Guest Post by Paul Craig Roberts
I have not paid close attention to the details of the sanctions Washington has imposed on Russia and on other countries that deal with Russia in sanctioned items, which in my impression are largely military related items. My view has been that the sanctions have been good for Russia by forcing Russia out of the globalist trap toward self-sufficiency. The sanctions have mainly hurt Europeans via higher energy costs and lost business opportunities. These sanctions also hurt Americans who invested in Russian oil and Russian financial instruments. These investments are now carried on US financial statements at zero value.
A report from the Hal Turner Radio Show sent to me from a reader in Europe claims that Bank of Russia official Vladimir Chistyukhin has concluded that Washington’s new sanctions have greatly expanded and now cut off every country from the dollar system whose banks process Russian payments. In other words, Washington is attempting to prevent Russia from engaging in any international transaction except perhaps those in which payments are made by the physical transfer of gold, as such payments can be made outside the banking system. Allegedly, Chistyukhin sees the expanded sanctions as Washington’s effort to destroy Russia by destroying the Russian economy. It does look like Washington’s effort to eliminate the import/export portion of the Russian economy.
According to Hal Turner’s report, banks in Turkey, the United Arab Emirates, and China, fearful of being cut off from the payments system, have stopped processing Russian payments. But how can such a scheme work? How can Chinese banks refuse to process payments to and from Russia when China depends on Russian energy? How can Indian banks refuse to process payments when India depends on Russian energy and weapon systems? Such sanctions would stop the export of Russian wheat and impose hunger, even starvation, on many. Think of all the businesses in many countries whose operations would be disrupted, perhaps causing their bankruptcy. It is difficult to imagine the world going along with this. These sanctions, if real, also seem to be a provocation too large for Putin to ignore.
I remain puzzled why Russia, China, and the BRICS have not been proactive and extricated themselves from the dollar system. China, for example, cannot comply with these sanctions and retain Chinese sovereignty. If China, India, et.al., comply with Washington, they will have accepted Washington’s hegemony.
Perhaps it is resistance to coming to terms with reality that has prevented a majority of the world sick of Washington’s bullying from together exiting the dollar system, dispensing with all economic contact with the West, and confining their trade to their bloc. Instead of allowing Washington to isolate Russia, why doesn’t the Kremlin organize the isolation of Washington and its NATO puppets? I have never understood why the Kremlin wants to supply energy to countries with whom Russia is at war.
Good leadership is the rarest of all things. Perhaps the world hasn’t enough of it to escape Washington’s grasp.
If the latest sanctions are effective in the way Washington apparently intends, Washington will have pushed the world closer to nuclear war. It is hard to believe that a country as well armed as Russia will sit there and let Washington ruin its economic prospects and endanger its national existence.
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Washington became King George.