[Xeamek]

That's literally how any 'anti-state' action works, ever. Does an individual Russian have a say in what Putin does in Ukraine? Probably not. But countries are a collection of its citizens. The only way to 'punish' a country is to punish its citizens. Sometimes it's more direct, other times less. But at the end of the day, any and all actions will trickle down to punishing individuals, because that's simply how actions against countries (or any other organized group of people) work.

[FpUser]

>"The only way to 'punish' a country is to punish its citizens."

And the rulers of said country do not give a flying fuck about it. They're also protected from the revolt as they have police / army in their pocket to deal with the people.

[baryphonic]

> But countries are a collection of its citizens [sic]

This seems excessively reductionist. An organized state, borders, a system for generating revenue, an armed force, and other infrastructure seems necessary for a proper country to exist. All of these militate against treating the country as merely a collection of people, or using the people as the fodder to "punish" the country.