With his army in retreat in Ukraine, Russian leader Vladimir Putin is facing the biggest threat to his two-decade rule yet.
And things aren’t getting any easier.
Experts say the likelihood of Putin being forced from power remains small for now. Still, the Ukrainian counteroffensive, a borderline disastrous tour of Asia and once unthinkable condemnation from Russian politicians threaten Putin’s popularity and grip on the Kremlin.
Now, Russia is facing a crisis in its energy war with the European Union. Earlier this month, Putin threatened to “leave the West to freeze” if the G7 imposed a price cap on Russian oil and gas. The warlike rhetoric came after Russian energy giant Gazprom suspended gas exports to Germany. Despite nearly universal opposition to the invasion of Ukraine, Germany has had a difficult time reducing its reliance on Russia for its natural gas needs. But, in response to the ongoing threat, and perhaps emboldened by Putin’s stumbles, the Germans have “temporarily” took control of Russian-owned oil refineries on their soil.
As CNN reports:
Germany’s economy ministry announced on Friday that it had temporarily taken over Russian oil giant Rosneft’s subsidiaries in the country. Rosneft Deutschland and RN Refining & Marketing account for about 12% of Germany’s oil refining capacity, the ministry said in a statement.
The move was designed to “counter the threat to the security of energy supply,” it added.
…
Germany’s Federal Network Agency, which regulates its gas and electricity industries, will control Rosneft’s shares in three refineries: PCK Schwedt, near Berlin, MiRo, near Heidelberg, and Bayernoil in Bavaria.
The Schwedt refinery is particularly important to Germany’s energy needs, processing about 220,000 barrels of crude a day. It is responsible for supplying about 90% of Berlin’s fuel, according to Reuters.
Moscow learned about the seizures through media reports as Berlin found it unnecessary to share the news with the Kremlin.
However, as noted above, Putin’s troubles aren’t limited to one continent. In Asia, the Russian despot acknowledged that Chinese President Xi Jinping expressed “questions and concerns” over the protracted fighting in Ukraine.
That was nothing compared to Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who told Putin to negotiate a ceasefire. Modi even chastised Putin in front of the cameras, telling him “this is not an era of war.”
Can Putin find an exit strategy for this debacle? Or is his downfall inevitable? Tell us your thoughts in the comments below!
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Putin was expecting that his army would roll over Ukraine easily. He did NOT think the Ukrainians would put up so much resistance having experienced freedom from despotic communist rule for only a couple of decades. Oops!
With all these things going wrong for Putin, along with people telling him he’s wrong and needs to end his phony war, he is just unbalanced enough to make good on his threat to use nuclear weapons in Ukraine. If he does that it will be the start of WWIII because western nations will respond in kind, and our world as we know it will most likely be changed forever.
Gus is right on target. Putin wants to reconstruct a fantasy world based on his vision of Kiev as it was a thousand years ago: the heart of the Russian State. Either that or he is nostalgic for the old Soviet Union. Since the resolve of Ukraine to refuse Soviet-style domination is succeeding and Putin looks foolish and humiliated, there is no telling what he will do next in a spasmodic fit of petulance.
Someone needs to shoot this bastard Putin.
20 years from now we may find out what this Russia/Ukraine war was all about. In the meantime all we know is what our overlords deign to tell us and even that we must be suspicious of.
I agree Q W. Some day we may know the whole truth but until then we are stuck with what the mainstream media feeds us. But has anyone considered the fact that Trump and Putin along with many other world leaders that Trump saw while in office, are sticking to a plan to eliminate all the bio labs around the world , including Ukrainian labs , and eliminate the Nazi Communist deep state at the same time. If oil is the tool used to accomplish these ends , so be it !