since I can't reply to the comment below I'll address it here:
Last time I checked high energy prices came from the orange turds continuation of the forever war in the middle east and not from russian oilwells receiving kinetic sanctions in 2026.
Economic troubles and deindustrialization in Europe started long before the war on Iran. Germany in particular has been crashing economically ever since being cut off from cheap Russian energy. The recent events simply accelerated the process that was already well under way.
Then again we can thank the old warmongering removed for finally weaning off europe from fossil and forcing renewables on them (making them more independent aswell) even if its means that their economic growth is checks notes a few percent lower (GROW mind you, not stagnate or recess).
That's going to be a decades long process because you can't just swap out the energy system over night. Not to mention the fact that Europe is still not really serious about this given that it refuses to buy solar and wind tech from China because supposedly it will spy on them or whatever. Literally nothing is being done to transition from fossil fuels right now, and that means there's going to be a massive economic crisis.
And that social fabric unravelling in Europe, is it in the room with us right now? I dont disagree that rising living costs and in generall collapsing infrastructure aswell as environment are going to make the situation really ugly in Europe in the future, but its just not happening right now nor in the near future. And lets stop pretending that this isnt an universal problem every county on earth will be facing.
You only have to look at the popularity of the current regimes in Europe here and the rist of nationalist parties to see just how ugly things are already. One has to be asleep not to see this. The rise of AfD in Germany is a direct product of war in Ukraine.
Not every problem the west has is tied to russia (most of them are selfmade lol). Again western economies can easily outlast russias even if the country was managed the best way possible. A single countries economy cannot outcompete so many others. Russia knows this and thats why this article and similar messages exists in the first place to convince people in the west that their attempts are seemingly futile even if that isnt the case at all.
Nowhere did I say that every problem in the west is tied to Russia. I simply pointed out that the proxy war is hurting Europe significantly right now, and there are far more problems than there are in Russia in Europe.
Like I said it will come down to who has the least catastrophic demographics between ukraine and russia.
What it will actually come down to is the economic situation between G7 and BRICS. Russia very obviously isn't going to run out of people, and even western sources admit that Russian army is actually growing and becoming stronger. What is going to be decisive is the economic collapse in Europe at which point it will no longer be able to supply Ukraine.