Overnight, the conflict between the West and Russia has reached a new level of escalation.

Shortly after Federal Economics Minister Robert Habeck announced in Gdansk that Germany could get by without Russian oil faster than expected and that an oil embargo was manageable, Russia turned off the gas supply to Poland and Bulgaria.

Whether the two are related and whether the spiral of escalation will continue today remains to be seen.

Nevertheless, several points can be stated:

First, Germany must abandon the certainty that Russia will honor existing treaties under all circumstances.

Both Russia and the federal government had always emphasized this point and pointed out that the guaranteed gas supply quantities always arrived.

In Poland and Bulgaria, Russia has now created facts contrary to existing treaties and crossed this red line.

This can be taken as a warning to other EU countries that the old promise no longer applies.

Second, Germany could be one of the next countries to be cut off from gas by Russia.

Because Germany (and the other EU countries) also refuse to pay for gas in rubles.

Russia cites the corresponding refusal by Poland and Bulgaria as the reason for the delivery stop.

In Germany, methods are being worked on that will allow German customers to pay in euros and rubles will then arrive in Russia.

But that does not mean that Russia will suddenly classify such a procedure as inadequate.

In any case, it is unclear whether the Russian justification for the delivery stop is credible, or whether Poland should be specifically punished, since the country is taking a particularly hard line towards Russia, imposing sanctions on the Gazprom group and helping Germany to become independent of Russian oil more quickly to become.

Third, Germany is making faster progress in making itself independent of Russian raw material supplies.

This applies in particular to the oil.

Just a few weeks ago, Habeck calculated that it would take until the end of the year for enough replacement deliveries to be available.

Now he's talking about an oil embargo being "manageable".

This is a strong achievement by the ministry and the companies involved - but it also shows that the "substitution" of raw materials can go much faster than expected in an emergency.

Economists have been emphasizing this point for a long time, but they find little attention in politics.

So far, the main concern there has been that an energy embargo would wreak havoc on the German economy.

Fourth, it should be clear that Germany and the EU must react to the Russian gas supply freeze.

It is difficult to imagine that Russia would cut off the gas for EU partners Poland and Bulgaria in violation of the treaties and that this would simply be tolerated.

The next logical step would be an EU oil embargo.

The fact that Germany is now open to this and that the presidential election in France is over could speed things up.

Fifth, Germany would slip into recession if the EU stopped supplying gas or imposed an embargo.

Economists estimate that up to 6 percent of economic output could be lost.

That would be comparable to the losses caused by the corona pandemic.

But there are also more optimistic estimates.

The optimists among the economists feel confirmed by the rapid oil substitution that Russian gas can also be replaced faster than previously assumed by companies and the government.