The US wants to take apart the Russian economy: Treasury
3 Min Read
What's a better way for an empire to eliminate its competitors?
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War affects any economy in the world, "except" for the US, which prints its own money in infinite abundance and recklessness.
Washington seeks to take apart the Russian economy, or in its own words, its "supply chain".
On Monday, the Deputy Treasury Secretary, Wally Adeyemo, announced that Washington wants to dismantle Russia's "war machine" by disrupting its defense industry and supply chain.
Read more: US has interest in undermining Russia as energy supplier: Blinken
"The next phase of our work will be to take apart Russia’s ‘war machine’ piece by piece by disrupting their military-industrial complex and its supply chain," said Adeyemo in a virtual discussion organized by the Peterson Institute for International Economics.
However, this isn't so new.
Earlier this month, US President Joe Biden said in response to Russia's special military operation in Ukraine, the United States and its allies will continue to ratchet up economic costs on the country and further isolate it.
Furthermore, he also said the sanctions imposed on Russia have wiped away Russia's economic development over the last 15 years.
"Our sanctions are lucky to wipe out the last 15 years of Russia's economic gains and because we have cut Russia off from importing technologies like semiconductors and encryption security and critical components of quantum technology that they need to compete in the 21st century. We are going to stifle Russia's ability as an economy to grow for years to come," Biden said in an address to North America’s Building Trades Unions (NABTU) Legislative Conference.
In a similar context, Adeyemo "offered" an ultimatum, saying that sanctions can be reversed if Russia changes its behavior. This is quite peculiar considering that repeated studies keep showing the ineffective impact of sanctions.
Read more: US sanctions on Russia likely to boomerang, drive inflation higher: Banker
"We always want to make sure that any sanctions that we put in place can at some point - if behavior changes - be reversed in order to make sure that threat actor knows that once sanctions are put in place, the goal is behavioral change ultimately," said Adeyemo during the discussion.
What does the US expect from the wave of sanctions? The Russian economy to shrink by 10%, and its imports to decrease by 37%, according to Adeyemo.
"Russia’s economy is expected to contract by 10 percent," Adeyemo said. "Russia is seeing inflation spike with the World Bank estimating inflation to reach 22 percent over the course of this year. Analysts forecast that imports could fall as much as 37 percent, and the domestic demand could decline over 11 percent."
However, economists, advisors, analysts and - anyone with the slightest knack for intelligence - knows that the situation in Ukraine and the sanctions on Russia will drive the entire global economy downward.
On Thursday, the International Monetary Fund warned of an impending global inflation shock that will affect even high-income countries. The sanctions on Russian exports have increased inflation in Europe and other continents.
