Russia Sanctions Blowback Only Beginning: Globalization in the Crosshairs, Russian Retaliation Coming?
By Yves Smith – naked capitalism – March 10, 2022
It’s surprising that the business press has not gotten to be apocalyptic about the worst case downside of the economic war on Russia. And by that we are not including nuclear winter. Due to the fact that financial and real economy effects occur in very different time scales, we are in a phase similar to the runup to the global financial crisis, where it was clear Something Bad to Horrible was underway, yet the press and pols were largely sanguine. I gasped out loud in May 2007 when Bernanke declared that subprime was contained.
The reason the blowback from the sanctions could be cataclysmic is that trying to isolate one of the biggest commodity producers in the world, with significant market share in many critical ones, will soon hit Covid-stressed supply chains. And if the economic brinksmanship isn’t dialed down soon, we’ll see tightly-coupled systems start to go critical. Because the hollowed out business press is much more fixated on finance than nitty gritty real economy operations, some bad outcomes will be noticed quickly because they affect visible companies, while others could be just as detrimental but not be picked up until the effects were advanced.
And recall that the defining characteristic of a tightly coupled process is that a shock moves through the system so quickly that it can’t be interrupted (or may not be reversible at all. Mind you, that does not necessarily mean it moves quickly in clock time.
Another characteristic of tightly coupled systems is that moves to reduce risk once the system is spiraling out of control are virtually assured to make matters worse, since participants don’t understand the system well enough to know how to intervene. The only measures that do help are ones that reduce the tight coupling, like trading halts.
Admittedly, the Something Bad to Horrible that is now occupying center stage is the prosecution of the war itself. That plus the West’s desire to punish Russia, combined with its unwillingness to do so militarily, has led to unprecedented economic measures, like preventing Russia’s central bank from using $300 billion of its foreign exchange reserves. Even the Financial Times politely pointed out that that move would focus the minds of other central bankers. As Michael Hudson and other commentators have pointed out, this move alone is a strong impetus of the heretofore slow-moving trend for China and other major non-Western economies to move away from the dollar, which has been a powerful tool of American economic and increasingly foreign policy.
So far, Russia has not imposed much in the way of counter-sanctions, although Russia-friendly websites report that Putin signed a series of measures early this week, to be announced Thursday. Since that shoe has yet to drop, we’ll go over only a few examples of how sanctions aimed at Russia are set to do a great deal of harm outside Russia. (Yes, it is theoretically possible that the US could de-escalate and swallow a peace negotiated by Ukraine, but given the press-induced blood lust and Biden Administration’s ego investment, that seems vanishingly unlikely).
One way Russia has been naughty is in seizing commercial jets under lease. According to Bloomberg, it’s managed to hang on to all but two dozen of over 500 planes. I had assumed Russia would keep them for domestic-only use; they can’t run much of a commercial airline service otherwise. If things ever get back to sort of normal, Russia probably won’t be able to lease planes for a very long time again and might have to make large deposits on service contracts, but count on the profit-minded to find a way.
It doesn’t appear that Russia is even trying to pretend it has no option: “Oh, gee, we understand you want your planes, but we can’t find a safe way to do that given the givens” or “Gee, we’d love to return those jets, but we are entitled to lease termination payments. How about gold for equipment?” From Bloomberg :
Technically, lessors have until March 28 to retrieve the planes under European Union sanctions. But state-owned Aeroflot PJSC and other Russian airlines have already gathered the vast bulk of them back inside the country, out of reach of their owners. The government aided the effort by instructing carriers to stop flying internationally and return the jets to Russia by Tuesday…
In telexes over the weekend, Russian authorities urged the nation’s airlines to restrict flying to domestic routes and friendly Belarus to prevent their jets being grabbed by repossession crews lying in wait, Emily Wicker, a partner with law firm Clifford Chance, told the lessor conference. The Russian government also advised operators to re-register foreign-owned aircraft in Russia from their traditional base of Bermuda, another move that could thwart efforts to revoke an aircraft’s certification — or track its maintenance and upkeep.
