Sanctions against Russia

[Bruce Tuncks]

But here's my problem...  I was not fooled for a minute about the "weapons of mass destruction " lies, yet I find myself much more believing about the Ukraine stuff. Yet both information comes from the same source.

[facthunter]

Bush's Government was rather questionable and justifiably so, but Trump made it look OK in retrospect. Biden is definitely Hawkish, but USA is and will be no matter who is President.. Appeasing Vlad wouldn't go down well with most of the populace.. Don't forget Russia Lost 26 Million of it's people in the last war and GERMANY was the reason and America has built Germany up  and supported the dreaded NATO. Trump undermined that a little.  Putin loved Britain  doing a Brexit. Nev

[Jerry_Atrick]

3 hours ago, Yenn said:

That way the Ukranians do the work and Russia sits back in comfort.

You've captured capitalism in one sentence.. But, yes.. this is the same model China is following..

2 hours ago, Bruce Tuncks said:

I wonder how much of Australia is up for grabs?

Would have to ask the yanks and the Chinese, I guess?

 

(pardon my cynicism).

[willedoo]

Only problem with that theory is that not all Russians holding assets outside of Russia have obtained those assets illegally. A lot of legitimate business people would be affected. They can only really sanction individuals who they see as contributing to the things the sanctions are aimed at. They can't just sanction people because they are Russian nationals and have assets outside Russia.

 

On a related subject, a lot of Russian capital has moved out of the country in recent years. To try to claw a bit of it back, last year the government brought in a separate tax bracket for those with money overseas. Instead of the flat tax of 13%, they pay another surcharge of about 3% from memory.  I don't know how effective it is or whether the government has made much significant revenue from it.

 

The problem with sanctions is that nobody wins. They often hurt others more than the intended target. All the sanctions levied on Russia since 2014 have hurt the EU countries more than they have Russia. For sure, it made things hard for Russia for a while, but it ended up boosting their economy through getting back into manufacturing things themselves and becoming more self sufficient. Also a lot more investment was put into agriculture. A lot of the food products they formerly imported from the EU were replaced by non sanctioning countries and most of those markets are lost forever. Russia is a lot better off economically now than they were before the sanctions started in 2014, so that makes the sanctions look not too effective as a tool. Problem is, apart from military force, it's the only tool the US has. Russia is currently number four in the world in foreign reserves held (behind China, Japan and Switzerland) and they have one of the lowest debt to GDP ratios in the world. With China as a friend buying from them, Russia has enough cash to run the country for two years while isolated from the West.

[willedoo]

4 hours ago, Bruce Tuncks said:

But here's my problem...  I was not fooled for a minute about the "weapons of mass destruction " lies, yet I find myself much more believing about the Ukraine stuff. Yet both information comes from the same source.

Bruce, only time will answer that question. If Putin invades Ukraine, the Yanks were right. If he doesn't, they're jerking your chain again just like they did twenty years ago..

[Bruce Tuncks]

Thanks Wille. Yep, expanding the sanctions was really just a thought bubble, as turbs would call it.

The only Russian I actually  knew was Simon Rieff, who was a Cossack from Georgia. He came to Alice Springs and started a furniture store in about 1950, after making his money from wolfram from a mine near Tenant Creek. I bet he would turn in his grave at the thought of his sons having their inheritance confiscated.

[willedoo]

11 minutes ago, Bruce Tuncks said:

Thanks Wille. Yep, expanding the sanctions was really just a thought bubble, as turbs would call it.

The only Russian I actually  knew was Simon Rieff, who was a Cossack from Georgia. He came to Alice Springs and started a furniture store in about 1950, after making his money from wolfram from a mine near Tenant Creek. I bet he would turn in his grave at the thought of his sons having their inheritance confiscated.

I didn't know the Cossacks extended down into Georgia, but it makes sense as they are just north of there, over the mountains. They had a fairly big span, from Eastern Ukraine right across that southern region of Russia. A lot of different clans of Cossacks. A few years ago, one of my brother's mates received a letter from Putin. officially recognising him as a Cossack of Cossack ancestory. I'm not sure whether he was born here or came here as a kid. It was all part of that re-conciliation of the Russian government to the Cossacks, after many decades of mistreatment and bias under the old Soviet government.

[willedoo]

I remember some time back when the American Congress was waving the sanction stick at Russia. Putin said that if they went ahead with it, Russia would consider counter sanctions. He said at the time that if Russia banned titanium sales to the U.S., Boeing couldn't build an aircraft. That's true, but just an idle, political threat. Russia needs Boeings just as much as Boeing needs Russian titanium. Russia would be just shooting themselves in the foot. Most of their old Tupolev and Ilyushin airliners are past their use by date and are being retired. Domestic designs can't fill the gap, so they depend on Boeing and Airbus for their aviation.

