t read his mind.
The U.S. could use “economic tools of leverage” and “of course military tools of leverage” if Russia does not agree to a good peace deal with Ukraine, Vice President JD Vance said in a Wall Street Journal interview published on February 14.
You might have Walz mixed up with Waltz, the National Security Advisor.
David:
Thanks, will fix.
Trump has bent the knee, so he’ll also have to lift sanctions now, and help Putin to build a modern Military…
Trade is a double-edged sword and so much so, that it is not unusual for enemies to continue to trade even when actually at war. Most of us are probably old enough to remember that the US sold wheat to the Soviet Union. None of us are old enough to remember the early 1700s, the Dutch continuing their carrying trade with France even while France was trying to conquer the Dutch, and the allies of the Dutch being extremely cranky about it.
Germany has been selling cars to Russia using Kazakhstan, Turkey, and Armenia as cut-outs, and Europe is still buying Russian natural gas.
@Karmi:help Putin to built a modern Military
What do you suppose Russia is doing with the money that they get from Europe for natural gas? Besides buying German cars and aircraft with it, that is. Probably spending on their military? Nah, that’s what the sanctions are there to prevent. Lol.
Niketas Choniates – yeah, Russia’s military is looking real modern, huh. NOT!!!
Maneuver warfare is out for Russia, so they’re doing Trench warfare now. Attack helicopters…guess they’re not spending any Euro money on those either. Aircraft protection from Ukraine’s rockets – mostly nonexistent…Ditto on they’re not spending much Euro money on that. Tanks? Nope…remodeling WW2 tanks with all that Euro money…Geez!?
Well, investing all that Euro money in upgrading their trenches, huh…Ditto on the Geez!?
Typo: In this sentence, “I also found this article, from a curious group that appears to be from the somewhat-isolationist segment of the right:” — “this article” does not have a live link.
Kate:
Thanks, fixed.
Maneuver warfare is out for Russia
Presently maneuver warfare is out for everyone, especially at the operational level but also at the tactical (battlefield) level — unless we’re talking about tank-infantry teams moving through and fighting in towns and village streets; which may be considered tactical maneuver warfare, but really isn’t. The use of drones and precision missiles (including, notably, shoulder-launched antitank missiles), along with the ever-increasing capabilities of such weapons systems, has severely limited the effectiveness, not to mention the survivability, of mobile formations operating in the open. This is especially the case for the use of tanks and lesser armored fighting vehicles, but also of aircraft and helicopters. Employing fighter aircraft to establish air superiority over battlefields as a prelude to achieving victory with ground forces is no longer a viable strategy, at least for the time being. Achieving air superiority is now mainly the function of infantry hiding in holes and trenches using shoulder-launched surface-to-air missiles to shoot aircraft from the sky — a relatively easy and inexpensive way of neutralizing enemy tactical air power. Likewise the new generation of hand-held precision guided weapon systems have rendered as virtually obsolete rotary attack aircraft (i.e.helicopters) along with the doctrine formulated for their use.
All of which is to say, the technological pendulum of warfare has swung back to favor the lowly foot soldier. This situation will certainly not obtain forever, or even possibly for very long. The pendulum will swing back: it always does. But for the time being, and into the foreseeable future, infantry fighting from cover will dominate the battlefield. What we are witnessing in Ukraine is nothing less than a new revolution in military affairs, attributable in large measure to the development of drones and drone warfare.
T“he technological pendulum of warfare has swung back to favor the lowly foot soldier. — for the time being, and into the foreseeable future, infantry fighting from cover will dominate the battlefield.” IrishOtter49
That would appear to greatly favor the far more numerous Russian army. However, I perceive that in modern land warfare, satellite identification of targets and the precision that provides artillery, are more determinate factors in achieving dominance on the battlefield. It is that which has allowed Russia to advance westward despite all the weaponry the West has provided Ukraine.
IrishOtter49
Maneuver warfare is most certainly not out for everyone. Russia’s lack of being able to conduct maneuver warfare is due to many things…too many to explain whilst trying to watch TV and type on this durn tablet. However, these many Russian weaknesses are some of the VALUABLE things Ukraine has exposed, and that info is worth far more than the aid we have given to Ukraine.
IrishOtter49
Well said. Hopefully the Pentagon is taking notes, though I doubt it.
Re: Sanctions:
(1) Which sanctions? We have a lot of sanctions on Russia. Lifting sanctions is not necessary the same thing as lifting sanctions on dual-use tech.
(2) Sanctions were supposed to be our devastating leverage that would cause Russia to cry uncle about two years ago. It turns out that wasn’t quite the case. To the extent that sanctions are leverage to get concessions from Russia now, though, you kind of have to lift them (or at least most of them) in order to deploy the leverage.
Some people seem to be forgetting that the Russian military does not exist in a vacuum free of Chinese military and tech support.
That would appear to greatly favor the far more numerous Russian army.
No, that doesn’t follow. I think you know why.
satellite identification of targets and the precision that provides artillery, are more determinate factors in achieving dominance on the battlefield.
