Andy Barr hammers Biden administration on ‘signal to Moscow that Ukraine was fair game’
Rep. Andy Barr forcefully questioned Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman Wednesday on why the Biden administration abandoned sanctions on a Russian pipeline last year, which he said cost the U.S. critical leverage when Vladimir Putin ramped up for war.
“The decision to waive sanctions without any reciprocal commitments from Putin was a signal to Moscow that Ukraine was fair game,” Barr, a Republican, said during a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing, which was centered around the original congressional authorization to use military force following the September 11, 2001 attacks.
Sherman explained that at the time President Biden wanted Germany to hold the leverage over the Nord Stream 2 pipeline, since it was being constructed there. Germany decided to indefinitely stop the pipeline last week, just as Russian troops moved into eastern Ukraine, setting off a full-fledged war that is now entering its second week.
“I think it is telling that it took Germany to reimpose sanctions before even the United States did. I find it interesting that the Germans are leading on this, not the United States,” Barr told Sherman.
Biden waited until after Putin launched the war to impose sanctions on Russia and Nord Stream 2’s corporate officers, owing to the belief that Putin would have used such preemptive sanctions as a provocation that justified invasion. In January, Democrats in the U.S. Senate blocked a GOP move to authorize preemptive sanctions at the Biden administration’s urging.
The Trump administration slapped sanctions on the undersea pipeline in December 2019, fearing Nord Stream 2 would turn Germany into a “hostage of Russia” for its reliance on their resources. Russia supplies about 40% of Europe’s gas and many Republicans see that dependence as a long-term threat to NATO.
But now that Nord Stream 2 looks dead – the company filed for bankruptcy and laid off its employee on Tuesday – Barr said the administration must now move to enact even stronger sanctions on other sectors, including in energy and banking.
“The administration likes to pat itself on the back that these are devastating, crushing sanctions,” Barr told Sherman. “Really? When we are continuing to import 600,000 barrels of Russian oil because we have…a huge energy loophole in these sanctions on Russian banks and we continue to fill up the hard currency reserves of Putin to finance this war effort … When is the administration going to get really tough on sanctions?”
Sherman made no promises, only arguing that the administration’s current sanctions are taking hold by tossing Russia’s economy into turmoil.
“The ruble is down 30%. The stock market is closed. The foreign reserves are being depleted. These sanctions have had a real and true impact,” she said.
But there’s already indications Biden is looking to go further, with a report that the U.S. is looking to expand the number of elite Russian oligarchs it is seeking to punish, that could include “travel restrictions and the seizure of overseas assets that could run into the billions.”
But some experts caution that sanctions are likely to have little impact on Putin, now that he is fully immersed in a war with Ukraine and that many Russian oligarchs remain aligned with Putin’s world vision.
“Many of them agree with Putin and they will accept the sacrifice as what is required to make Russia great again,” said Matthew Schmidt, an associate professor of national security, international affairs and political science at the University of New Haven, who has worked with congressional committees. “Two, Putin controls the security services and as long as he has their loyalty, they know he has the willingness to kill people and the capability at home or abroad.”