 

Always a juggling act with sanctions and counter sanctions. The challenge is to find something effective against the target without inflicting too much self harm.

[Marty_d]

They can always go Chinese, I think they've just produced a medium range passenger jet.

[Yenn]

Ukraine is now wanting us to put sanctions in place before an attack by Russia.

If that was done it would guarantee an attack as the big stick threat would no longer exist.

This is looking more and more like a war of words, and in this case Putin has the dictionary.

[willedoo]

4 minutes ago, Yenn said:

Ukraine is now wanting us to put sanctions in place before an attack by Russia.

If that was done it would guarantee an attack as the big stick threat would no longer exist.

This is looking more and more like a war of words, and in this case Putin has the dictionary.

President Zelensky of Ukraine is always out of his depth. Before becoming president he was a television series comedian, playing the role of a schoolteacher who became president by accident. Life imitated art when the oligarch who owned the network (his boss) backed him to run for president as a bit of a joke. He got 70% of the vote due to his popularity and lack of popularity of the former president. The former president, also an oligarch (andTony Abbot's mate) is now under arrest on charges of treason and aiding a terrorist organisation for continuing to buy coal from the Donbass authorities during his term.

 

Zelensky has been between a rock and a hard place since getting the top job. He initially had good intentions of settling the Donbass conflict but soon found himself hamstrung by the parliament and the oligarchs who wield the real power. Possibly the fact of being Jewish would also make it harder for the Right Sector to accept him. He means well, but his judgement is amateurish. He has to tread a fine line to stay alive, so there's a limit to his power and influence. A lot of his statements are just a wish list.

 

The only one who is really standing out in recent events is France's President Macron. In stark contrast to the UK and US hysteria and beating the drums of war, Macron has emerged as the only cool head in the West. He's been very busy working as an intermediary between Zelensky and Putin. and also trying to calm Joe down in the process. War seems to be a desired outcome for the US and UK, but it's Macron who's working to prevent it. Macron has always seen France as the one to wield influence in Europe independently of the US.

[Bruce Tuncks]

I well remember Simon Rieff jr at the Alice Springs school. I thought he was really big but as an adult I knew him as a squat short guy .  He was the spitting image of Breshnev, which of course I didn't know at the time. He was famous among us kids  for seducing the tall blonde daughter of a senior cop in the town.

We liked ethnics. The first decent meal I remember was cooked by the Gagliardi's at their new restaurant ( the Sorrento), and my mother invented take-away cos she rode her bike there and came home with real Italian spaghetti in the milk billy.

 

[Jerry_Atrick]

13 hours ago, willedoo said:

Macron has always seen France as the one to wield influence in Europe independently of the US.

Certainly since Merkel has gone.. I don't even know the new Chancellor's name, and he has been criticised for being quiet. But, I guess, sending the Germans in would not be a great diplomatic move..

[old man emu]

1 hour ago, Jerry_Atrick said:

sending the Germans in would not be a great diplomatic move..

The word "Barbarossa" comes to mind.

[willedoo]

It's looking more likely that the US will get their sanctions. Putin has officially recognised the two Donbass republics as independent sovereign nations. He's also instructed the Russian Defence Ministry to send peacekeepers there. At this stage, no word on how many and in what form. It's a big step as Russia has not previously recognised the independence of the republics since their push for autonomy in 2014.

 

Russia is now the only member of the UN to recognise them. It will be interesting to see if ant others follow suit, like China. I can't see this ending as cleanly as Putin might be planning. The other aspect is that he might be doing it to create a position to pull back from in exchange for other concessions. It's not in his nature to suddenly change his mind and he usually has more than one possible scenario planned for in the mix. He will most likely try to talk the other members of the Collective Security Treaty Organisation into joining a peacekeeping occupation, but it might be too much of a hot potato for them.

[kgwilson]

My wifes family were from Donetsk. During the Bolshevik revolution her mother witnessed the murder of her parents who were Cossacks. Russia had dominated Ukraine for a long time and in the 30s took all the grain and starved the Ukrainian population. Then apparently the Eastern regions were repopulated by lots of ethnic Russians. Everyone was after their resources including Hitler during operation Barbarossa and that galvanised the Soviet republics to throw everything at him for the "Motherland". After the final demise of the Soviet Union and Ukraine finally gaining its independence and Russias influence severely depleted, Ukraine thought it had a new independent future. 

 

Part of the problem was the huge Russian population that had moved in to the Eastern regions from the late 30s onwards & Putins strong arm tactics and an insatiable desire to regain the Ukraine that he and many other Russians see as an integral part of Russia. Putin has been financing the Russians in the Eastern regions for decades & settling the skirmishes in 2014 & 2015 with the Minsk accord is just a minor blip with the real intention being total control.

