Obama hesitant to impose sanctions, because the Russians might retaliate

Here is one of the things that happens when you are weak and ineffectual, and refuse to implement policies that serve your own best interests. When you need to stand up to someone who is doing something wrong, you might be afraid to, because you or your allies need something that only they can give you.

We take you now to Ukraine, where the eastern part of the country has just declared independence - whether legitimately or otherwise - in a clear move toward being swallowed up by Russia. All of this, of course, started with a move of bald aggression on the part of Vladimir Putin, who obviously fears no sanction on the part of the United States. Nor should he. Bloomberg reports today that the Obama Administration is exceedingly skittish about imposing sanctions on Russia for its aggression in Ukraine. Why? Because the Russians just might retaliate by cutting off gas supplies to the EU. And if Gazprom stops the supplies, who would step in? Not the U.S., because although we are sitting on a wealth of natural gas resources, we're nowhere near the level of full production that would allow us to step in and supply our allies:

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OAO Gazprom (OGZD), Russia’s gas-export monopoly, yesterday threatened to cut off supplies to Ukraine, a reminder of the power Russia wields over energy supplies to the rest of Europe. A gas cutoff by Russia would wipe out half of Ukraine’s supply and could severely disrupt supplies to the EU. The EU, Turkey, Norway, Switzerland and the Balkan countries got 30 percent of the natural gas they burned from Russia last year, according to the U.S. Energy Department. We have to be very careful not to hurt ourselves more than we hurt the other side,” Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski said yesterday in a speech in Brussels, echoing comments made last week by U.S. Treasury Secretary Jacob J. Lew. In a sign of Russia’s ability to use its economic clout to drive a wedge between its adversaries, France’s government said this week it will deliver Mistral helicopter carrier warships to Russia as planned, rejecting requests from its European and U.S. allies to cancel the sale.

Those of you who constantly rail against "oil company profits" as justification for opposing domestic energy production, here is what you get when you win the debate. You get the U.S. and its allies dependent on other nations who often do nefarious things, and can't be confronted because all they have to do is threaten to cut off your supplies and you have no choice but to capitulate. Of course, that might not matter anyway. Obama is weak and feckless by nature - unless he's attacking his own political opponents, thus showing us is real priorities - so he might have little stomach for this fight regardless of any potential consequences. It's entirely possible that the possibility of retaliation is just his excuse for inaction. But to the extent such retaliation would indeed present a problem for the U.S., that's because of decisions of the U.S. government to cater to the demands of green environmentalists rather than producing the energy we need here and now.