Written by JOSH BOAK, Associated Press

WASHINGTON (A.P.) –Just a few days before Russia attacked Ukraine in February. 24th The president Joe Biden quietly dispatched a team to the European Union headquarters in Belgium.

They were not generals or spy chiefs; they were experts at understanding the fine print and tracking the circulation of cash, computer chips, and other products across the globe. Their mission was to inflict maximum harm to Russian Putin, the president of Russia. Vladimir Putin, making it more difficult, if certainly not impossible, to finance a long-term war in Ukraine and hinder his access to the technologies that are the basis of modern combat.

According to Biden Administration officials, there were intense discussions on February 1 at Brussels, Paris, London, and Berlin that often ran for 6 hours each as allies worked to come up with the specifications of a massive economic blockade. A few of the goods that the U.S. wanted to ban were met with resistance by Europeans and would be telling their businesses to cut off several billion dollars of annual revenue from Russia.

“You are able to say no right now, but once the bodies are being taken out of Ukraine You’re not going to wish to be a snob,” Raimondo said she advised her allied counterparts. “Do what’s right.”

Everyone signed up before the invasion.

Raimondo explained that what ultimately drove the agreement and its fast timeframe was the threat from Putin’s imminent assault on Ukraine.

“We all grew up fast that it was the right time to join forces and stay with one another,” the woman said. “If you inflict enough suffering and apathy, then isolating Putin and it brings the conflict towards a close.”

The richest nations of the world, apart from China — are now directly in confrontation with Putin in their terms of preference. They have implemented sanctions where their strengths conflict with Russia’s weaknesses. Russia is dependent upon the U.S., the E.U., Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan for the latest technologies and investments, which is why allies decided to block Moscow off.

It’s a deliberate strategy to keep Putin in a downward spiral when foreign investors take out their cash to protest the violence. It’s also an impressive display of unity that allies’ dependency upon fossil fuels will test in the next few months.

On Wednesday, an economics group said the amount E.U. countries have paid over 13.3 million euros ($14.7 billion) to Russia for natural gas and coal since the beginning of the war, which is funding Putin’s military machine.

The allied discussions before the war were crucial. However, the E.U. did not sit around to see U.S. direction to act. Bloc Members had been collaborating for several months.

A single E.U. diplomat, who spoke on the condition of confidentiality to discuss internal discussions and negotiations, discussed in an interview from January possible penalties, which included the export ban. The diplomat also said that the E.U. was able to maintain its sanctions enforcement coalition following Russia’s occupation of areas of the Donbas zone in Ukraine.

However, this time, both the U.S. and E.U. responded to Russian aggression with innovative rules that impeded Putin’s ability to fight by denying him access to semiconductors and computers and lasers, telecommunications equipment, and sensors that make up war material.

A supply chain problem will require Russia to scavenge its existing aircraft’s tanks, aircraft, and other equipment to find spare parts, effectively reducing its economic and military capabilities. It is also the case that U.S. and E.U. officials confronting the supply chain problems following the pandemic discovered ways to increase the problems for Russia by imposing trade regulations.

As a sign of early successes, U.S. officials point towards the shutting of Lada auto manufacturing plants in Russia and the more than 300 businesses that have stopped conducting transactions with Russia. These companies aren’t just Starbucks and chipmakers like Germany’s Infineon, which announced it would stop all deliveries direct and indirect to Russia and also technical assistance.

Within days of the war, The allies blocked foreign accounts of the central bank of Russia. Two top Biden administration officials who were not permitted to speak publicly about the strategic plans spoke under the terms of anonymity. They said that this option wasn’t initially discussed with allies because of fear that Russia might move its funds before the deadline. Instead, they waited to announce the asset freeze until after the attack, as the pictures of bombs and murder prompted the Europeans to agree quickly.

The freeze has rendered half of the 600 billion dollars in Putin’s war chest inaccessible. Even though the Russian stock market is shut and the ruble’s value has plummeted, The sanctions were crafted to ensure that the economic effect is progressively more restrictive. So long as Ukraine can keep its military assistance in place against serious casualties, sanctions are more likely to further exhaust, Putin.

On Thursday, E.U. Commission Vice President Valdis Dombrovskis praised the “very great coordination” across nations, adding that sanctions “are taking a toll. Russia’s financial markets are on the verge of falling apart.” The author also pointed out that sanctions have cost the allies, even though the cost is lower than the impact of the spread of the war.

However, with each round of sanctions that come out, the unity of 27 E.U. members is being tested more. For example, suppose the idea of imposing a ban on Russian gas and oil is brought up short. In that case, Germany and Italy, both heavily dependent on Russian energy sources, will be in a difficult position to stop the determination of some Eastern member states like Poland as well as the Baltic states who are determined to hit Putin as hard as they can in the shortest time possible. In contrast, the U.S. is less dependent on Russian natural gas and oil and natural gas, making it easy for Biden to ban imports of these substances at the beginning of this month.

It is also possible that the sanctions fail to end Putin and that Russia may discover ways to attract merchandise into the economy. Data on trade analysis by ImportGenius reveal that China has surpassed Germany by 2021 to become the largest exporter to Russia. U.S. officials also say that Russia has sought help in the form of China. Chinese government.

In a tweet, Olivier Blanchard, former chief economist at the International Monetary Fund and now an associate in the Peterson Institute of International Economics and a fellow at the Peterson Institute of International Economics, compared the sanctions to the bombings that hit German factories in World War II. The bombings weakened and weakened the German army in ways that prevented them from pursuing an ongoing war — and economists played an influence in deciding the target.

In all the work that has been accomplished, the question remains whether the effort is sufficient.

Blanchard suggests expanding export control from defense-related production to “anything that disrupts production” within the Russian economy. For example, suppose refrigerators in Russia require gaskets manufactured within the E.U. and are not allowed access to this gasket. It can make it difficult to enable Russia’s Russian business to run, Blanchard stated.

Tania Babina, a finance professor at Columbia University born in Ukraine, declared that sanctions could not stop dictators. She warned that Putin could eventually become more ensconced in the U.S. and E.U. take more aggressive actions. She added that Europeans must impose sanctions to stop using Russian natural gas and oil.

“He will do everything to win, and will even have his grandma fight should he need to,” Babina said. “He will not lose Ukraine. This is the reason it is crucial to stop the energy exports of Russia.”

However, Babina pointed out that there is an additional, more terrifying cost of the sanction policy: Ukrainian lives.