For Europe, the merits of sanctioning Russian energy were always questionable. After all, cheap energy is essential to the running of the economy, and Russia was Europe’s single biggest source. Not only that, but alternative sources – like Saudi Arabia – are not obviously more ‘moral’ than Russia. (The Saudis have been bombing Yemen for the last seven years.)
However, Europe went ahead with sanctions, and since February there has been a dramatic decline in Russian oil imports. Where do things stand now?
Inflation in the EU is running at 9% – the highest on record. And while this trend began before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, it has certainly been exacerbated by sanctions. As the Economist notes, the “root cause” of Europe’s inflation is “a severe energy-price shock”. In Britain, where inflation is about equal to the European average, there are already warnings of possible blackouts this winter.
Meanwhile, Russia’s oil revenues have actually risen. This is mainly due to the rising price of oil, which has more than offset lower export volumes. In addition, Russia has easily found alternative buyers for its energy – notably India and China. So not only are sanctions hurting Europe, they’re actually helping the West’s main geopolitical rival – which gets a discount on each barrel of oil it imports.
In an interview back in May, EU Commission President Ursula Von Der Leyen explained precisely how energy sanctions could end up backfiring. If we “immediately” cut off the oil, she said, Putin “would be able to take the oil that he does not sell to the European Union to the world market, where the prices will increase, and sell it for more”. Strangely, Von Der Leyen seems to have ignored her own advice.
And if you thought that was ironic, India has been importing crude oil from Russia, refining it, and then re-exporting it to Europe at a profit. Which means Europe is still ‘funding Putin war’s machine’ – only now it’s paying a fee for the privilege of doing so.
As Phil Pilkington notes, the rhetoric around sanctions “has completely stopped making even internal logical sense”. On Thursday, Russia began reducing gas supplies to Europe (presumably in response to Macron, Scholz and Draghi meeting Zelensky in Kiev). This prompted complaints from European leaders – the same leaders who claim they want to stop ‘funding Putin’s war machine’.
When you impose sanctions on a country, you’re supposed to be glad you’re not receiving its exports – that means the sanctions are working. The truth is that Europe needs Russian gas as much as Russia needs hard currency.
At this point, however, I can’t imagine Europe backtracking on sanctions: doing so would be too humiliating. Hence energy prices are likely to remain high, and a major recession may be just around the corner.
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Well, you could knock me down with a feather. I’d never have guessed it would turn out like this.
But then I am not an expert, and certainly not one of those brilliant, government-appointed ones.
It’s like someone going on hunger strike and then much to their surprise they get hungry and starve.
Energy prices are going to remain high because that’s what the UN/WEF want and the Government is using it to reduce consumption.
There’s no “may” about a major recession being just around the corner. It’s already started. A litre of unleaded at a local garage has increased by 10p a litre in the space of a week. That in addition to an increase in 60p a litre over the previous 2 months.
I am in the fortunate position of not having to use my car every day and I can restrict its use still further fairly easily if I need or choose to do so. Most people can’t.
And that’s before we get onto the ramping up in the cost of household energy; steeply rising food prices and now increased mortgages.
There is going to be the mother of all recessions …… and that is exactly what the WEF want. You can’t “build back better” unless you first destroy everything.
Remind me, when did economic sanctions ever really work?
Probably what is, essentially, a ‘do nothing’ strategy may very well be the right course of action, as it so often is in most areas of policy making.
How much better a place to live in this country would be if politicians could grasp that one simple fact.
Sanctions on luxuries would work, but sanctions on basic commodities and energy will not.
Like they worked in Saddam’s Iraq?
Taking a morally correct course of action – in this case refusing to directly fund a brutal war of aggression by continuing to purchase oil, gas etc from the invading state – often does lead to at least short-term pain.
Those nations which support the mass destruction and murder taking place in Ukraine by taking up the slack of Russian energy and other products (eg India and China) pay an immediate price in terms of an uneasy conscience and reduced reputation in the wider world (141 out of 181 nations voted against the Russian action in the UN with 35 abstentions and only 5 in favour), and in the longer term the likelihood of overall economic loss (withdrawals of external investment until a change of policy and alignment etc).
In any case the Russian sanction / counter-sanction issue pales into insignificance before the whole lemming-like and pseudo-scientific ‘Climate Change’ / Net Zero (indeed general environmentalist) agenda.