This point was, or should have been perceived, as implicit when I wrote “the use of drones and precision missiles.” In the event precision artillery (both gun and rocket/missile artillery) are not more determinate factors in achieving dominance on the battlefield but rather determinate factors in enabling infantry to dominate the battlefield. Petain’s famous dictum that “artillery conquers, infantry occupies” is no longer true; in fact it never was, and Petain, along with the countless Poilus who assaulted the German trenches on the Western Front after the preliminary artillery bombardments ceased, damn well knew it. Battles on the Western Front were won or lost (or stalemated, as the case may have been) by the infantry. Artillery merely facilitated (and, too often, hindered) the infantry in their work. This is equally true of the fighting in Ukraine. In war some things never change or, at the least, are highly resistant to change. In Ukraine artillery can do a fine job of ravaging mechanized formations, but it does not conquer nor does it dominate: in the end it is always infantry that must take and hold the ground pounded by artillery to achieve victory.
As T.R. Fehrenback observed re the Korean War: “Americans in 1950 rediscovered something that since Hiroshima they had forgotten: you may fly over a land forever; you may bomb it, atomize it, pulverize it and wipe it clean of life—but if you desire to defend it, protect it, and keep it for civilization, you must do this on the ground, the way the Roman legions did, by putting your young men into the mud.”
Neo, your last part, i.e. JD Vance’s talk with WSJ was proved as a fake news. JD already pointed out in X that WSJ twisted his words.
Trump’s goal is to lower energy price, therefore offsetting the possible inflation caused by incoming tariff wars. Lifting sanctions on Russia, allowing more Russia oil and gas on world market help lowering the oil and gas price.
Russia loosing 1500 casualties a day in infantry warfare can hardly be considered a benefit to the motherland.” At present it is the only thing they can do, “poor bloody (dead) infantry” indeed.
It appears the Russian attacks in Donetsk have culminated and the Ukranians still hold parts of Kursk.
And as regards having to rely on infantry (Russia) to storm defensive positions (Ukraine) Russia appears to be wanting to revisit WW1. It takes logistics to feed, arm, and move an army even one of infantry. It is telling that Russia is now using horses, donkeys, and civilian-grade motor vehicles. Anything that moves is targeted by drones and drone supported arty.
Poor bloody infantry; see Ukraine (or Kursk) and die.
Buying Russian oil benefits Russia. You want forever wars?
No 3D chess needed. It ain’t rocket surgery.
om,
Actually high oil price benefits oil export countries like Russia. You cannot defy the invisible hand of the market.
When I said that infantry warfare is presently the dominant form of warfare I did not say that infantry would not suffer grievously. It will, and in Ukraine, it is. My point is, infantry warfare is the only way to fight with any hope of achieving results, however high the price of achieving results may be.
The only way to avoid paying that high price is to not fight at all. But if you’re going to fight, you’re going to have fight, mainly, with infantry.
If one is stuck using just infantry warfare in 2025 something is seriously wrong with your military.
Infantry warfare is old, but so is maneuver warfare – military campaigns date back to those of Alexander the Great, and probably even earlier.
Russia is unable to get infantry, tanks, helicopters, basic communication, air force, etc to work in unison—together.
There may be modern terms for a newer version of maneuver, but the concept seems to be the same.
mkent – linked to at beginning of the post did a most excellent job of how certain sanctions have helped cause/force Russia into WWI trench fighting…
An unexpected result of brutal and Russian approach may be the mutiny and collapse of the Russuan army. Look back to what happened to the French army 1917. A near collapse avoided by Petain.
IIRC the Tsar’s army fell apart in 1917 too. Trench warfare reliant on infantry has its risks to nations.
St dude:
No, what I quoted was not “fake news.” Vance did in fact say that the WSJ had “twisted” his words in the interview. I believe he was talking about the indendiary headline, which I didn’t quote. The WSJ did interview him and they apparently posted the transcript, and the part I quoted was not twisted and there was nothinig fake about it.
The transcript of the relevant portion:
Watching a drone fly through the open door of an armored vehicle to kill the troops inside or smacks some grunt on a ATV in the back miles behind the line tells me there has been a paradigm shift. A foxhole is not much protection when a FPV drone drops a mortar shell right on you.
“When Did @WSJ turn into the Huffington Post?”
If it’s the, ahem, “news” section of the WSJ it has been as wretched as the NYT and WaPoo for a long time now. Absolutely biased and worthless. It’s coverage of Gaza is close to unfiltered Hamas propaganda, replete with unchallenged quotes from the “Gaza Health Ministry”. And similar bias oozing from the headlines on anything having to do with the Trump administration. The opinion section is better but far from perfect. The main thing keeping me subscribing now may be the Saturday number puzzles …
Chases Eagles:
Indeed it is likely that staying put in an entrenched position long enough for the drone operators to find you isn’t a good survival strategy in Ukraine.
And to St Dude:
Buying Russian oil gives who hard currency? Buying Russian natural gas gave who leverage over European response to Russian foreign adventurism?
The populists will sell Russia the rope that that will hang them. Self interest is sometimes short sighted.
What did the Gods of the Copybook Headings say about the Gods of the Market?