Sanctions Effectiveness Quotes

Opponents of U.S. sanctions have made 'unilateral sanctions' their special target. They argue that sanctions observed by many nations would be much more effective. True enough. Far better for trade with an outlaw regime to be restricted by many nations than by just one.

Though there are some debatable exceptions, sanctions rarely play a significant role in dislodging or constraining the behavior of despicable regimes.

I rang my friend Jim Wolfensohn, who was then running a private commercial bank in New York. I said, "Come up to Vancouver", and he did. I put my proposition to him. He said, "I think it could work." I said, "Will you help us?" He said, "Yes." So, I set aside senior people in our treasury and they worked with Wolfensohn and the investment sanctions were applied. And that's what brought the regime down. The last South African Finance Minister, Barend du Plessis, went on record as saying that it was the investment sanctions that put the final nail in the coffin of apartheid.

Sanctions are not really an economic weapon.

It is said that sanctions do not work—that they lead to resentment and possibly war. When sanctions do not work the reason is that they are not strong enough.

The United States really only accounts for about 3 percent of the economic engagement with Russia. Europe is 40 percent, and so Europe's contribution to this pressure is far more than symbolic. It's very practical. And that's one of the many reasons why we have worked hard to remain in close coordination with our European partners.

Attempts to settle crises by unilateral sanctions outside the framework of U.N. Security Council decisions threaten international peace and stability. Such attempts are counterproductive and contradict the norms and principles of international law.

Unilateral sanctions on Cuba have been oppressive and largely ineffective, and that's why the public largely supports lifting them.

There is a much cheaper way, less complicated way to bring Iraq and Saddam Hussein to its knees: it is simply to send the Bush economic team over there and let them run the country.

What the United States has to do is send a clear message to Iran that they will not be able to develop nuclear weapons. Why endure the difficulty of sanctions if they are not going to be able to develop nuclear weapons anyway?

People talk about smart sanctions and crippling sanctions. I've never seen smart sanctions, and crippling sanctions cripple everyone, including innocent civilians, and make the government more popular.

I think the most important challenge that remains is this mentality in Washington that sanctions have been an asset, and some people want to find even an excuse to keep them or an excuse to reintroduce them. I don't know whether they've looked at the record of how sanctions actually produce exactly the opposite of what they wanted to produce.

The cumulative effects of the economic and financial sanctions might well bring the rebellion to an end within a matter of weeks rather than months.

Sanctions make a substantial contribution to power based on privation, and they have never hurt a single despot in the whole history of their use.

Sanctions against such country as Russia are unlikely to be effective.

Keep pressure on Iran, because pressure works.

Sanctions work over time. They do work, but it takes years for them to have an effect.