Energy Flow and Embargoes
East-West Relations in the 20th Century
Deutsche Fassung
Abstract
Sanctions have proven to be unsuccessful means of stopping global energy flow. In the 20th century, this also applied to the cross-border trade in Soviet fossil fuels that were in great demand on the world market. During the Cold War, Western embargoes served little purpose, because the West Europeans had a far greater interest in importing raw materials and expanding trade relations with the socialist “Eastern bloc” than the Americans. Transatlantic divergences in dealing with the Soviet Union were already noticeable in the NATO pipe embargo in 1962. In 1981/1982, they were expressed even more clearly in the fierce American-West European dispute over the construction of the first gas export pipeline from Siberia to Europe.
(Osteuropa, 10-12/2021, pp. 59–82)