I really wonder why. Something must have happened

Not relevant to the point - "I gave my item to my former friend Paul". For some reason or for some other, it happens.

And miscalculations in game theory happen ("he wouldn't, given...").

I put my gold in the safe of my best friend, he has a good safe. Then I rapped and killed his wife and children, and destroyed his house. But he doesn’t want to give me the gold back.

ok, but russia and the west were never best friends, just some russians have major crushes on western europe and would still trust the europeans to hold their gold more than their own russian compatriots :))

You are doing the complexity of history, and the due diligence of objective assessment and focus, a great disservice with those gross similes.

Let us stick to a fitting analysis for the point of the limited trust entities can give each other, and let us stick to actual events for what the crimes committed are concerned (for the respect due).

Putin is under an arrest warrant from the International Criminal Court for war crimes. Rapes and killings are widely documented as part of the war he started. I don't think the parent comment was overstating the crimes in question in its simile.

The biggest thing wrong is Russia's gold isn't in the EU. It's actually the other way round - Russia has kind of stolen Spain's gold, at least has it and won't return it.

>Russia has kind of stolen Spain's gold…

For historical reasons, this is kind of amusing.

> I don't think the parent comment was overstating the crimes

Said comment was understating the crimes, but also misrepresenting them in context.

Those crimes are exceptional in ferality, not exceptional as abstracted within the difficulties of trust building. (Which is also gained diplomatically, and diplomacy has clearly failed - bilaterally).

Miscalculation is the right word.

And: it is relevant. You gave away the relevancy yourself. It is called game theory. Games have rules. Break rules see what happens. Or instead be prepared.

Seems like someone broke rules but wasn't thinking through consequences or didn't care about them

Ok, so you meant, with «I really wonder why - something must have happened», that what happened is that they did not calculate it through properly. But that is suggested for a large number of the players in that game. All losers, or going trough a very suboptimal path.

It would be realistic if administrations went through a path in decision making guided by the awareness of their own weakness in decision making abilities.

The something was the collapse of the USSR, right? "The end of history" etc.

Case in point: a naive belief in "high moral". Bad guy (Ru) attacks good guy - bad, punish, cancel. When good guy (US) attacks bad guy - that's different, whataboutism etc. Such POV falls apart when good guy (US) attacks another good guy (EU), and while you may chose to ignore such possibility, European leaders don't (a rare case of competence on their side).

Possibility? Didn't the US sabotage Nordstream 2 a few years ago? It's pretty clear that the US isn't friendly towards Europe unless Europe behaves like a vassal.

It's unclear who blew up the pipeline, but evidence appears to point to Ukraine, not the US.

I don't think it has anything to do with morality.

It is just leverage.

The assets are still there and frozen for the most part (in Euroclear).

Some people would like to see them put to use in guaranteeing reconstruction and defence for Ukraine.