Forces Minister: 'Putin continues to prepare for an invasion'
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While the West scrambles to agree on which sanctions to slap down on Russia while it eyes up an invasion of Ukraine, it appears that Moscow has struck back amongst the leaders’ quarrelling. In the latest act of Russian aggression, the Kremlin has taken to banning ammonium nitrate, a key chemical used in fertiliser that is vital for agriculture.
Brandon Weichert, geopolitical analyst and author of Winning Space: How America Remains a Superpower, told Express.co.uk: “The decision to sanction fertilizer exports going from Russia to the rest of the world is massive.
“The impact will be a massive spike in prices.
“Gas, groceries, all of the essentials for our modern life are about to explode in price.”
It comes after Mr Putin has already been accused of “weaponising” gas supplies.
Now, instead of the “massive” sanctions that the EU has warned, Mr Weichert has argued that France is “playing nice” with Russia, preventing the harsh response needed to limit Mr Putin’s might.
He said: “America has ceded its advantages in Europe to Russia.
“The impact will be a massive spike in prices.
“Gas, groceries, all of the essentials for our modern life are about to explode in price.”
It comes after Mr Putin has already been accused of “weaponising” gas supplies.
Now, instead of the “massive” sanctions that the EU has warned, Mr Weichert has argued that France is “playing nice” with Russia, preventing the harsh response needed to limit Mr Putin’s might.
He said: “America has ceded its advantages in Europe to Russia.
“France is working hard to stymie US foreign policy in Europe and to play nice with the Russians.”
The term stymie here implies that France is thwarting the US’s ability to intimidate or take effective action against Russia.
Mr Putin, on the other hand, has shown that he can damage the West with its own sanctions with relative ease.
Mr Weichert added: “These are the real reasons, along with Russia’s enhancement of its national self-sufficiency, for why the threat of Western sanctions is having the opposite impacts on American rivals. Deterrence is lost.”
But the West has drafted up a range of measures that it could use against Mr Putin to discourage a Russian invasion of Ukraine.
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Prime Minister Boris Johnson said: “What we’re doing is targeting particular Russian banks, Russian companies, and making sure that we take steps, take even more steps, to unseal the facade of Russian property holdings… whether in London or elsewhere.”
Another threat Russia has faced involves scrapping the Nord Stream 2 pipeline, a system that would transit gas from Russia to Germany.
But Mr Weichert appears to believe that France’s position is limiting an effective response from NATO allies.
He told Express.co.uk: “For years, going back to the 1990s, Paris, along with Berlin, has moved closer and closer to Moscow.
“Paris has demonstrated a willingness to engage in direct, bilateral talks with Moscow–without even taking into account the wishes and needs of its fellow NATO allies or of the Ukrainian government.
“Right now, Russia and France share a lucrative trading relationship.
“But beyond that Paris likes to ping-pong US and Russian power off each other while acting as the proverbial middle-man in that arrangement, using their status as the most powerful military indigenous to the European continent as leverage to enhance their own standing in Europe during these Russo-American crises.”
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