“It is time to turn off the tap,” announced European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen last week, in her 19th attempt to apply pressure on Russia. The latest proposed package of sanctions includes a ban on imports of Russian liquefied natural gas (LNG) from January 2027 — one year earlier than previously planned — and extends sanctions to refineries and oil traders in third countries, such as China and Russia, accused of helping Russia circumvent sanctions.
On paper, this is presented as a decisive step to “cut Russia’s war revenues” and to force Moscow to the negotiating table. In practice, it is little more than the continuation of a policy that has failed time and time again. Russia has not been brought to its knees and has redirected energy flows elsewhere, while Europe has been crippled by higher prices and locked itself into a position of permanent dependence on the United States.
Before the invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Russia was the EU’s largest supplier of oil and natural gas. Since then, Russia’s share of EU oil imports has dropped from 29% to 2%, and that of gas from 48% to 12%. Yet imports have not ceased entirely. Two pipelines remain operational: the Druzhba pipeline, which still delivers oil to Hungary and Slovakia, and the TurkStream pipeline, which supplies gas to Bulgaria, Hungary, Greece and Romania. Meanwhile, the EU has rushed to replace Russian pipeline gas with much more expensive and volatile LNG, whose share of total EU gas imports has more than doubled from 20% to 50%. Nearly half of this LNG now comes from the United States, making Europe the most important market for US LNG exports.
The irony is that while the EU boasted of cutting pipeline imports from Russia, it has quietly increased its purchases of Russian LNG, most of which goes to France, Spain, the Netherlands, Belgium and Italy. This is simply a matter of economic reality: not only is Russian LNG “significantly cheaper” than American liquified gas, but existing agreements bind European buyers to Russian supplies.
Nothing, however, illustrates the absurdity of the EU’s sanctions regime more than the fact that Europe continues to indirectly import large quantities of Russian oil. Instead of buying cheap crude directly from Russia, as it used to, it now purchases refined products from countries like India and Turkey, which import Russian crude, refine it and sell it back to Europe at a significant markup. In the first six months of 2025 alone, the EU and Turkey imported 2.4 million tonnes of petroleum products from India. Estimates suggest that two thirds of this originated from Russian crude. In effect, the EU and Turkey paid India around €1.5 billion for oil that was Russian in all but name.
This means that Europe is now paying more for the same Russian oil than it did before, while also paying more for LNG to replace Russian pipeline gas. The bloc has thus shot itself in the foot twice: once by substituting cheap Russian pipeline gas with more expensive American (and Russian) LNG, and again by substituting direct Russian oil imports with indirect and more costly purchases from India and Turkey.
The consequences have been brutal. Europe has endured three consecutive years of industrial stagnation. Germany — once the engine of the continent — is now experiencing outright deindustrialisation, with 125,000 industrial jobs lost in just the past few weeks.
Russia, meanwhile, has emerged relatively unscathed, redirecting its exports to Asia and consolidating its partnership with China. From the standpoint of Europe’s long-term interests, the obvious path would be to re-normalise economic relations with Moscow, resume cheap energy imports and work towards a negotiated end to the war. But rationality has long since disappeared from European policy. Indeed, Brussels has doubled down, announcing not only the LNG ban but also a de facto prohibition on any future use of the Nord Stream pipelines, while at the same time sabotaging any peace effort.
The justification, once again, is that sanctions will force Russia to end the war on the West’s terms. The reality is that 18 packages of sanctions have failed to achieve this goal, and the 19th will fare no better. What it will do, however, is deepen Europe’s dependence on the United States.
Indeed, the timing of the new sanctions package was not coincidental. Just days earlier, Donald Trump issued an ultimatum to Nato allies. The US, he declared, would only impose “major” new sanctions on Russia once Europeans had agreed to stop buying Russian oil. He went further, suggesting Nato impose 50-100% tariffs on China and India, both of which he accused of circumventing sanctions. He insisted such measures would weaken Russia’s “strong control” over its partners. Trump even claimed that halting Russian energy imports, combined with heavy tariffs on China, would be “of great help” in ending the conflict.
The logic is baffling. Europe has no power to force China or India to stop buying Russian oil. Tariffs on those countries would fuel sky-high inflation and trigger counter-tariffs that would devastate European exporters, while doing little to change their purchasing behaviour. Even EU diplomats privately acknowledge that Trump’s conditions are unrealistic — as Trump himself likely understands all too well. Yet his demands reveal the transactional essence of transatlantic politics today.
