Lindsey Graham’s Ghost Sanctions, the Stalemate of the 100 Years War on Russia, & Internal Struggles in USA & Moscow, with John Helmer

Washington advances new sanctions on Moscow but faces an energy crisis within.

Russia has battlefield leverage but internal economic strain, oligarch power and the clashing of ideologies threaten it.

Just days after Washington's envoys Jared Kushner and Steve Witcoff returned from Moscow and Kiev with cautious optimism regarding renewed diplomacy and an end to the war, Congress placed one of its most sweeping Russia sanctions packages yet on President Donald Trump's desk, one coming from the icy, skeletal fingers of recently deceased Lindsey Graham. The contradictions between negotiations, economic pressure and a war now entering its fifth year are on full display.

Vanessa and I dove deep into the intricacies of this conflict from a Critical Perspective with a veteran journalist John Helmer, author of Dances With Bears (https://x.com/bears_with)on X and online. This rare conversation with Helmer, who’s lived in Russia like I have, goes beyond the sanctions themselves, questioning the increasingly simplified narratives surrounding Russia’s position in the Ukraine war, the pressures building inside its economy, the political power of its oligarch class and whether four years of war and Western isolation are fundamentally reshaping the Russian state.


https://youtu.be/eG3mKBiAvP8?is=Y4iNhRlwkQ_P5kSG

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