 

This whole episode is a massive gamble for Putin but he sees the West as weakened and unwilling to enter into a full on confrontation. The fly in the ointment is the massive wealth accumulated by the super wealthy Russian elite in the West that could be cut off entirely by the sanctions. If that comes to fruition Putin could be on very shaky ground.. Russians have never been afraid to go to war with themselves.

[facthunter]

Forget having things like the Olympic Games then. Nev

[kgwilson]

Well Putin has made his move & Biden & Boris have imposed their sanctions. Are we seeing a repeat of Hitler annexing Austria and the Sudetenland in Czechoslovakia in 1938. Nothing was done then. Hungary & Poland then took bits as well to ostensibly protect their ethnic minorities in certain regions. Within a year WW2 began.

[Jerry_Atrick]

The sanctions at the moment are quite mild, but a taste of things to come. Russia has an advantage in that it has troop numbers while European troop numbers are depleted. The 5 banks that BoJo announced sanctions against are not well known in London, anyway.. There is criticism here that the Conservatives are not doing enough because apparently, who would have guessed, the Conservatives get their funding in a material way from Russian interests; and the term I forgot to describe London is Londongrad (duh!) as its reputation for allowing the proceeds of corrupt and financial crime to enter the real economy and be protected.

 

Germany has cancelled its approval of the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline, which will further raise gas prices in Europe (I have just had my second heating oil bill.. back to Jacobs Creek for me for a couple of months). I haven't yet looked at today's markets but I am expecting that anyone who has a short position in commodities is thinking about selling the shirts off their backs.

 

An interesting impact has been on surrogacy.. Apparently, the Ukraine is one of the worlds largest suppliers of surrogate mothers as the laws are accommodating and at between USD$15k and USD$20K it is cheaper than other places (many of whom have outlawed them, or have laws designed to jack up the prices). I was reading on the weekend that that sort of money is huge for the mother.. But there are many would be parents that are suffering anxiety and naturally, a lot of people have put off the decision at the moment - or have gone elsewhere.

[Marty_d]

Yes, the oligarchs are well into the conservatives pockets.  I reckon that the sanctions by both UK and Australia will be, to borrow Paul Keating's phrase, "like being flogged with a warm lettuce" to Russia.

 

What I find funny is that both Jeremy Corbyn and Nigel Farage are in lockstep on this one, both being fully supportive of the Kremlin.  (You can understand Nigel's position, the disinformation from Russia did heaps for his Brexit result.)

[old man emu]

Australian goods exports to Russia amounted to about $680 million in 2020, down from around $730 million in 2019. Major goods exports comprised of alumina, live animals, starches, inulin and wheat. Imports from Russia totalled about $210 million in 2020, roughly half the amount of 2019. Major imports include fertilisers, crude petroleum and wood manufacturing products. Australia’s imports of crude petroleum from Russia have been declining since 2014.

 

If the Conservative government of Australia wants to impose trade sanctions against Russia, then they would not be "like being flogged with a warm lettuce", more like being dusted with talcum powder. It's obvious that the Conservative government's Chester is simply yapping "Me Too!" as it bounces around the United States' Spike.

What is the point of Australia getting involved in another European war? These countries have military forces larger than our total population, women and babes included. Wars are fought for either religious or economic reasons, and the current kerfuffle is an economic one. Russia itself does not seek geographic domination of the World, and its political system is not well accepted in most countries, where religious and ethnic affiliations seem to be the greatest influences. Australia has enough to do in its own local area of the Southwest Pacific Basin, countering the expansion of Chinese influence by our humanitarian and economic development aid. 

 

Australia has a reputation for being a country where Peace dominates. That's why millions have left the lands of their heritage and come here mainly for the betterment of their descendants. Which of you doesn't have an ancestor who did the same thing? Even those who came at His Majesty's Pleasure, through hardship and had work, ended their lives in much better situations than when they were doing things that resulted in their transportation. In the 20th Century we learned by bitter experience that getting involved in other people's wars gains us nothing.

 

[kgwilson]

Vlad will be pushing his luck if he moves past Donetsk and Luhansk where there are significant Russian populations originally due to Stalins theft of their grain, starvation of the locals & Russian resettlement in the 1930s. NATO can amass more than 3 million troops if it had to. He is banking on the West not shutting the money gate entirely as that will hurt them as much as Russia & everyone knows that in the US the only thing that talks and walks is money.

[willedoo]

The Russian Defence Ministry has said that the Russian military is attacking Ukrainian military infrastructure, air defense sites, military airfields and aircraft. No news yet as to where it's happening, whether just in the vicinity of the cease fire line, or more widespread.

[Marty_d]

Missiles in Kyiv doesn't sound like military targets to me.

[Bruce Tuncks]

KG, I recall reading how in WW2 , The Ukranians tried to join with the germans, and it was the biggest mistake of his career that Hitler spurned them.