I wish one day the West is brave enough to freeze (or seize) assets of putin’s cronies (for example, a lot of them have real estate in Florida and London). But the West instead choses to punish the ordinary Russians and Ukrainians via non-personal sanctions like they did with Crimea.
When you investigate the case it turns the other way around. Bill Browder is a corrupt and Magnitsky was rightly in prison. The Russian prison conditions are bad, however I don't see the sanctions targetting the prison system in Russia (not even speaking about how widely this could be applied to most countries).
It's pretty hard to do anything to a kleptocracy where the leadership doesn't just pass on / accept any hardship to the locals if they don't care about them.
I'm not sure they have many other choices to maintain their power / assets at home / etc. I think most of them are effectively without much in the way of alternatives.
As it is infighting inside Russia can be pretty brutal / risky. I can't imagine losing any political clout would be a good choice.
too many of them have stolen enough to live comfortably even in US without having to work ever again. It has always been “Plan B” for many, so they can just take that.
It doesn't work like that in Russia, this is not the type of mentality. You have to keep returning favors one way or another and unless you risk your ass on American soil for the FSB you or your wealth won't last long.