Lessors are now weighing their next steps…they’ve hired lawyers to parse insurance and re-insurance policies as they gird for long, costly fights and try to recover their losses…
Russia’s recent actions raise questions about another aviation staple: records documenting every detail of a jet’s upkeep, from maintenance visits to the remaining life for key parts. Without such paperwork, a jet’s value rapidly diminishes, said Chris Sponenberg, a vice president at Wilmington Trust.
However, at this juncture, the vast majority of harm to the non-Russian world is not due to retaliation. For instance, Biden appeared to up the ante by banning Russian oil imports earlier this week. However, Biden may simply have been taking credit for the state of play. It’s not clear how much oil was able to come into the US due to barring Russian ships from ports,1 shipments from Black Sea ports being halted due to war risk, and oil buyers being unable to get letters of credit.
Admittedly, the Reuters Feb 24 story does not parse out how much of the freeze on letters of credit was due to war risk, as in fear of destruction of tankers, versus fear of sanctions, which the US had said it would impose:
At least three major buyers of Russian oil have been unable to open letters of credit from Western banks to cover purchases on Thursday, four trading sources said, citing market uncertainty after the Russian invasion…
Letters of credit from the bank of the buyer are standard practice in commodities trading and guarantee the seller’s bank that payment will be made in full and on time.
Keep in mind that the latest report we have seen says Russia was still sending gas to Europe consistent as stipulated.
Another source of pain we’ve mentioned more than once is fertilizer. Russia and Ukraine provide roughly 40% of global supply. Fertilizer was already expected to be in short supply before the war. It’s hard to ship it given the inability to use the Black Sea and difficulties in getting paid. A lack of fertilizer means greatly reduced output of grains and famine. That will be compounded by reduced wheat exports from Russia and Ukraine.
Similarly, Russia is a critically important supplier of aluminum, necessary for airplanes and other equipment, and metals used in non-electric cars. It was possible to work around chip shortages to a degree. Metals are a much more binding constraint. And car prices were already a big driver of headline inflation.
We are already seeing market upheaval in terms of the massive nickel short squeeze. Matt Levine provided great one-stop shopping, describing how a huge Chinese producer, Tsingshan Holding Group Co., the world’s largest nickel and stainless steel producer, got caught in a short placed by its owner, Xiang Guangda. Levine pointed out how a producer could be net long yet still not having enough ready cash to meet on a margin call on his hedge. Levine described how some people, apparently officials at the LME, decided to intervene on Guangda’s behalf, no doubt arguably to protect market integrity. From Levine:
There is a sense in which this is all a bit unnatural. Yes, nickel prices should go up for geopolitical reasons, but arguably they should not go up that much; arguably the extent of these moves is driven by technical factors (margin calls on short sellers who are “really” long) that, in some sense, shouldn’t count. I mean. You could think that. You don’t have to; you could instead think “no, market structure is part of the real world, and if prices go up because of a short squeeze then prices go up, that’s life.” But some people certainly think that these price moves shouldn’t count, either because they are generically unnatural and unfair, or more specifically because they might blow up some traders and destabilize the market.
One way to reduce this sort of pressure is to suspend some of the margin calls, which happened:..
Another, more drastic way to reduce this sort of pressure is to suspend nickel trading, which also happened:…
A third, even more drastic way to reduce this sort of pressure is to retroactively suspend nickel trading, by canceling trades that already happened. That happened too; from the LME today:
The LME have been monitoring the impact on the LME market of the situation in Russia and the Ukraine, as well as the recent low-stock environment observed in various LME base metals. With immediate effect, and following the suspension of the LME Nickel market announced in Notice 22/052, the LME (acting where required through the Special Committee) has determined that it is appropriate in the circumstances to take the following actions in respect of physically settled Nickel Contracts: (i) cancel all trades executed on or after 00:00 UK time on 8 March 2022 in the inter-office market and on LMEselect until further notice (Affected Contracts); and (ii) defer delivery of all physically settled Nickel Contracts due for delivery on 9 March 2022 and any subsequent Prompt Date in relation to which delivery is not practicable (as determined by the LME and notified to the market) owing to a trading suspension in line with the process in this Notice.