Trump’s ultimatum dovetails with a broader US strategy: to dominate Europe’s energy market. US Energy Secretary Chris Wright made this explicit: “You want to have secure energy suppliers that are your allies, not your foes.” Under Washington’s plan, the US could account for nearly three-quarters of Europe’s LNG imports within a few years. Indeed, ExxonMobil now expects Europe to sign multi-decade contracts of US gas as part of its pledge to buy $750 billion American energy.
Until recently, EU countries resisted such deals, fearing fossil fuel dependence and the undermining of climate goals. But the tide has shifted. Italy’s Eni recently signed a 20-year deal with Venture Global, its first long-term agreement with a US LNG producer. Edison and Germany’s Sefe have signed similar agreements. The result is structural dependence on US gas — which is not only more expensive but also has a far higher carbon footprint than Russian pipeline gas — for decades to come. This is a textbook example of geopolitical vassalage.
But it gets worse. Even as Europe is told to cut all ties with Russian energy, reports have emerged of secret talks between ExxonMobil and the Russian oil company Rosneft about resuming cooperation on the massive Sakhalin project in Russia’s Far East. If confirmed, it would mean that while Europeans are forbidden to buy cheap Russian gas and oil, American companies are quietly preparing to return. The aim, it would seem, is to buy Russian energy cheaply, resell it at a premium and push competitors like Turkey and India out of the game.
But there’s a clear flaw in this strategy. It is hard to imagine US companies actually resuming business with Russia while the war continues — especially as Washington threatens ever-tighter sanctions on Russia and its key partners, such as China and India. Indeed, Exxon’s CEO has denied the rumours. This contradiction highlights the limits of Trump’s transactional approach: the belief that he can neatly separate economics from politics, striking commercial deals with Moscow while challenging Russia’s broader security and geopolitical aims.
“The result is a geopolitical paradox so twisted that it almost defies comprehension.”
All the while, the push to decouple Europe from Russian energy has only strengthened the strategic partnership between Moscow and Beijing. Earlier this month, they signed a memorandum to build the Power of Siberia 2 pipeline, a $13.6-billion project stretching 2,600 kilometres through Mongolia. If confirmed, it would deliver 50 billion cubic metres of gas annually to China, providing Beijing with a reliable source of cheap energy.
For Europe, this is a disaster. Having voluntarily cut itself off from Russian energy, the continent is now committed to a future of high prices and low competitiveness. Russia, by contrast, is securing long-term markets in Asia. The new pipeline would also have implications for the US as well. Analysts predict the pipeline will cause a “structural shock” to global LNG trade, reducing China’s reliance on seaborne cargoes and undermining US ambitions for long-term contracts.
But this simply highlights why it is imperative for the US to keep its client states as reliant as possible on American fossil fuels. Seen in this light, the war has been nothing short of a triumph for the United States: guaranteeing windfall profits for its energy companies and binding Europe ever more tightly to its geopolitical priorities. Indeed, it is difficult to avoid the suspicion that this outcome was part of the rationale all along. After all, driving a permanent wedge between Europe and Russia while securing Europe as a captive market for US energy has arguably been a consistent objective of American strategy for decades.
By adopting sanctions that align with Trump’s demands, Brussels is sacrificing what remains of its autonomy. The result is a geopolitical paradox so twisted that it almost defies comprehension. European governments, trapped by their own rhetoric and by a dogmatic commitment to permanent confrontation with Moscow, have manoeuvred themselves into a laughable position. They have allowed Trump to frame his demands as a perverse quid pro quo: he can present Europe’s economic self-harm and growing dependence on US energy as the price they must pay in order to accelerate their own strategic decline.
Overall, the EU’s energy policy since 2022 has been a textbook case of self-inflicted harm. By cutting itself off from cheap Russian supplies, it has handed the United States a once-in-a-generation opportunity to dominate Europe’s energy market. By embracing sanctions, which have failed to weaken Russia but have devastated European industry, Brussels has turned the continent into a geopolitical pawn. Europe’s leaders claim to be defending values and solidarity; in reality, they are presiding over a process of deindustrialisation and decline, while continuing to dangerously escalate tensions with Russia. Unless there is a dramatic shift, the continent’s future will be one of stagnation and irrelevance — and, at worst, all-out war.