Why would China be willing to stop gas shipments from Russia? USA is also not willing to stop oil shipments from Russia, although Russia is the third-biggest oil exporters to the USA.

Independent states usually don't do anything that would harm them directly, they force their colonies and vassals to harm both themselves and the enemies. In this case, it's the EU harming themselves and Russia with sanctions, while the USA and China being relatively unaffected.

The EU isn't harming itself it is protecting 70 years of peace on the continent that is now threatened by a paranoid Russian Czar.

I would argue that this is less of a problem for the US than it is for Europe. China is an American problem Russia is ours.

Isn't it far more important to ensure that they can't use dollars, than avoiding giving them more? They already have dollar reserves.

If we can make dollars worthless for them, they will have given us the gas for free from their perspective.

> Isn't it far more important to ensure that they can't use dollars...

It's in America's National Interest to maximize the usage of dollar reserves. Denying China the use of dollars would have a (relatively small) detrimental direct effect, and will set a precedent and likely accelerate the popularity of other reserve currencies.

That's like using high-velocity lead to remove an ingrown nail.

Many sanctions so far are limiting Russia's ability to use money (in exchange for securities, other currencies, goods or services). I am only proposing that we proceed along the current path.

As an example, denying them imports is reducing the value of their dollars.