In the UK for example we could near instantly relieve ourselves of any reliance on imported fossil fuels and massively reduce the now spiralling costs of home energy and petrol / diesel by giving the go-ahead to fracking, remove all limitations from North Sea extraction and allow the 100s of years worth of coal under our feet to be utilised again.
Also by removing the massive subsidies from ‘alternative’ (ie relatively useless) energy sources such as wind turbines, ceasing to waste massive amounts of energy on their construction, pushing secondary (ie hugely inefficient) energy technologies such battery-driven cars whose electricity of course first has to be generated etc etc.
All this is in fact is the Putin / Beijing etc regimes’ greatest fear – that the West finally sees through the morale-destroying, tyrannical and economically suicidal Green agenda.
And gets back to the optimistic historical march towards universal prosperity which had been taking place since the Industrial Revolution and stalled in the late 1980s.
Such an epoch-defining change of course would also encourage those living in currently totalitarian societies such as Russia and China to embrace multi-party liberal democracy because of the hugely positive example it would create (just as previous positivity in the West helped to usher in the largely peaceful fall of the Soviet Union).
All pointing towards the peaceful and prosperous world that we all presumably wish to live in / bring into being for our children.
“embrace multi-party liberal democracy because of the hugely positive example it would create (just as previous positivity in the West helped to usher in the largely peaceful fall of the Soviet Union).”
If this is meant to be an advertisement for the western model then it is blatant nonsense. Western democracies are being turned over, are being fashioned into tightly controlled and surveilled technocratic states where we “own nothing but are happy.”
“embrace multi-party liberal democracy because of the hugely positive example it would create (just as previous positivity in the West helped to usher in the largely peaceful fall of the Soviet Union).”
If this is meant to be an advertisement for the western model then it is blatant nonsense. Western democracies are being turned over, are being fashioned into tightly controlled and surveilled technocratic states where we “own nothing but are happy.”
I am afraid you either haven’t read the rest of my post or completely misunderstood it, as the main point was precisely to highlight and condemn both the economically harmful and anti-democratic tendencies of environmentalism / Net Zero etc.
See eg:
“All this is in fact the Putin / Beijing etc regimes’ greatest fear – that the West finally sees through the morale-destroying, tyrannical [my bold] and economically suicidal Green agenda.”
Ultra-health is a subset of the overall Green social-Darwinian and materialistic ideology, and the whole thing has fed into the sort of regimented and compliant world-view that led to huge majorities of Western populations eagerly holding out their wrists for the Beijing-inspired coronavirus lockdown and mask-mandate handcuffs.
As well as now standing quietly by as their living standards are being torn to shreds by completely avoidable sky-rocketing energy and fuel prices / knock-on general inflation, accepting the effective suppression of widespread access to private transport through the enforced introduction of electric cars etc etc.
All this is not being imposed externally or top-down by eg the WEF and its Orwellian slogans but rather represents the consequences of the mass religion of choice in the West which has been increasingly adopted in the 34 years since Margaret Thatcher launched the pseudo-scientific Climate Change agenda onto the world political stage (in part as a convenient excuse and justification for her government’s wilful mass destruction of British heavy industry, coal mining etc).
And I was calling for a complete rejection of this whole nihilistic and inherently tyrannical Green / ultra-health agenda to allow a dramatic economic and democratic revival in the West, which in turn would act as a beacon of light to the still vastly more oppressed populations in Russia, China, North Korea, Iran etc.
Just to highlight the distinction, our democratic and free-speech liberties allow us to mount this sort of vigorous challenge to fundamental state policies, ones which would lead to a midnight knock on the door in the above totalitarian states.
Liberal democracy is an oxymoron – it’s not liberal and it’s not democracy. Never has been, just a continuation of Statism (aka Fascism) hidden behind a soft, fluffy sounding name with the dolts in the population given ‘voting’ as a tranquilliser.
All ultimately coercion-based nation-states are indeed at least potentially tyrannical, which is why I wish to see a progression away from the whole model towards entirely non-violent and cooperation based administrations.
On the other hand the multi-party liberal democratic model is a massive step forward in this direction from the sort of genuinely fascistic tyrannies which are currently in place in eg China and Russia.
To emphasise this point, if you made the same sort of fundamental attack on the state and its underpinnings as
‘Liberal democracy is an oxymoron – it’s not liberal and it’s not democracy. Never has been, just a continuation of Statism (aka Fascism) hidden behind a soft, fluffy sounding name with the dolts in the population given ‘voting’ as a tranquilliser.’
in a totalitarian system you would face immediate arrest and extreme punishment.
