Europe's choices

1/3 · ANALYSIS · 10 October 2026

Europe stopped depending on Moscow. Who does it depend on now?

Europe is entering winter with its lowest gas reserves in almost twenty years: at the end of August storage was about 63% full (Oilprice, 27/8/2026, based on Gas Infrastructure Europe data). Qatari gas, blocked at Hormuz, has almost disappeared (see the Hormuz crisis).

Europe suffered this part of the crisis. But its fragility in the face of such a shock stems from a choice made four years ago. This is the first piece in a series on the major choices of Europe's leadership: for each one we ask what was decided, what alternatives existed, what it cost and what worked.

The choice of 2022

After the invasion of Ukraine, the Union decided to exit Russian gas. The choice was not entirely free. In the summer of 2022 it was Moscow that cut Nord Stream flows to a fifth of capacity (Bloomberg, 25/7/2022), and in September the pipeline was destroyed.

The exit is now written into a regulation, 2026/261 (EUR-Lex). Short-term contracts are already banned: since 25 April 2026 for liquefied gas, since 17 June for pipeline gas. Long-term contracts end on 1 January 2027 for liquefied gas and on 30 September 2027 for pipeline gas.

The question is how that gas was replaced. In 2021 Russia accounted for over 45% of European imports; in 2024, 19%; in 2025 about 13%, according to Energy Commissioner Dan Jørgensen (ANSA via Il Nordest, 24/4/2025). Today the largest supplier is Norway, with about 30% (European Commission, quarterly gas report, Q2 2025). The rest arrives mainly by ship, as liquefied gas, and 58% of that gas comes from the United States: about a quarter of all European demand (ACER, 2026).

The dependence on Moscow is over; the dependence on the sea, and on Washington, has begun. In July 2025, in the trade deal with Trump, the Union also pledged to buy 750 billion dollars of American energy over three years: a political, non-binding commitment that many analysts consider unachievable (Oil & Gas 360, 28/7/2025).

How much we pay

Liquefied gas is more expensive by nature: it has to be cooled, shipped and regasified. But there is more to it. In the second quarter of 2025 gas in the United States cost 13.7 euros per megawatt-hour; once in Europe it cost 35.5 (European Commission, report cited above). That gap covers the costs, and the margins of those who sell. According to IEEFA, in 2025 American liquefied gas was on average the most expensive for European buyers, ahead of Qatari and Russian gas; from 2022 to 2025 the Union bought 131.5 billion euros' worth of it (IEEFA, European LNG Tracker). IEEFA is an American non-profit institute, funded by philanthropic foundations, which states that it supports the transition to clean energy.

On the bill, the European average for households, taxes included, looks like this:

Sources: Eurostat, 5/5/2026 for 2025; Eurostat figure for 2021 reported by Euronews, 26/2/2026. The example is our own calculation on an indicative consumption level; differences between countries are very large.

The price has almost doubled, and the late-2025 figures do not yet include the Gulf war: between February and April 2026 gas in European capitals rose by a further 6.8% (Euronews, 14/5/2026, HEPI index). It must be said, however, that wholesale prices had already started to soar in the second half of 2021, months before the invasion, with the post-pandemic recovery (World Bank, monthly series): the crisis does not stem from European choices alone.

While Washington negotiates with Moscow

Europe has set a date to give up Russian gas, and until then keeps buying it; its main ally is going in the opposite direction. On 9 October Trump announced a deal with Putin to receive Russian diesel: over 300,000 tonnes immediately, then growing quantities up to a few million. The US Treasury issued a licence suspending until April 2027 the sanctions on Russian diesel already loaded on ships (OPB, 9/10/2026). Zelensky called it “a weak decision” by strong partners.

On 8 October Reuters reported that envoy Jared Kushner and Kirill Dmitriev, an adviser to Putin, had discussed bringing an American investor into Nord Stream (Reuters via WHBL, 8/10/2026). The White House says it has not been discussed recently; Berlin says a reopening is “not desired”. The pipelines are under European sanctions: under EU law a restart would remain illegal, whatever Washington decides.

Who destroyed Nord Stream

On 14 October the trial of Serhii Kuznietsov opens in Hamburg. A Ukrainian citizen extradited from Italy, he is accused of leading the group of seven people who planted the charges. According to German investigators, the order came from a Ukrainian state agency, to deprive Moscow of gas revenues. Kyiv denies it; Zelensky has said he knew nothing about it (JusticeInfo). A second suspect, Volodymyr Zhuravlyov, was arrested in Croatia in August, after a Polish court had refused his extradition (LIGA, 19/8/2026). The theories circulated in recent years blaming the United States or Russia itself have not been borne out by any judicial investigation. The charges, in any case, have yet to be proven in court.

