US sanctions are particularly brutal now because of their increasing use of "secondary sanctions" in which any party, American or not, that is found trading with the sanctioned nation/group is put under the same sanctions as that group. All this does is make the workers even more isolated and at the will of a country's leaders, and while the assumption of sanctions is that the people will rebel when material conditions get bad enough and they are dissatisfied NO ONE EVER REBELS ON THEIR OWN WHEN THE US SAYS THEY ARE GOING TO AT ANY POINT IN HISTORY.