US group identifies: These sanctions could seriously disrupt Russia's war effort in Ukraine

A US group has identified several little-known but potentially key sanctions that it says could seriously disrupt Russia's war effort in Ukraine, following last month's targeting of sanctions on the Kremlin's largest oil companies, the British newspaper The Guardian reports today.

Previous rounds of sanctions have targeted Russian energy companies, banks, military suppliers and the "shadow fleet" - ships transporting Russian oil.

However, the Dekleptocracy Group, a civil society organization that studies Russia's war economy, says that chemicals used to produce military-grade mechanical lubricants and tires are a weak point that policymakers in the United States (US), the United Kingdom, and the European Union (EU) can exploit.

Christopher Harrison, the group's president and a former State Department expert on Russia, described these targets as "very narrowly defined and technical," unlike the microchips and oil companies that typically attract the attention of governments and state agencies.

But they are difficult to replace and are crucial to Moscow's ability to deploy tanks and conduct combat operations at the front, according to Dekleptokrasi.

"A shortage of lubricants would seriously endanger the Russian war machine," their latest report states.

Only a few companies in the world produce chemical additives for mechanical lubricants – engine oils for tanks and cars. Almost all of them stopped selling these chemicals to Russia at the start of its full-scale invasion, leading to widespread shortages and complaints from drivers.

Dekleptocracy has identified a Chinese company, Xinxiang Richful, as supplying a large portion of Russia's needs, supplying up to eight million kilograms annually. The company recently opened an office in the US state of Virginia. Blocking the company, as well as several smaller suppliers, would cause a shortage of mechanical lubricants in Russia, the group says.

The Chinese company did not respond to a request for comment, according to the Guardian.

Dekleptocracy also determined that Russia has very limited domestic capacity to produce vulcanization accelerators and other substances necessary for the production of military-grade tires.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said at the G7 meeting last week that most of the main options for imposing sanctions have already been exhausted.

"Well, we don't have much left to sanction — I mean, we hit their biggest oil companies, which is what everyone asked us to do," he said.

Tom Keating, director of the Centre for Finance and Security at the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), a leading British defence think tank, said the findings by Dekleptocracy were valuable work and evidence that there was still room for new sanctions.

"As long as Russia successfully procures the components it needs for its military and as long as it successfully sells its oil, the environment remains rich in targets," he said.

Russia has a strong oil industry, but it lacks domestic producers of a number of lesser-known but important chemicals, including food additives and substances used in the production of rubber, pharmaceuticals and shampoo. Moscow launched an initiative this year to domestically produce hundreds of chemicals – further evidence that this sector is its weakness, according to Dekleptocracy.

"We analyzed the Russian economy and some of the things that they absolutely need to keep their war machine running. We studied their industrial base, their chemical base, to find the critical points – things that the Russians can't produce themselves," Harrison said.

Rubio's remarks came after the US imposed sanctions on Russian oil producers Rosneft and Lukoil in October in an effort to "weaken" Russia's war machine.

Keating said it was too early to assess the effectiveness of sanctions against Rosneft and Lukoil, as little has been done to enforce secondary sanctions against companies that continue to buy their oil.

"A successful sanctions regime depends not only on identifying new targets, but also on ensuring the enforcement of sanctions against those already identified. Ukraine's allies must enforce existing sanctions and take action against those who enable their circumvention," he said.

Dekleptocracy participated in previous efforts to impose sanctions on the Arctic LNG 2 gas terminal. It worked with the administration of former US President Joseph Biden to identify elements of the project – such as specific ice-resistant tankers – that were critical to its operation and vulnerable to US pressure.

"I think they did an incredibly good job of showing potential weaknesses that could at least cause disruption. Maybe not permanently damaging, but certainly disruptive," said Kara Abercrombie, a former US assistant secretary of defense in the Biden administration.

Dekleptocracy is part of a larger civil society effort — involving Ukrainian groups like Razom We Stand and B4Ukraine, as well as the U.S. Center for Advanced Defense Studies — to sift through vast amounts of trade data to find vulnerabilities in Russia’s war economy and point governments to targets for sanctions. Keating says these groups often identify targets that policymakers overlook.

"It's extremely valuable work. It regularly uncovers anomalies that need to be addressed," he said.