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The two remarks by Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov that John Kiriakou pairs to summarise the failure of the sanctions weapon — that Russia was surprised by how swiftly the Americans imposed sanctions, and, a year or two later, surprised by how quickly Russia got around them.
Lavrov on sanctions is the pair of statements by Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov that John Kiriakou uses to compress the arc of the Western sanctions campaign against Russia into two sentences.
The pair
Agreeing that sanctions had not worked against Russia and had instead strengthened its domestic industry, Kiriakou supplied the Russian side of the ledger.
“Foreign Minister Lavrov said two things. He said, number one, the Russians were surprised at the swiftness with which the Americans implemented sanctions. He said that just a week after the sanctions were announced. And then a year or two later, he said he was surprised at the quickness with which the Russians were able to get around sanctions.”[1][2]
The frame it sits in
Kiriakou made the observation immediately after arguing that a rhetorical weapon had been devalued the same way an economic one had. Sanctions “sort of forced the the Iranians to stand on their own or their own two feet”; calling everybody who disagrees with a policy an anti-Semite “has made the meaning worthless.”[1]
He extended the same logic to Iran, where he says forty-seven years of sanctions left the country making for itself whatever it could not buy: “if they have a need for something that they can’t buy because of sanctions, they just make it themselves, and they’ve become quite good at it.”[3]
The wider argument
Kiriakou’s separate illustration of what overuse of the sanctions weapon produced — a Chinese domestic payment card routed through Shanghai rather than New York — is set out at sanctions effectiveness. His summary there and here is the same: “that is what happens when you overuse and overimpose sanctions.”[4]
Sourced from John Kiriakou's on-record public statements. See his profile for the full body of his interviews, podcast appearances, and short-form video.