What worked

In 2022 many predicted rationing and closed factories. It did not happen: Europe replaced most Russian gas in three years and stopped being open to blackmail by a supplier that used deliveries as a weapon. That is a real achievement. The price was a bill that has almost doubled and a new dependence, more expensive and more exposed to distant crises.

Our assessment

Leaving Russian gas was a defensible choice: no country should entrust the heating of its homes to a state that has just invaded a neighbour. The mistake was doing it without building real autonomy. Europe changed supplier, not condition. It tied a quarter of its gas to a single country, promised to buy even more, and now finds that this country is negotiating with Moscow on its own, on diesel and perhaps on Nord Stream, while European households pay the bill. A leadership able to choose, in a time of transition, should have asked not only whom to stop buying from, but whom never again to depend on so heavily.

Update, 11 October 2026. According to the German organisation Urgewald, using data from the analytics firm Kpler, between January and September 2026 EU ports received 12.18 million tonnes of Russian liquefied gas from the Arctic Yamal project: 9.5% more than in the same period of 2025, a record. Of Yamal's deliveries, 85% end up in Europe; in September almost three quarters of those reaching the Union were unloaded in France, at Dunkirk and Montoir (Euronews). Urgewald estimates their value at about €7.9 billion, but warns that this is a calculation based on market prices, not the sum of actual payments or of Russian state revenue. In the third quarter deliveries fell by 13.6% year on year. The purchases are legal: short-term contracts have been banned since April, long-term ones will be from 1 January 2027. For this reason we have corrected the sentence that opened the section “While Washington negotiates with Moscow”, which said Europe “is giving up” Russian gas: it will, but for now it is still buying it.

Update, 15 October 2026. The trial opened on 14 October before the Hamburg Higher Regional Court and is expected to run until early 2027. According to the prosecution, Kuznietsov and other Ukrainian servicemen acted on orders from Ukrainian state agencies; the defendant denies this and did not speak in court (Courthouse News). The defence argues that there is no evidence of his involvement and, at the same time, that the pipeline was a legitimate military target, “a weapon in the hands of the Russians”. The court will therefore have to decide whether this was an attack on civilian infrastructure, prohibited by the law of war, or a military operation. According to the BBC, in September 2022 Kuznietsov was on active duty in the Ukrainian armed forces (LIGA, citing the BBC). Ukraine's Prosecutor General says it has found no evidence of state involvement (Kyiv Independent).

What to watch

• Gas storage levels on 1 November and the Hamburg trial, from 14 October.
• Deliveries of Russian diesel to the United States and the talks on Nord Stream and Lukoil.
• Eurostat household bill data for the first half of 2026, expected at the end of October.

Sources: Oilprice, 27/8/2026 · Bloomberg, 25/7/2022 · EUR-Lex · ANSA via Il Nordest, 24/4/2025 · European Commission, quarterly gas report, Q2 2025 · ACER, 2026 · Oil & Gas 360, 28/7/2025 · IEEFA, European LNG Tracker · Eurostat, 5/5/2026 · Euronews, 26/2/2026 · Euronews, 14/5/2026 · World Bank, monthly series · OPB, 9/10/2026 · Reuters via WHBL, 8/10/2026 · JusticeInfo · LIGA, 19/8/2026 · Urgewald, 9/10/2026 · Euronews, 9/10/2026 · Courthouse News, 14/10/2026 · LIGA, citing the BBC, 10/10/2026 · Kyiv Independent, 9/7/2026

2/3 · ANALYSIS · 15 October 2026

The Euro-Russian market that worried Washington: what the numbers say

A recurring thesis

In public debate, in Italy and elsewhere, one idea keeps coming back: before the war a great market was taking shape between Europe and Russia, European industry joined with Russian raw materials. A prospect that would have weakened the United States, and that Washington would have had an interest in stopping.

The idea has a true part and a part the numbers do not confirm. Here we separate them. This is the third piece in the series on the choices of Europe's leadership, after the one on energy.

The dream "from Lisbon to Vladivostok"

The project has a date. On 25 November 2010 Vladimir Putin, then prime minister, proposed in a German newspaper a great economic space "from Lisbon to Vladivostok", with a free-trade area (Moscow Times, 25/11/2010).