Agreed.
I completely agree.
Is it morally correct to make your own citizens hungry, unable to heat their homes, put them out of work, cause misery, hardship and death?
Agree…and after everything ‘the West’ has done in other countries to even start with a ‘moral’ argument is hypocrisy at its worst. There is nothing any more or less moral or immoral about what is happening now than any other conflict….if so surely it’s utterly immoral to be sending weapons to a country where innocents are being killed..on both sides..
As an argument coming from ‘the west’ who have caused more pain, terror
death and destruction than pretty much anyone, it’s a non-starter…
To repeat what I stated above it is not just morally correct but obligatory to refuse to subsidise acts of unilateral military aggression / campaigns of mass destruction and murder such as the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
None of this needs to lead to the sort of mass impoverishment which you correctly identify as currently taking place in eg the UK. This situation is overwhelmingly being caused by the self-destructive Green agenda and its ‘Climate Change’ apocalyptic enforcement tool (ie not by Russian sanctions in either direction).
This in turn is not being top-down imposed by the government but is rather eagerly embraced by a large majority of the population due to the near universal adoption of the Green religion in the West over the past few decades.
Hopefully that world-view and agenda will rapidly change when the economic pain really beings to bite (though that is not meant to imply that human beings require personal suffering to reject harmful ideas and policies).
Nonsense…when did this moral obligation start? Why does it never apply to the ‘West’…why doesn’t it apply to Yemen…Tigray, tons of other places? Can’t you work up the same moral outrage for them?…What you mean is when it’s white and western….
Washington Post 17th July
Even if that reality does not materialize immediately, officials have described the stakes of ensuring Russia cannot swallow up Ukraine — an outcome officials believe could embolden Putin to invade other neighbors or even strike out at NATO members — as so high that the administration is willing to countenance even a global recession and mounting hunger.
In other words, if you aren’t White and European you can starve to death in your millions…..as long as we get our preferred political outcome…
save us your pathetic moralising….it’s just self-indulgent virtue signalling.
Nonsense…when did this moral obligation start? Why does it never apply to the ‘West’
Morality is universal and applies equally to everyone across the world (obviously including those living in ‘the West’)
…why doesn’t it apply to Yemen…Tigray, tons of other places?
The discussion here was specifically about the morality of sanctions designed to hinder the Russian invasion of Ukraine, not an ultimately futile attempt to cover all of the world’s problems at once.
Can’t you work up the same moral outrage for them?
Well I am certainly not attempting to express outrage, just analysis and where necessary criticism of ideas and actions, but again we cannot cover all the world’s geopolitical topics in one discussion thread designed to respond to a specific article (in this case focussed on the effect of sanctions against Russia).
…What you mean is when it’s white
There is no such thing as either white or black (at least in terms of skin colour).
Racial categorising is just one of the many social-Darwinian pseudo-sciences that have brought nothing but artificial divisions, mistreatment, violence and misery to humanity.
As I have stated elsewhere we are all of exactly equal value and to be treated with exactly equal respect and consideration.
Again, agreed. Not sure why you’re getting so many downvotes. I must be missing something, or someone is.
Anarchy is the only way for us folks. Find your tribe.
PS: anarchy is not about arson or beating policemen. It is about a group of intelligent, independent people functioning without a leader. an: without; archos: leader/hierarchy/external control.
Therefore, anarchy proper is, quite literally, not for the majority, because most people need to be told what to do. And the last two and a half years has made it very clear that most people even seem to like being told what to do.
Well, they can keep their kindergarten.
We have our eyes on a rather remote complex of valleys in the Balkans. It hasn’t been invaded for seven hundred years. Care to work with us?
Anarchy is the only way for us folks. Find your tribe.
All human beings are of exactly equal value and possess an essentially perfect soul. Existence is the journey towards ultimately achieving this state of perfection which necessarily includes a rejection of all ‘them and us’ / tribal sectarian illusions.
PS: anarchy is not about arson or beating policemen. It is about a group of intelligent, independent people functioning without a leader. an: without; archos: leader/hierarchy/external control. Therefore, anarchy proper is, quite literally, not for the majority, because most people need to be told what to do.
I don’t believe in any ‘isms’ (obviously including anarchism) or, again, segregated groupings – especially those based on both external hostility and elitist concepts such as higher intelligence or innately greater levels of independence of thought.
