Logistics: The Evasive Dark Fleet
Ezoic
August 18, 2025: The Russian economy and war effort in Ukraine is financed by oil and other energy exports. Russia is operating under severe economic sanctions imposed to reduce that income and create economic conditions for Russia that make it difficult to impossible to continue their war in Ukraine.
The key to Russian oil exports is the use of foreign tankers to smuggle their petroleum and coal from Russia to overseas customers. Eighty percent of the of the oil for China goes by pipeline and cannot be disrupted. China accounts for nearly half of Russian petroleum and other energy exports. It’s the other half that is at risk because of a growing list of sanctions.
Current estimates are that nearly 900 tankers are smuggling sanctioned Russian petroleum to customers in China, India, the European Union/EU, Turkey and Myanmar. Most refined petroleum products go to Turkey, China, Brazil, Singapore and India. The rest goes to nine countries, in the Middle East, Africa and Taiwan. China has been buying 47 percent of the crude oil while India takes 37 percent followed by Turkey and the EU with six percent each. China, India and Turkey account for about 90 percent of Russian income from the sale of oil, natural gas and coal. The U.S. is imposing additional tariffs on countries that import Russian oil. India is already subject to these tariffs, which increases what they have to pay for imports from the United States. The Americans are negotiating with China and Turkey over what tariffs are being imposed to discourage Russian oil imports. Meanwhile, Russia has been bringing in up to $700 million a month from these exports.
https://www.gopbriefingroom.com/index.php?action=post;board=60.0
