Yeah, that is what Putin was hoping for and planning for. There is this old old Russian joke: "Mommy, mommy, the price of vodka is up. Does that mean daddy will drink less? -No, baby, it means we will eat less."
Are you going to post the "sanctions" they have in place? You know, the big ones. Notice you left out India and China, which, of course aren't all that small. Not to mention the other 42 countries (many of which are, indeed, small).
Japan's "sanctions". I gotta tell ya, they look scary. We can look at the other "big ones" as you call them next. But before we leave Japan, which of these sanctions has a lot of teeth to bring Russia to its knees?
Taiwan, Japan and Singapore - joined Western sanctions fully. No financial transactions, very restricted exports, restricted imports (like coal import stopped) etc. South Korea: * had banned all financial transactions with the Russian Central Bank and sovereign wealth funds (with the exception of energy-related payments), as well as Bank Rossiya. * export controls on Russia regarding shipments of strategic items—including electronics, semiconductors, computers, information and communications, sensors and lasers, navigation and avionics, and marine and aerospace equipment * blocks seven Russian banks from the SWIFT international payments system, including Sberbank, VEB, PSB, VTB, Otkritie, Sovcom, and Novikom. * stopped all imports of coal from Russia
Were it not for trade hours, I would just say that there is a LOT that could be unpacked there in a larger discussion. Let us stipulate in advance that China is a snake that looks out for China. So, yes, they are working the big brother/protector to Russia routine to keep Vlad licking Xi's bootheels. But China has a vested interest in keeping Putin needy too so he has Vlad within a tight set of bolinger bands. Vlad is self-stimulating in public over he has Germany and the west as his bitch right now. China setting itself up to play that game with him too. This is what love between snakes looks like. Just remember that when a reporter asked Gorbachov if the Soviet Union ever considered using nuclear weapons against the west he said: "No but we considered using it against China twice." Heh, not much love below the surface. China has a bunch of land in Mongolia that it had to give up to Russia as settlement for one of the wars in the 1860's or so. I can see them playing the Ukraine game with Vlad. That would be rich. I can see Vlad giving it up or cutting a sweet deal for China, because well, good to be on the right side with your masters. You know, like, who the hell cares about Mongolia? Oh wait, Lithium or some frigging thing and you start looking at former lands. Vlad knows that game- not sure he likes being on the other end of it.
South Korea. Another "big one". So here there's some bite in the export "controls", but it depends on how significant these controls are.
That's weird, because that's not what Japan is reporting. Maybe I need to check with the Kremlin again to make sure. What about oil imports? the stuff that matters, I mean.
Any one country doesn't mean much. The fact that Russia is more and more isolated from the civilized world means a lot.
Japan's top oil refiners Eneos Holdings and Idemitsu Kosan are halting Russian crude oil imports after the fulfillment of current contracts.