Obviously that’s bad! You don’t want to break trades! The whole point of an exchange is that it is a transparent and predictable place to agree to trades. On the other hand if price moves are too wild, and if they are driven too much by margin calls, you’re going to blow up enough exchange participants to undermine predictability anyway. (If a lot of traders go bankrupt, it is hard to avoid breaking trades. If some of those traders are nickel producers, bankrupting them due to soaring nickel prices is an especially bad idea: You need them to make some more nickel!)
So you shut everything down for a while, including retroactively, and hope that everyone can get their financing in order to make for an orderly reopening. In theory, if the people caught in the short squeeze are in fact largely big nickel producers, this should work. If you’re a nickel producer your nickel should be worth more now, and probably someone will give you some money for it.
On the other hand if you’re a retail investor who was three times short nickel, this was not your week.
Oh, and in a later story, Bloomberg reported that Tsingshan also got emergency bank loans.
What Levine does not say explicitly but strongly implies is if you blow up enough big traders, you could blow up the exchange. If traders fail to meet margin calls and their liquidated position leave a loss, the exchange has to plug the hole from its reserves, or failing that, capital calls to members or other backstops. We’ve repeatedly pointed out that derivatives central counterparties are systemically under-reserved because charging enough to properly reserve would render derivatives economically unattractive. Volatility is certain to continue. How long before we see a CCP or exchange bailout?
Mind you, these are just first order effects. There are going to be plenty of second-order ones due to “for the want of a nail” supply chain problems propagating, as well as businesses failing due to Russia effects, even just exposure to suddenly high energy prices.
The Russia-friendly press has highlighted additional Russian gambits. One sounds potentially very powerful, the other isn’t, as described. The first, from RT, contends that Russia could withhold chip substrates as a quid pro quo for being denied advanced chips. From RT:
The ban on technology exports to Russia, in response to the war in Ukraine, could backfire on global manufacturers of computer processors and semiconductors, as many crucial components for their production are made exclusively in Russia, an industry expert has warned…
While global tech majors are announcing their split from Russia, Izumrudov says potential Russian retaliation moves “would leave almost the entire world without microelectronics.” [Oleg Izumrudov, head of the Consortium of Russian Developers of Data Storage Systems (RosSHD), says.]
According to the expert, Russia accounts for 80% of the market for sapphire substrates – thin plates made of artificial stone, which are used in “every processor in the world,” including those manufactured by AMD and Intel.
“Our position is even stronger in special chip etching chemistry using ultra-pure components. Russia accounts for 100% of the world’s supply of various rare earth elements used for these purposes,” the expert states…
He says the timeframe to ensure the quality of sapphire substrates, required for microchips, for instance, is 30 years of continuous production. Plants at which they can be made have to be located in conditions of almost zero seismic activity, which means the products of enterprises similar to those in Russia in seismically active California or Taiwan “are noticeably inferior in quality and volume to the level required in the industry.”
The key question is whether the second-best sources are workable, and what the cost is in terms of reduced reliability and performance.
Izumrudov also asserts that Russia has work-arounds for the loss of tech imports. He does not mention a large laundry operation through non-banned countries.
Pepe Escobar claims Russia is about to announce a work-around for the banking restrictions. I’m dubious about this one:
Moscow has not even announced a package of what could be defined as “counter-sanctions from hell”. Yet a decree on “foreign exchange obligations to foreign creditors” which allows Russian companies to settle their debts in rubles is already an eye-opener.
Economist Yevgeny Yushchuk defined it as a “nuclear retaliatory landmine”.
It all revolves around a new presidential decree, signed last Saturday: “On Temporary Order of Obligations to Certain Foreign Creditors”.
It works like this: to pay for loans obtained from a sanctioning country exceeding 10 million rubles a month, a Russian company does not have to make a transfer. They ask for a Russian bank to open a correspondent account in rubles under the creditor’s name. Then the company transfers rubles to this account at the current exchange rate, and it’s all perfectly legal.
Payments in foreign currency only go through the Central Bank on a case-by-case basis. They must receive special permission from the Government Commission for the Control of Foreign Investment.