And the last two and a half years has made it very clear that most people even seem to like being told what to do. Well, they can keep their kindergarten.
Again I am afraid I don’t accept either the elitist or sectarian aspects of this statement. We are all capable of temporarily buying into harmful ideas and forms of behaviour, but at the same time have both the free-will and conscience to eventually lead us away from them. Nothing whatsoever to do with either intelligence or educational levels.
We have our eyes on a rather remote complex of valleys in the Balkans. It hasn’t been invaded for seven hundred years. Care to work with us?
To quote a far wittier writer than myself, I could never join a club that would have me as a member
Anarchy is the original anti-ism. You’ve got it all backwards.
“All human beings are of exactly equal value.”
They should be equal in the eyes of any manmade laws, yes. But they are most definitely not of equal value; this isn’t elitist, it’s just fact, Sontol. It’s also why an inevitably small number of intelligent people can find a way to work together, without leader, because they know and respect the fact that what one excels at is what another does not, and vice versa.
Saying that all humans are of equal value is one of the most destructive isms. It’s patronising nonsense and you’ve fallen for it.
“Value” is a totally subjective concept, but that does not mean we should try to avoid the subject by pretending obvious differences don’t exist.
When everybody is somebody, nobody is anybody. Reductio ad absurdum.
Everyone is on a journey to anarchy (the real meaning of the word). Some have got very close, some are getting there and some don’t know what it means (but may figure it out).
An anarchic society is one where the only thing that has the final say is fact, reached via the Scientific Method. Argument, counterargument, test, hypothesis, demonstration, solution. If your argument was found to have been the best today, that’s fine, but tomorrow is a new day and it might then be someone else’s arguments which are proven correct. The chosen route is decided in this way, not by any single individual with authority over the rest.
But like I say, this isn’t for everyone. Most either want to lead or be led.
Some of them want to abuse you, some of them want to be used by you.
My idea for today’s problem was the best today. My idea tomorrow may even be the best solution for tomorrow’s problem. But my idea may be the worst on the third day – I would not want the tribe to follow me on the third day.
We are only as good as our last success, and sometimes not even then.
Anarchy is the original anti-ism. You’ve got it all backwards.
Anarchy as a political and / or social movement is inherently contradictory.
In the specific guise you are presenting here with its fundamentally elitist and sectarian approach (ie ‘we free thinkers need to separate out from the uneducated sheep’) it is just another quasi-religious attempt to hi-jack the simple spiritual-moral code of ’cause no deliberate harm to others’ (which does include rejecting nation-states’ false claims to legitimate use of coercion, enforced taxation, punitive imprisonment, extreme violence via warfare etc, or in that sense their ‘power’)
But we are meant to challenge these sorts of ongoing problems and work toward non-violent progress for the benefit of all (to varying degrees depending on our situation, work and family requirements etc), not attempt to artificially section ourselves off.
“All human beings are of exactly equal value.”
They should be equal in the eyes of any manmade laws, yes.
I was precisely rejecting inherently temporary and provisional man-made laws in favour of the eternal spiritual values which we all share via our souls and consciences (though it is up to each of us how long it takes to fully live up to them). And the main guiding principle is to treat all of our fellow human beings as our exact equals and with respect / non-harm at all times.
But they are most definitely not of equal value; this isn’t elitist, it’s just fact, Sontol. It’s also why an inevitably small number of intelligent people can find a way to work together, without leader, because they know and respect the fact that what one excels at is what another does not, and vice versa.
Equality of worth has nothing to do with equality of skills, knowledge etc.
In the practical aspects of material human existence the wider the pool of abilities, access to resources etc the better for all (ie we should be trying to bring about a non-artificially divided and economically integrated world).
Small groups of self-selected ‘intellectuals’ (or some other random and largely illusory criterion) living in isolation either have to continue to rely on salaries, benefits and general economic integration with the despised outside world, or exist in extremely primitive conditions for no good reason.
And that is leaving aside the much more important ethical requirement to reject all forms of sectarianism and elitism.
The hippy commune movement is a real-world case-study of the anarchic and separate-living ethos. Most of them collapsed into chaos then disintegration after a very short time, on the way to which massive levels of strict hierarchy, bullying, self-selected cult-type leadership etc emerged.
