What I worry about is the shot in the arm Russian finances are about to get due to oil revenue at a point they seemed to weaken strategically. Not to mention pressure to weaken oil sanctions.
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I was just going to post this. You don’t have to wait long to know their thoughts…
> Not to mention pressure to weaken oil sanctions.
The Trump administration instantly folded under that pressure and has already removed some sanctions: https://xcancel.com/SecScottBessent/status/20297142537252622...
Maybe a short financial shot in the arm, but destroying their ability to get Shahed drones is substantial.
Russia has been mass producing its own copies or the drones - the Russian version is called Geran 2 - for several years now. They use a lot of western and sanctioned components and they assemble them in big factories eg Kupol plant in the Russian city of Izhevsk
AFAIK by this point they are now building them all themselves in the big Yelabuga factory.
Alternative scenario:
Iran should be militarily defeated in a few weeks, so that's a brief shot in the arm.
If Iran gets a half decent government and sanctions on Iran are lifted, that would lower oil prices and hit the Russian economy.
By way of comparison, Iraq's oil production didn't return to the pre-war level until mid 2012.
It's probably reasonable to expect several years of disruption to Iranian oil even if sanctions were to be completely lifted in the very near term.
Sure, but blocking Iraq, Kuwait, Saudi, Qatar etc from exporting through Hormuz has a much bigger effect on global oil prices, and that can be resumed immediately if/when the war stops.
> at a point they seemed to weaken strategically
They can hold out for many years. Oil prices going up just means a slightly gentler market for russians.
> They can hold out for many years.
They are running down cash, gold, and cannon fodder.
Russia's oil revenue was down but it was far from being game changing even with stricter sanctions. The oil sector hit has always been more of a big incentive to end the war then something than will impact it militarily on the ground.
Really? Cost of extraction in Russia is about $30/barrel, sanctions introduced discount of about $20/barrel in 2025 which means 70% profit drop at market price of $60. Sounds pretty game changing to me.
Russia can still produce tens of thousands of drones, missiles, and push up endless meatwaves of conscripts even if their oil sector declines (oil is 15% of their GDP). This war hasn't been that sophisticated for a while. Drones are cheap and China will keep selling them parts while buying their oil.
But would it have got them to stop the war? Seems unlikely.
Probably not but it changes the calculus of whether Ukraine or Russia will win.
Not necessarily:
Money isn’t everything. Russia cannot produce electronics on its own, so only because American companies sell to shell companies that sell to Russia is Russia able to launch missiles and similar high tech weapons on Ukraine and, no, Russia has no chance in hell of winning in Ukraine with the so called (sadly but truly deeply dehumanising) “meat wave” attacks sending in soldiers with little training and just a riffle… So really oil revenues are a way to hurt Russia but not a way to cause them to lose the war, but depriving them of American technology that they need to develop the kinds of weapons that they use to attack Ukrainian cities and power stations and infrastructure probably would
I mean no matter how the war ends ukraine has lost
> no matter how the war ends ukraine has lost
This is nonsense. Lviv is by all accounts a thriving city. And Ukraine's defence-industrial base is now among Europe's finest.
Lviv, the Polish city? Come on let's be real.
The cover of war is a great use for targeting fossil fuel infrastructure Russia relies on for exports. Sufficiently inhibiting their ability to export will force them to shut in wells (as we're seeing with major Middle Eastern oil exporters as shore storage reaches capacity), which will potentially take years to restart.
Come again - what Russian fuel infrastructure is being targeted, with the Iranian war as a cover?
Russian shadow fleet vessels.
https://fortune.com/2026/03/11/oil-situation-strait-hormuz-s...
From the American perspective it's a plus - If Russia is getting richer (when it desperately needs the cash) it has an incentive to not get involved in the Iran war (at least in the short-term). (Remember that just before the Iran invasion, US and some of its European allies were suddenly capturing Russian "shadow fleet" oil tankers and increasing pressure on India to cut down Russian oil, and its oil revenues dropped drastically). If Iran can be conquered, Americans gets richer, gain more influence in the middle-east and the Europe (to whom they'll sell the gas) while the Russians will lose much of their influence in the middle-east.
As for Ukraine, nobody in the west really cares for it - that proxy war has given all the dividends it can for the west (EU has cut off all economic ties with Russia, EU is now dependent again on the US for its energy thus making the US richer, EU's next generation have now been brainwashed to hate the Russians again, Finland and Sweden have been successfully pressurised to give up neutrality and join NATO, Finland and Sweden joining NATO means the Arctic Council is now dominated by NATO - Arctic is where the west will next try to cut off Russian influence, Ukraine - which had a large territory and the one of the largest military in Europe - has been cut down in size and is now totally economically and military dependent on the west in effect a vassal state) and the Ukraine war is a stalemate now, where Russians will make slow gains as their army grinds down and keeps losing soldiers - and that's a plus too. As Russia becomes weaker, another proxy war or even a direct attack against it can be waged later in the future (maybe after Putin?). American deep state always plans long term - Death by a 1000 cuts ...
EU has cut off economic ties? Sure, if 2027 is in the past and you believe they will stay the course
https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_25_...