Berlin answered cautiously: Angela Merkel said she shared the idea, but that Russia was not moving in that direction (AFP via bilaterals.org). The project never went beyond statements.

And the dollar? In 2019 Rosneft, Russia's largest oil company, switched all its export contracts from the dollar to the euro, to shield itself from American sanctions (High North News, citing Reuters).

What the numbers say

Sources: Eurostat, 7/3/2022 for 2012 and 2021; for 2002, Eurostat data reported by Chronicle.lu; for 2025, Eurostat Comext data reported by The Trade Hub, consistent with the quarterly data from Eurostat.

Trade grew until 2012, then fell with the Crimea crisis, the first sanctions and the drop in oil prices. In 2021 Russia accounted for 4.1% of European exports and 7.5% of imports, and 62% of what Europe bought from Moscow was energy (Eurostat, cited above).

It was an important relationship but a simple one: Russian raw materials in exchange for European machinery. And before the war it was already shrinking. Russia's GDP, $1,830 billion, was about a tenth of the Union's, $17,300 billion (World Bank via FRED). Talk of an economic "empire" in the making finds no support in the data.

Who had opposing interests

American interests, on the other hand, are documented.

On 20 December 2019 Trump signed a law sanctioning the companies laying Nord Stream 2. A few hours later the Swiss-Dutch company Allseas suspended work (Reuters via PGJ). The German government said it rejected "extraterritorial" sanctions (EUobserver).

On 7 February 2022, next to Chancellor Scholz, Biden said that in case of an invasion Nord Stream 2 would be finished. Scholz avoided naming the pipeline (CNBC, 7/2/2022).

After 2022, who gained can be measured:

• Gas. In 2025, 54% of the liquefied gas exported by the United States went to the Union, 63% more than the year before (Banchero Costa via Hellenic Shipping News). The energy piece in this series showed at what price.
• Weapons. Between 2021 and 2025 the United States supplied 58% of the weapons imported by Europe's NATO members (SIPRI via Defense News, 9/3/2026).

On the dollar, by contrast, the war did not change the trend. In 1999 it made up 71% of central bank reserves; today it is at 56.7%, while the euro has risen to 20.6% (IMF, 30/9/2026).

An interest is not a cause

Having an interest does not mean having caused an event. The full-scale war began on 24 February 2022, when Russian troops entered Ukraine. On 2 March the UN General Assembly demanded their withdrawal with 141 votes in favour (UN, resolution ES-11/1). On 16 March the International Court of Justice ordered Russia to suspend its military operations (ICJ, order). How we got to that day, with everyone's responsibilities, is the subject of the next piece.

The moral bill

There is one point where the criticism of Europe fully holds. While giving up Russia in the name of principles, the Union built other relationships with fewer scruples:

• On 18 July 2022 Commission President von der Leyen signed an agreement in Baku to double gas from Azerbaijan by 2027, calling the country a reliable partner (European Commission, IP/22/4550). A year later Azerbaijan took Nagorno-Karabakh with a military offensive, and more than a hundred thousand Armenians fled to Armenia (UNHCR, via Reuters).
• On 31 May 2023 Italy lifted the ban on selling bombs and missiles to Saudi Arabia, imposed over the war in Yemen (Reuters via The New Arab).
• In January 2024 Germany dropped its veto on Eurofighters for Riyadh, citing the Saudi attitude towards Israel after 7 October (AP via PBS).

What worked

Cutting trade took away the lever Moscow had used for years to influence European governments. Since the second quarter of 2025 the Union has had a trade surplus with Russia, for the first time in more than twenty years (Euronews, 30/8/2025; Eurostat via Sofia Globe, 24/2/2026). A Europe that in 2021 bought 45% of its imported gas from a single country was exposed to blackmail; today it is much less so.

Our assessment

This section expresses the site's position. It is separate from the facts set out above.

Those who argue that the United States had an interest in separating Europe from Russia are right: Washington said so and acted on it, with the Nord Stream sanctions and with Biden's promise. Those who argue that for this reason America "made the war break out" confuse an interest with a cause, and erase the choice of whoever sent in the tanks. The Euro-Russian market was not killed in 2022: it had stalled ten years earlier, when Moscow preferred Crimea to free trade.

One fact weighs more than intentions. Whatever the cause of the war, its outcome left Europe with no alternative and made it more dependent on Washington, its main beneficiary. But the Russian alternative was itself a dependence. A sovereign Europe should have built its own autonomy, not chosen between two masters.