Saying that all humans are of equal value is one of the most destructive isms. It’s patronising nonsense and you’ve fallen for it. “Value” is a totally subjective concept, but that does not mean we should try to avoid the subject by pretending obvious differences don’t exist. When everybody is somebody, nobody is anybody. Reductio ad absurdum.
Believing that everyone is of equal value does not mean that we don’t also have profound personal differences. Variety is the spice of life and all that.
In fact it is ‘them and us’ sectarian ideologies (such as the ‘intelligent’ versus the ‘sheep’) which tend to iron out individuality in favour of group identity.
A nice nod to The Eurythmics
https://www.conservativewoman.co.uk/tolerance-the-gateway-drug-to-every-evil/
A very blunt, maybe even brutal takedown of the anything goes, woke society that we are being forced to endure.
A necessary corrective and thought provoking piece which is worthy of wide circulation. The substack version does not hold back.
‘Worth reading in full.’
“Existence is the journey towards ultimately achieving this state of perfection which necessarily includes a rejection of all ‘them and us’ / tribal sectarian illusions.”. And yet you’ve been happily sold a story of aggresion being “unilateral” – only Russian. You’ve bought into a narrative of the conflict being black and white and you’ve contradicted your own moral beliefs in doing so. Like so many others over the last two years, you seem completely unaware of your own hypocrisy.
Your knife sticking skills are exemplary FL.
Tip o’ the hat.
And yet you’ve been happily sold a story
I always look to primary sources rather than other people’s opinions / stories to help me come to conclusions about any topic I am interested in (especially vitally important ones such as this one)
of aggression being “unilateral” – only Russian.
Russia unilaterally invaded Ukraine, not the other way round.
It has moreover been unilaterally malignly interfering in Ukraine’s internal affairs more or less since its independence in the 1990s.
For example Russia assisted in a (failed) violent coup in 2014 seeking to override Ukraine’s clearly expressed democratic wish to form a partnership with the EU instead of closer ties with the Kremlin;
During the same period the Russian Federation hugely encouraged the violent uprisings in the Donbass, at the very least supplying weapons and training to the insurgents and probably direct military assistance.
Russia also, of course, unilaterally invaded and annexed Crimea in 2014.
Furthermore prior to the invasion of 24 February this year Putin regime sought to unilaterally partition Ukraine by illegally declaring the eastern provinces of Donetsk and Luhansk to be independent states (then almost comically seeking to invoke UN Article 51 to justify its invasion, the exact opposite of the intention of the clause).
I am not aware of any parallel interferences the other way round, ie Ukrainian coup-instigations, invasions, attempted partitioning or other military, violent or generally intimidating activities inside Russia.
Hence the correct refence to Russia’s unilateral aggression.
You’ve bought into a narrative of the conflict being black and white and you’ve contradicted your own moral beliefs in doing so.
Again I am not interested in any ‘narratives’ (unless I am reading a novel or watching a film), only facts and moral principles.
The Cabal have already foreseen the outcasts, the critical thinkers going alone & perceive them to be a huge threat to their NWO construct. Prion disease is developing in the apex predator mammals, the very ones which would be desirable for outcasts to hunt & eat.
The evil, evil barstewards.
“ and in the longer term the likelihood of overall economic loss (withdrawals of external investment until a change of policy and alignment etc).”
I wouldn’t hold my breath.
Higher prices (and therefore better margins) on lower volumes. It might seem paradoxical that energy companies embrace climate change quite enthusiastically, but this explains it.
You presume their costs have stayed the same. You also assume the retailer of energy is the same as the producer of oil and gas and therefore energy supply is vertically integrated – it isn’t.
Oil and gas are globally traded commodities whose prices are affected, like everything, by supply and demand.
Big companies like BP, Shell, Exxon are no more in control of prices than you or I.
There are multiple independent oil and gas producers who sell wholesale to refiners or retailers, and independent refiners, and independent retailers of petroleum products.
If you check company accounts you find net margins are very slim, around 5% and determined by costs over which they have no control and what the market will bear.
The prices you see at the pumps today, reflect the anticipated cost to the retailer when they have to replenish their stocks next week or next month. The fact that oil prices have gone down today does not lean that the cost of restocking will have gone down, since future stock will have been refined from oil at the previous higher price, and will also be dependent on how much refined fuel is in the supply system.
Correction on the title.
Energy sanctions are hurting the ordinary people of Europe.
Those who deem to rule us aren’t going to be affected too much by rising energy and food prices.
