Almost three and a half months of conflict in Ukraine and still no end in sight. The financial support of the United States and Europe is colossal, particularly in terms of arms deliveries, but for what effects? As for the economic sanctions once morest Russia, there once more, even if they are exceptional in their scope, they do not seem to be giving any tangible result. QR news takes stock with Julien Pomarède, political science researcher at ULB and Nicolas Gosset, researcher at the Royal Institute for Defence.
The usefulness of arms deliveries
The weapons delivered by the West have greatly contributed to the resistance capacity of the Ukrainians explains Julien Pomarède. Same observation for Nicolas Gosset: “Without these arms deliveries, the Ukrainians would be unable to hold the lines of defense once morest the scale of the Russian offensive in the Donbas. Currently, the situation on the ground is changing very little for the two forces involved. It should be noted that the Ukrainians have made a commitment to Washington not to use these medium-range weapons directly on Russian territory. And Ukrainians have an interest in respecting this commitment to those who indirectly help them on the battlefield“.
Ineffective sanctions?
The first source of financing the war is our energy dependence on Russia explains Nicolas Gosset, researcher at the Royal Institute of Defense : “For oil alone, Europe pays 286 million euros a day to Russia. Oil alone accounts for 46% of Russian exports. This is more or less half of the funding from the Russian state. Faced with this observation, Europe is working gradually to limit the impact on our populations. If Europe manages to respect its schedule, i.e. to cut itself off from Russian oil by the end of the year, this will significantly attack Russian financial income.s”.
Europe too lax?
Before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Europe’s relations with Russia were questionable in more ways than one, says Julien Pomarède: “Russia has played enormously on Europe’s dependence on gas or on the ideological proximity with certain right-wing or far-right leaders in Europe. In the future, Europe will have to review its discourse“.
