Finally, both Nordstream 1 AND Nordstream 2 still have a gaping holes in them from the bombings so restarting deliveries will probably take several years at least.
All in all, this plan gets only a 2 out of 10 for being impractical, too slow AND depending on factors outside our control. 1 point because it does at least sound spy-ish and proactive.
Before 2022 we had the big EU auto companies in Russia, we also had nice handbags, shoes and outfits to sell to Russia. Plus we could have them hide their money in London property. Machine tools were also a brisk trade.
Nowadays Russia needs nothing from Europe. Nothing apart from peace and their 300 billion back. But we have gone past that stage. The Russians have never broken any energy contracts in this, the West has cut themselves off.
Regarding the EU not wanting the former Ukraine to lose, there is a difference between what the officials want and what the people want. From Finland to Portugal I am sure most people would want no war and cheap energy, however, their 'leaders' are just doing what Washington tells them to do.
Not really. Putin will not deal with Europe honestly.
A better idea is to try to get Russia to join the EU and use an open market to exert control over the more extreme behaviors and tendencies in Russia. A lot of Russian behavior is based on paranoia (completely justifiable paranoia when you see the way the US is behaving) so perhaps having them in the European fold will chill them out a bit - obviously this is far fetched but it's at least a way to fix this long term.
As a Russian? Absolutely yes.
We had a dry run 3 years ago, during Prigozhin's mutiny. He was advancing towards Moscow at freeway speeds, and the population was happily taking pictures. Nobody was organizing barricades, protests, or pro-government rallies.
Putin's regime is purely authoritarian ("information autocracy") it has _no_ ideology. Moreover, the government in Russia does everything it can to keep the population passive.
And before you ask, Iran was different because it's _not_ an authoritarian country. It's a full-blown totalitarian theocracy with an official ideology and the elites there actually _believe_ in their doctrine. They have a core of people who will die rather than betray it. And most importantly, they have actual institutions that can survive the death of individuals.
Eventually nobody will want the job.
It may have been true in the case of Maduro, but the jury is out (we also "decapitated" Hugo Chavez in the early 2000s but he came roaring back).
It is emphatically not true in the case of Iran, Russia, China, DPRK or any state that has been truly sovereign for a couple generations. These states have deep political power structures that don't rely on the whims of one individual.