Russian Government Still Punching Itself in the Dick About Food Imports

Thanks to the downing of a Russian Su-24 fighter, Russia is declaring war…on Turkish food imports. Because this is a tactic that has worked so well for them lately.

You may recall that late last year, in response to the Western World being like, “hey, stop fucking with Ukraine,” Russia, in the form of Dear Supreme Beneficent Leader Poot-Poot, took the eminently reasonable and not at all bugfuck insane move of banning all food imports from basically the entire Western World (specifically the US, Canada, the EU, Norway, and Australia), because, in Russia’s paraphrased words, “THE WEST IS NOT OUR REAL DAD.” One writer (me) described it as the country punching itself right in the dick. It turned out to be a terrible idea, with food prices on virtually anything Russia can’t produce for itself (which is most things, actually) skyrocketing. Who could’ve predicted that?!*

In Turkey’s case, Russia isn’t outright banning food imports, but instead stepping up inspections using the country’s food safety watchdog, Rosselkhoznadzor—an agency Russia steadfastly and with a straight face continues to claim is not politically-motivated, no matter how many times the government passive-aggressively uses it as a cudgel against countries that have hurt Russia’s poor widdle fee-fees. Despite officials telling reporters an embargo won’t happen, an outright ban on Turkish products could come soon; increasing inspections past the point of sanity is the same tactic Russia employed in regards to McDonald’s before its outright Western import bans. This is almost certainly a Bad Idea; Turkish products make up about 4% of Russia’s food imports at this point, including 20% of the country’s vegetables. Oh, well, there’s always beets.**

This has been the final edition of The Russian Government Can Fuck Right Off, brought to you by Kitchenette.

* Literally everyone.

** This sentence pretty much single-handedly explains why Russian literature always seems to be so dour and fatalistic. Death doesn’t seem so bad when the alternative is beets.

Image via Slasha/Shutterstock.