Economic War: Western-Style

Russia's Central Bank Steps In to Steady Ruble


Putin may be a pre-Glasnost Russian oligarch, but he was raised in the world of intrigue and not the world of finance.

Perhaps he miscalculated while he was busy preparing military plans to defend his temporal sphere of influence?  His economy's collapse was entirely predictable.  What he did not learn in KGB spy school is that capitalist  economies are interrelated. Interdependent.  And dominatable by the biggest bully on the block.

So once you plugged into world finances you are subject to risk of economic warfare.  And the US can swamp anyone, even allies, when and if it chooses.  Just ask Canada about all the trade sanctions against the US for unfair / protectionist practices they simply ignore - wood, salmon, - and keep going.   


http://gwynnedyer.com/2014/oil-blind-sided-by-technology/

Sanctions were not the biggest weapons in the American arsenal.  Oil independence means their demand can be used as a weapon against corrupt governments as Gwynne Dyer explains above.  They can turn production up and drop the ruble to nothing.

And it gets worse if you are Russia.  What people forget is that the US has a strategic ban on oil exports.  They are artificially lowering supply, not just lowering their purchase of oil, due to the 40 year embargo on oil export thanks to OPEC and the 1978 crisis.  http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2014-11-05/bhp-billiton-starts-exporting-u-dot-s-dot-oil

All that needs to happen to make the Russian economy - in these worsening times - drop to zero is to allow US companies to dump oil on the market. 

So Putin can celebrate liberating a few hectares of land.  Maybe that will comfort the Russian people unemployed in bread lines?

Alternate strategies are just as viable as military strategies

Where would America be now, if instead of invading Iraq in 2003 for a second time they had invested $1 trillion in solar panels and wind farms? 

Here is my conjecture:

Oil would be $40 a barrel and the treasure and more importantly the lives of both soldiers and civilians would remain.  The Middle East would be full of poor dictators unable to buy weapons to keep their people down. The rotted governments would have collapsed from the inside. Real change might have taken root and without the rallying cry of America the Crusader perhaps the moderates would have won.

There are many ways to win. Not all of them are obvious.