We’re not in the same boat. They are calling the shots from a nice safe position. We are the ones taking the bullets.
‘ After all, cheap energy is essential to the running of the economy…’
But the aim is not to have cheap energy or enough energy, so over the next ten years the economy will not be running thus finishing what was started during the CoVid lunacy.
This is the pre-requisite for Saving the Planet™️.
i wonder why people don’t see this: it has been stated enough times, clearly enough by the Ecofascisti and WEFers.
It’s back to the fields for we Plebs whilst our lords and masters live it up on the rents collected from us.
We won’t be in the fields. We’ll be cooped up like battery hens in tiny high rise blocks within the control grid of the Smart Cities. The fields are for the wildlife & the cabal no longer tainted by the presence of the Plebiscite.
Too bloody true. Have you seen the high rises going up in Manchester City centre and Salford? The whole landscape resembles a stockyard for cranes.
Not personally. I now live south of the Watford Gap
“It’s back to the fields for we Plebs whilst our lords and masters live it up on the rents collected from us.”
Which is exactly Charlie Windsor’s vision of the future, a sort of 21st century Constable painting. Charlie and his bird touring their estates acknowledging the doffed caps of their peasants as they trundle by in their EV’s – powered by cheese dontcha know.
For those who get on the moral high-horse, the sanctions imposed by the ‘West’ don’t just affect Europe….after two years of Covid restrictions…also predominantly imposed by the ‘West’……we know that the third world is going to see unprecedented food hardship…
“There is really no true solution to the problem of global food security without bringing back the agriculture production of Ukraine and the food and fertilizer production of Russia and Belarus into world markets despite the war.” These blunt words by UN Secretary-General António Guterres accurately describe the present global food crisis.”
…..but as long as the ‘west’ take the moral high ground who cares how many hundreds of thousands starve to death…?
Oh and as Ursula Von the liar said just last week…the conflict has enabled Europe to fast track its green agenda….so there you go, bonus..
The aim is depopulation.
There’s never much logic to sanctions. They seem to pretend the very reason markets work no longer applies, e.g. that there are two parties in every transaction and those transactions take place because both parties are gaining from it. There are those that would like to sell and those that would like to buy. Block transactions from happening and those that would like to buy suffer just as much. They are even worse when there are alternative buyers, because then you aren’t stopping the market, only those applying sanctions are opting out of a market, so denying themselves mutual benefits of being at market. Of course I’ve kind of ignored the main idea which is that by ganging up the pain to those applying the sanctions is spread but the pain of those the sanctions are applied to is concentrated. But still it is supposed to be unbearable yet never is. In practice it is far harder to ensure an objective is achieved e.g. a climbdown, and if it isn’t one there just remains net shared pain.
Sanctions are a product of the way in which politicians misunderstand markets and think they can usefully control them when their control is in many regards illusory. IMO this is one of the key conceits of the EU and why it was good to leave.
We’re now at a stage where people will start saying Ukraine has to win otherwise “Russia’s sanctions” will be a threat to the world come winter.
If Russia hadn’t invaded Ukraine we wouldn’t have had to do stupid things to ourselves and justify the stupidity. Just like if the the virus hadn’t spread into the civilised world we wouldn’t have had to wreck our economies and then find ways to show what we did wasn’t actually stupid.
The virus was not a threat it was just re-branded ‘flu. It was ramped up by the WHO, national governments and their propagandist media with the sole intention of forcing populations worldwide to accept dangerous injections designed to maim, sterilise and kill. Following on comes CBDC, digital ID and social credit and depopulation.
Bluntly we are being taken to Orwell’s 1984.
Look up Agenda 2030, it’s all there.
The root cause of Europe’s inflation is NOT a severe energy price shock. The root cause is the supply destruction caused by lockdowns, together with money printing on an industrial scale.
If you massively increase the money supply while reducing production, the result is inflation. This is absolutely basic economics.
The world oil price has risen, but not beyond where it has been in the recent past without an inflationary surge.
That is why the inflation rise started before the war in Ukraine. Sure, the war has exacerbated it. But it is the coronavirus policy of Western governments, inspired by Communist China and cheered on by journalists like those at the Economist, that is the root cause.
Inflation was a raging certainty when Sunak let the printing presses roll. This was the only way to destroy the savings of the middle class and at the same time reduce the debt he had deliberately created.
All part of Agenda 2030.