Faced with the imminent possibility of a Russian invasion of Ukraine in a dangerously tense diplomatic atmosphere, NATO and other Western allies are once again turning to sanctions in the absence of other means. Since World War II, governments around the world have resorted to sanctions to resolve foreign policy dilemmas on more than 700 occasions.
Historical records of sanctions date back to ancient Greece, when the Athenians banned merchants from nearby Megara for cultivating land sacred to the Athenians and killed an Athenian official. Megara sought the help of Athens' arch-rival Sparta, which allegedly led to the Peloponnesian War that ended Greece's golden age.
League of Sanctioners
However, another cataclysmic event, World War I, brought the use of sanctions back into vogue. After the armistice that ended the conflict, and the search for an alternative to the violence that claimed 14 million lives, the leaders of the victorious powers created the League of Nations to maintain international peace and gave it the right to block trade with any country that might threaten the peace.
As President of the United States, which was a major player in the founding of the League, Woodrow Wilson announced:
"A country that is boycotted is a country that is close to surrender. Apply this economical, peaceful, silent and deadly medicine and there will be no need for force. It's a terrible drug. It does not cost a single life outside the boycotted country, but it brings pressure to the country that, in my estimation, no modern country can resist".
The League successfully used sanctions to end conflicts between Yugoslavia and Albania, and between Greece and Bulgaria. However, their sanctions against Italy after the invasion of Abyssinia in 1935 (today's Ethiopia) are most remembered. Too weak and too slow to stop fascist aggression, they were largely seen as a symbol of resistance.
The British government even went so far as to inquire whether Mussolini would mind including oil in the embargo. When Duce said that it would bother him, oil was exempted.
As Prime Minister David Lloyd George said, the sanctions "came too late to save Abyssinia, but they came at the last minute to save Her Majesty's Government."
The Cold War brought a series of sanctions between the capitalist and communist worlds—but, because the two blocs generally didn't trade much with each other, the sanctions were more expressions of discontent than successful policy. Moreover, the sanctioned states could turn to the rivals of the sanctioning countries, and they were happy to trade with them.
A weapon of mass starvation
Then, just as communism was collapsing, Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait. The invasion united the United Nations (which was usually divided along ideological lines) against Iraq.
As a result, the Security Council imposed what were then the largest sanctions against a regime in history, requiring all UN members to block all trade with Iraq, except for food and medicine.
The goal of the sanctions was to persuade Saddam to leave Kuwait, but they continued after the first Gulf War because of fears, which later turned out to be unfounded, that Iraq was developing weapons of mass destruction.
In order to gain public support for lifting the sanctions that were choking the budget, the Iraqi government falsified data indicating that malnutrition resulting from the sanctions had claimed the lives of half a million children. Claims of civilian suffering have also been made about the sanctions imposed on Haiti following a military coup that ousted elected president Jean-Bertrand Aristide.
Smart sanctions
This started the campaign of targeted sanctions. Previously, sanctions were applied to entire economies without much thought as to how they would affect the innocent civilian population. However, the thought that sanctions, designed to rein in ruthless despots, are actually killing some of the people they are supposed to protect has resulted in a number of changes.
A country that is boycotted is a country that is close to surrender. Apply this economical, peaceful, silent and deadly medicine and there will be no need for force. It's a terrible drug. It doesn't cost a single life outside the boycotted country but it brings pressure to the country that, in my estimation, no modern country can resist
Instead of focusing on general bans on imports and exports, the sanctions have been refocused on freezing the assets and travel of dictators and their associates.
However, the effectiveness of this type of sanctions has yet to be demonstrated. Autocrats are usually smart enough not to open accounts in their own names at banks under the jurisdiction of governments that are likely to impose sanctions on them. They are also generally not interested in vacations in enemy territory, which is why such sanctions do not hurt too much.
Nevertheless, sanctions were resorted to by the USA and the EU in the most urgent foreign policy crises, including preventing the Iranian government from obtaining nuclear weapons. Then the Western powers actually realized what kind of instrument they had in their hands.
SWIFT – a serious weapon
Although the US has done little trade with Iran, international financial transfers for almost every country in the world take place through the SWIFT financial network, which is headquartered in Belgium. If Iranian banks are cut off from SWIFT, it would be much more difficult for Iran to receive payments for its oil.
On March 23, 2012, the Council of the EU ordered Iranian banks to be excluded from this system, and the Iranian economy began to decline. Still, it took more than three years for Iran to agree to the nuclear deal.
The Western alliance is now considering that and more in its efforts against Russia. Not only are they considering removing Russia from SWIFT, but they are also considering blocking Russia's new Nord Stream 2 pipeline to export natural gas through Europe. They are even considering, symbolically, sanctions against Putin personally. However, even that may not be enough to prevent Russia from attacking its neighbor.
The article was taken from the portal "Konverzejšn"
Translated and edited by:
N. Bogetić
Bonus video:
