Ukraine has now become ‘the sandpit of capitalist exploitation’.
On New Year’s Day 2025, Zelensky terminated Russian gas supply to Europe via the Ukraine. With the exception of a few minor players, including Azerbaijan, Qatar, and Norway, Europe is now reliant upon the United States for LNG gas supply.
The United States created this situation by blowing up the Nordstream pipeline from Russia to Europe by the Baltic Sea.
This article is about how the US and Ukraine are trying to stifle Russian earnings from supplying Europe with cheap gas.
Till 1 Jan 2025, Ukraine pumped Russian natural gas through its territory to several European countries, including Slovakia, Moldova, and Hungary.
“Weeks after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the European Commission announced the REPowerEU plan to transition away from dependence on Russian fossil fuels by 2027. It followed with embargoes on coal (August 2022), crude oil imports (December 2022), and oil products (February 2023), and it participated in the G7 oil price cap.” – Brookings Institute
However, it did not sanction gas supplies via Nordstream or Ukraine or Turkey. So the United States blew up Nordstream 1 and 2. And now Ukraine has refused to permit Russian gas to transit through its territories.
The southern part of Europe is still highly dependent upon Russian energy, particularly gas via the Turkstream pipelines ( shown above ).
Russia still uses the TurkStream pipeline on the bed of the Black Sea to export gas. The pipeline has two lines. One feeds the domestic market in Turkiye, while the other supplies central European customers, including Hungary and Serbia. However, the TurkStream has limited annual capacity.
NATO countries, by reducing Europe’s reliance on Russian gas, have forced the purchase of liquefied natural gas (LNG) from Qatar and the US, alongside piped gas supply from Norway.
LNG is far more expensive than gas delivered via pipelines. One of the motivating factors for NATO support of the rebels coup d’etat in Syria has been Assad’s refusal to allow Qatar gas to be part across Syria to Turkey to supply cheaper gas to Europe. Assad said did that to keep onside with the Russians who had monopolised energy supply to Europe and did not wish to have Qatar as a competitor.
Germany is particularly dependent upon pipelines for gas supply because, until recently, it had very little capacity for LNG imports. It is building floating LNG ports to overcome this. However, they have proved to be very expensive .
Let me ask you one question
Is your money that good?
Will it buy you forgiveness
Do you think that it could?
I think you will find
When your death takes its toll
All the money you made
Will never buy back your soul
– ‘Masters of War‘ by Bob Dylan
Workers BushTelegraph is predicting an energy crisis in Europe this winter.
Ian Curr
2 January 2025