As I discussed with Michael Hudson, what this means in practice is that the bulk of the $478 billion or so in Russian foreign debt may “disappear” from the balance sheets of Western banks. The equivalent in rubles will be deposited somewhere, in Russian banks, but Western banks, as it stands, can’t access it.
Sorry, this is silly, except possibly as a talking point for debt cramdown negotiations: “You know we are prohibited from paying you the usual way. This is much better than nothing, which is what you’d get otherwise.” It cannot be forced on lenders. The question is how many, if any, would bite.
This idea would work only if the debts in question were subject to Russian law. This is almost certainly not the case. The reason Cyprus was a huge center for investment into Russia was that Western companies and investors structured those deals as subject to English law, which could be adjudicated in courts in Cyprus, which used English law.
If not, Russia cannot unilaterally change payment terms. If a Russia borrower agreed to pay as of certain dates in dollars or euros, tendered to a certain account or address, those payments are still due. Depositing a foreign currency in a new account does not cut it.
Due to time constraints, as well as this situation still evolving, I have not begun to adequately articulate how much havoc widespread commodities shortages will inflict in an overly-interdependent manufacturing and trading system. The fact that the harm hasn’t show up much does not mean it won’t become baked in very soon.
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1 I have no idea how much Russian oil is carried by Russian tankers…
The Great Reset is Getting Closer
By Vernon Coleman | March 9, 2022
Sir Klaus Schwab (knighted by the queen for services to conspiracy) is eager to move on with the Great Reset. And so are his co-conspirators. They know that they’re now very close to victory.
The covid fraud terrified, demoralised and trained the naïve and the ignorant and initiated a mass of jab induced illnesses and deaths. The climate change fraud has created a population filled with false anxiety. And now the deliberately manufactured hysteria over the Russian invasion of Ukraine has triggered massive shortages of fuel and food that will result in hundreds of millions of deaths. The hysteria was composed, orchestrated and conducted by the usual media suspects, with the BBC and The Guardian in the vanguard. The BBC long ago stopped being a provider of news and became a propaganda unit – denying, suppressing or twisting the truth with pride rather than regret or embarrassment. (When the BBC proudly announced that it didn’t interview doctors questioning vaccination it abandoned all claims to be a news organisation.)
The story told by the media is that Putin is a threat to democracy. If someone can find evidence of any democracy in the West I’d be delighted if they pointed it out. Where is the democracy in Canada? In Australia? In New Zealand? In the UK? In the USA? Anywhere?
Free speech died in February 2020 and hasn’t been seen since.
You’d have to be as naïve as a five-year-old not to realise that the West engineered this war; manipulating Putin into position like a chess piece.
There have been dozens of wars and invasions and massacres in recent years but never before has there been such mass hysteria. Never before have politicians sported coloured favours in support of their favourite side in the conflict. I don’t remember much establishment concern when the Americans and the British were killing a million babies in Iraq. I don’t remember the media complaining about our attacking Libya.
Sainsbury’s, a British grocer, says that it stands united with the people of Ukraine. I don’t remember them standing united with the people dying in scores of other conflicts.
Sanctions won’t do the Russians much damage but the sanctions aren’t aimed at Russia – they’re aimed at us. They’re part of the route to the New World Order.
You’d have to be blind, stupid or bought not to see the plot unfolding and the endgame approaching rapidly.
And yet blindness, stupidity and corruption are commonplace.
For example, the authorities now claim that covid can shrink the brain. The paid for media commentators ignore the fact that it has been known for months that it is the covid-19 jabs which cause brain damage.
The official line is that the only real sign of Long Covid is a loss of smell. And that’s almost certainly a result of olfactory nerve damage resulting from the worthless PCR tests.
The official view is that cricketer Shane Warne died of a congenital heart problem. No officially acceptable commentator has even suggested that there might be a link to his covid-19 jab. And no-one in the mainstream media has questioned the conclusion that yet another super-fit professional sportsman has suddenly developed a deadly, previously unsuspected congenital heart problem. Not even Shane Warne ever managed that much spin.
Any rabid pro-vaxxer who does not, for at least a moment, ask herself or himself whether Mr Warne might have been killed by the covid jab is an idiot. Any doctor who doesn’t ask himself how many the jabs are killing should be struck off the medical register for rank stupidity.
