(RoyalPatriot.com )- Earlier this week, Russia announced it would be cutting off exports of gas to two countries that have been “unfriendly” to Russia.
Bulgaria and Poland will no longer have access to Russian gas after they both refused to pay for the export in rubles. In doing so, Russia also threatened to cut off other Western countries from their gas supplies, in what is being seen as retaliation for those countries putting economic sanctions on Russia.
Many European leaders have labeled this latest move by Russia as “blackmail.” It’s an intense escalation in what’s becoming an economic war involving sanctions back and forth that is happening at the same time fighting on the ground is happening in Ukraine.
Russia’s cut off of natural gas to two members of NATO comes just one day after the United States and some of its allies committed to urgently send more weapons to Ukraine.
As a result of Russia’s move, it’s likely that countries that rely on their gas could be forced to ration the supplies they already have, which could drive already high prices even higher.
But, it’s also likely to take much-needed money away from Russia at a time when they seemingly would need every little bit of financial help they could get.
Poland in particular has been a prominent part in providing supplies to Ukraine during the war, which is a major reason that Russia targeted it with this latest move. Many weapons that have been sent to Ukraine from other countries have been delivered through Poland.
And Polish government officials just this week said they would be sending Ukraine even more tanks to aid it in fighting back Russian troops.
Only a few hours before Russia said it would cut off natural gas supplies to Poland, the Polish government announced new sanctions against Gazprom — the Russian state-owned energy company that provides it with gas. Additional economic sanctions were put on Russian oligarchs and businesses.
Bulgaria very recently still had many ties to the Russian government. However, a new more liberal government took over in the fall of 2021, and started to cut those old ties.
When Russia invaded Ukraine, Bulgaria supported many of the punitive economic sanctions placed on Russia. The country also allowed fighter jets from Western countries sit at a newly-established NATO outpost on the Bulgarian coast of the Black Sea.
While being cut off from Russian gas certainly wasn’t good news, Poland in particular has been working in recent years to diversify its source of natural gas supplies. As the weather continues to get warmer, the country will rely less on gas than it does during the winter months.
In addition, it was expected that both Bulgaria and Poland were going to stop importing Russian natural gas by the end of 2022 anyway.
Even though this move might not affect Poland and Bulgaria too dramatically, the move by Russia is still a warning sign to other countries that they could be next. Some of those other countries would be hurt more dramatically by such a move, too.
