Nicholas Fenton
Recent news reports suggest U.S. President Donald Trump may finally have overcome his seeming unwillingness to level additional economic sanctions on Russia. Faced with the reality that at the current level of pressure Russian President Vladimir Putin feels no imperative to seriously engage in negotiations with Kyiv, Trump said Monday he would give Russia 10 or 12 days to make progress toward ending the war before imposing “sanctions and maybe tariffs, secondary tariffs.” If Trump wants to end the war anytime soon, additional sanctions will likely be necessary.
Our latest research concludes that at the current level of sanctions and battlefield intensity, Russia is likely able to maintain its war effort for at least the next three years. Over the three and a half years since its invasion of Ukraine, analysts have consistently underestimated Russia’s economic resilience. Moscow has not only maintained economic growth but also successfully restructured its economy on an impressive war footing. It is inaccurate to claim that sanctions don’t work, as Trump mused later this week, but there are ways to make them more effective. First, we need to examine the reasons for Russia’s economic sustainability, of which there are several.
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