It's

 

why he went now.

Blunt sanctions talk; blurrier means of measuring success

'With inflation already at record highs, a global pandemic that keeps businesses struggling to reopen and an energy shortage throughout Europe, the mathematics on punishing one of the world’s biggest economies can be complex to tease out.

“To be honest, there aren’t any formalized systems, processes or procedures where Treasury actually makes that assessment, so that’s an interesting shortcoming but it’s a reality,” said Adam Smith, who served in the Obama administration as senior advisor in Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control. “The bigger question is, are these going to change President Putin’s mind.” (Sanctions, that is).

(You got your answer today.)

"Nicholas Mulder, a professor of modern European history at Cornell University, says there are sometimes concrete measures of successful sanctions. He cited the restrictions on Iran’s growth, particularly from 2011 to 2015, when crude oil exports dropped by more than half.

In April 2015, then-Treasury Secretary Jack Lew said Iran’s economy had shrunk by 20 percent due to sanctions, according to a Congressional Research Service report.

(How things work with me. 

I'm sitting here reading this and before I even get to the paragraph below in my mind I'm screaming: THIS ISNT IRAN!)

But Mulder says that since Russia is a massive economy, the mathematics on sanctions enforcement and their success will look different, saying “it quickly becomes difficult in terms of repercussions on global markets.”

(Putin knows this, it's why he went now.)

William C. Wohlforth, faculty director at the Dartmouth Institute for Global Security..."“The only indicator that matters is whether it deters Putin from further moves in Ukraine. Sanctions on this or that oligarch will have zero effect,” he said.

Mulder said measuring success will also be difficult as Asian economies now take on a larger chunk of trading with Russia than they had in 2014, when sanctions were imposed when Russia annexed Crimea from Ukraine.

“There are ways of adjusting trade,” Mulder said, given that non-European countries will maintain commerce with Russia.

"The world needs it's energy and minerals" I think I remember somebody saying...