And there is the double standard. The Union broke with Moscow in the name of principles, but at the same time resumed selling weapons to those who had bombed Yemen and called reliable a government that a year later would settle a conflict by force. Principles applied only to the enemy of the moment are not principles: they are convenience.

What to watch

• Eurostat data on trade with Russia in 2026 and the 23rd sanctions package.
• The $750 billion commitment to American energy: how much of it has actually been bought.
• The review of the EU common position on arms exports.

Sources: Moscow Times, 25/11/2010 · AFP via bilaterals.org · High North News, citing Reuters · Eurostat, 7/3/2022 · Chronicle.lu · The Trade Hub · Eurostat · World Bank via FRED · Reuters via PGJ · EUobserver · CNBC, 7/2/2022 · Banchero Costa via Hellenic Shipping News · SIPRI via Defense News, 9/3/2026 · IMF, 30/9/2026 · UN, resolution ES-11/1 · ICJ, order · European Commission, IP/22/4550 · UNHCR, via Reuters · Reuters via The New Arab · AP via PBS · Euronews, 30/8/2025 · Eurostat via Sofia Globe, 24/2/2026

3/3 · ANALYSIS · 15 October 2026

From 1990 to 2022: how the war in Ukraine came about

Why this piece

The full-scale war begins on 24 February 2022, but the rupture between Europe and Russia goes back a long way. The previous piece distinguished between those who had an interest in that rupture and those who caused it. Here we set out thirty years in order, with one rule: for every fact that is uncomfortable for one side, we also look for those uncomfortable for the other, and we give the floor first to courts and international observers, then to governments.

1990: the verbal promise

On 9 February 1990 US Secretary of State James Baker told Gorbachev, three times, that NATO would not move "one inch" eastwards. Bush, Kohl, Mitterrand and Thatcher said similar things. This is shown by the documents published in 2017 by the National Security Archive.

But none of those statements ended up in a treaty. The treaty on German reunification only bans foreign NATO troops and nuclear weapons in the former East Germany. In 2014 Gorbachev himself said that eastward enlargement was not discussed in those years; he added, however, that the West had betrayed their spirit (German Federal Academy for Security Policy).

What Moscow signed

• Helsinki 1975 and Istanbul 1999: every state freely chooses its alliances. The Istanbul Charter adds that no one may strengthen its own security at the expense of others, the argument Moscow has always used, and that no one may consider any part of Europe its own "sphere of influence". Both are in the same paragraph.
• Budapest 1994: Ukraine gives up the ex-Soviet nuclear weapons; Russia, the United States and the United Kingdom undertake to respect its borders.
• NATO–Russia Founding Act, 1997: neither side has a veto over the other's decisions.

And it was the Eastern countries that asked to join NATO: Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic and the Baltic states remembered Soviet invasions and occupations.

From cooperation to confrontation

1999. Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic join NATO. In the same year NATO bombs Serbia over Kosovo without UN approval. Moscow will not forget it.

2002. It is still a time of cooperation: the NATO–Russia Council is born. In those months, standing next to Ukrainian President Kuchma, Putin says that relations between Ukraine and NATO are "a matter for those two partners" (Kremlin).

2007-2008. In Munich Putin openly attacks the US-led order. Warnings also come from the West: back in 1997 the American diplomat George Kennan had called enlargement the gravest error of American policy since the Cold War (New York Times, 5/2/1997). In February 2008 the US ambassador in Moscow, William Burns, writes to Washington that Ukraine in NATO is the brightest red line for Russia's entire ruling class (cable published by WikiLeaks, Fair Observer).

In April, at the Bucharest summit, NATO announces that Ukraine and Georgia "will become members" (NATO, 3/4/2008), but Germany and France block the concrete path to membership. The result: Moscow feels threatened, Kyiv is left without protection. In August war breaks out in Georgia; an inquiry commissioned by the European Union will conclude that Tbilisi fired first, but that Russia's response went beyond the limits of self-defence (RTÉ, on the Tagliavini report).

Even then the road was not set: in 2010 the United States and Russia sign a new nuclear arms treaty, and in 2012 Russia joins the World Trade Organization, welcomed by Europe (EUI).

2013: two markets for one country

The real rupture comes from an economic dispute. Moscow wants Ukraine in its customs union; Brussels offers it a free-trade agreement. It cannot have both.

