Sanctions are failing to turn Putin’s oligarchs against him

When personal sanctions on Russian oligarchs and officials were imposed by the UK, US and EU after Putin’s invasion, the rationale was that this would undermine the Kremlin. In the main, this has failed – and there is still no coherent strategy to encourage those Russians willing to turn against the regime.

Wider economic sanctions are slowly grinding away at the economic base of Putin’s regime and its war machine. The case for personal sanctions is much less clear. It is absolutely right and proper that those directly involved in the war, conducting repressions or justifying aggression ought to be punished. However, in their enthusiasm to be seen as taking a determined stand (and, in part, driven by what one British diplomat described as ‘performative one-upmanship’), all sorts of other Russians, especially wealthy ones, ended up on these various lists. As things stand, the UK has sanctioned over 1,600 people and entities, the EU almost 1,800, and the USA more than 3,000.

One frequently-used argument at the time was that this would induce the oligarchs to try and persuade Putin to change course or even turn against him.