BRUSSELS, Sept. 25 -- The vote was not close, and the reasoning behind it was not hidden for long.

On September 22, foreign ministers of European Union member states gathered in Brussels and removed two of Moscow's most prominent financial figures from Europe's Russia sanctions list. Alisher Usmanov, the metals and telecommunications oligarch whose fortune is estimated at $14 billion, and Mikhail Fridman, co-founder of the Alfa Group conglomerate, are now free to move assets across European borders again. The decision did not happen because either man had changed. It happened because two EU member states needed something and found a way to get it.

France needed Usmanov gone. Azerbaijan had been holding French nationals in detention, and...