In August 2013 Russia blocks Ukrainian goods at the border for a week (OSW). An adviser to Putin calls signing with Europe "suicidal" (Reuters via Moscow Times). In November President Yanukovych gives up signing; on 17 December Moscow grants him $15 billion and a one-third discount on gas (Moscow Times). This is where the Maidan protests come from.

2014: Maidan, Crimea, Donbas

Maidan. After three months of protests, Yanukovych flees in February. Between 18 and 20 February alone, in central Kyiv, 73 civilians and 11 police officers are killed (Hromadske). In early February a leaked phone call had already been released in which the American diplomat Victoria Nuland discussed with the ambassador who should join the government and swore at the European Union (MPR, citing AP): Washington wanted a say, and did not agree with Brussels.

The far right. It existed and was armed. The Azov battalion was founded in 2014 and its first commander came from a neo-Nazi group; in 2018 the US Congress banned funding it (The Hill, republished by Congressman Ro Khanna). But at the polls it carried little weight: in 2019 the entire far right, running together, won 2.15% and stayed out of parliament (Swedish Institute of International Affairs). The same year Zelensky, from a Jewish family, won with 73%.

Crimea and Donbas. In March Russia annexes Crimea; the UN General Assembly declares the referendum invalid, with 100 votes in favour, 11 against and 58 abstentions (Library of Congress). In April an armed group led by Igor Girkin, a former Russian intelligence officer, takes Sloviansk. Girkin will say he "pulled the trigger of the war", while admitting that by summer most fighters were local (Moscow Times). In 2025 the European Court of Human Rights ruled that Russia controlled the separatist areas from 11 May 2014, and that it is responsible for shooting down flight MH17 (ECHR, 9/7/2025).

Odesa. On 2 May clashes between pro-Ukrainian and pro-Russian groups leave 48 dead; 42 die in the fire at the Trade Unions House, where the pro-Russian activists had barricaded themselves (Kyiv Post). In 2025 the European Court found against Ukraine for failing to prevent the violence, rescue the victims and investigate properly (ECHR, 13/3/2025).

The dead. From 2014 to 2021 the UN counts about 14,300 dead, at least 3,404 of them civilians, most in the first two years (OHCHR).

Minsk: an agreement nobody kept

The Minsk agreements (2014-2015) provided for a ceasefire, the withdrawal of weapons and foreign forces, and autonomy for Donbas. They were never implemented. In 2022 Merkel said Minsk had also served to give Ukraine time to grow stronger (TASS, on Die Zeit): for Moscow this is proof of Western bad faith. But Russia never withdrew its forces, as the agreement required.

The last weeks

In the days before the invasion OSCE monitors record a surge in shelling along the front: in Donetsk, between 18 and 20 February 2022, more than 2,100 ceasefire violations (OSCE). Each side blames the other.

Moscow justifies the invasion with an alleged "genocide" of Russian speakers in Donbas. In March 2022 the International Court of Justice says it has no evidence of that genocide (ICJ).

Our assessment

This section expresses the site's position. It is separate from the facts set out above.

Explaining is not justifying. The West gave verbal assurances and then disregarded them, ignored its own diplomats and in Bucharest chose the worst path: announcing membership without granting it. Washington tried to shape the government born of Maidan. In Ukraine the armed far right was tolerated for too long, and in Odesa the state failed. These are facts, and an honest account must include them.

But Russia had signed the right of every state to choose its alliances and had guaranteed Ukraine's borders. It used a trade blockade to stop Kyiv from making an economic choice, then took Crimea and Donbas. No Western mistake makes an invasion lawful: the UN Charter forbids the use of force to everyone, including those who feel threatened. It is the same yardstick we use for Washington, and it must be used for Moscow too.

What to watch

• The next piece in the series: Europe's choices after 2022 and what they have cost.
• The individual cases against Russia at the European Court of Human Rights, opened up by the July 2025 judgment.

Sources: National Security Archive · German Federal Academy for Security Policy · Istanbul Charter · Kremlin · New York Times, 5/2/1997 · Fair Observer · NATO, 3/4/2008 · RTÉ, on the Tagliavini report · EUI · OSW · Reuters via Moscow Times · Moscow Times · Hromadske · MPR, citing AP · The Hill, republished by Congressman Ro Khanna · Swedish Institute of International Affairs · Library of Congress · Moscow Times · ECHR, 9/7/2025 · Kyiv Post · ECHR, 13/3/2025 · OHCHR · TASS, on Die Zeit · OSCE · ICJ