The Canadian province of Quebec will charge its most intelligent residents a special covid health tax. The 13% of Quebec who have been wise enough not to be jabbed with a toxic drug will have to pay extra taxes – presumably to help pay for the additional health care required by those less intelligent and less well informed residents who succumbed to pressure and allowed themselves to be poisoned.
The Premier, Francois Legault, admitted that the bullied and simple minded souls who had been jabbed ‘had made some sacrifices’ and were ‘owed this kind of measure’.
At least he recognises that having the poisonous, experimental jab was a sacrifice.
Everywhere you look there are signs that the conspirators are tightening the net.
Share prices around the world are crashing as the price of oil and gas continue to soar. Everyone hoping to have a pension is affected by this. Council employees who think their pensions are safe will lose out since many local authorities have made reckless investments which are collapsing in value.
Local councils everywhere are doubling the price of car park tickets – all part of the synchronised plan to bankrupt local businesses and all part of the Agenda 21 process of economic destruction.
Uninformed citizens everywhere are responding to the media onslaught and demanding that Russian oil and gas be banned. I wonder how many of the people who complained that Shell bought some Russian oil will complain when there is no fuel for their cars or for their heating.
The media proudly announce that motorists will take fewer and shorter journeys. That’s great if you don’t mind a 10 miles each way walk or bicycle ride to the shops. Rural communities will die a thousand carefully planned deaths. And the elderly and infirm will be marooned in their homes. It’s all part of the plan, of course.
In Scotland it will soon be legal for school-children to change sex as and when they feel like it – without a medical diagnosis. Boys will doubtless change into girls on Thursdays so that they can use the girls’ changing rooms for PT classes. And then they’ll change back again on Fridays so that they can play football and avoid the 21st century equivalent of domestic science.
They’re already talking about stricter controls of the internet. (As far as I am concerned the controls couldn’t be much stricter. I am banned from every social media site I’ve ever heard of.) How much longer before websites disappear for good? I’ll be surprised if we’re still here in six months’ time.
Most big investment companies (particularly in the UK) are keen to ban Russian oil and gas in order to please the global warming cultists who have acquired power and influence far greater than their numbers justify. The shortage of oil will, among other things, mean that farmers won’t be able to afford fertilisers. Food supplies will plummet.
Recent research shows that the educational system in the UK has been carefully and systematically and deliberately destroyed during the last few years. Around half of all British adults have the numeracy of a primary school child. Only one in five UK adults is functionally numerate. This ignorance means that people are easily tricked by misinformation spread by the BBC, other media groups and Government advisors.
Governments and the media are stirring up the people ready for a long war. We’ve been told that the war could last a decade or more. How did Orwell know?
The conspirators are inspiring hatred and they are demonising peace-loving citizens everywhere. It all rather reminds me of that once popular TV show called ‘The Price is Right’. Before the show started a warm-up man would build the audience up into a frenzy. It’s what is happening now. ‘Boo and hiss if you see a Russian!’
Fuel and food prices are going to soar. Fuel and food will be scarce. Inflation is going to go up to a new height. The result will be impoverishment and death. Rising inflation will destroy those with savings. Rising interest rates will destroy those with variable rate mortgages.
Hundreds of millions will starve to death in Africa but Black Lives Matter demonstrators will be too busy whingeing about statues to notice.
The conspirators know that China has been stockpiling food and metals for months. The Chinese aren’t interested in the global warming nonsense. They’re building coal fired power stations and they’ve given families permission to have three children.
China and Russia are in partnership and the conspirators know that if the Chinese and the Russians don’t take part in the Great Reset then the West will shrink alone – and be weak and vulnerable.
And so the hatred and the fear and the anger against Russia (and China) will be stirred up ever more.
The war is real enough, of course, but it is being used (and was probably triggered) by the conspiracy practitioners; the evil billionaires whose plan to take over the world may sound like something out of an old James Bond movie but which is very real.
We’re in the final stages of the move towards the Great Reset.
We win now or we lose forever.
And to win we need to explain to everyone we know or meet what is happening and why.
We’ve got until the end of 2022 – if we’re lucky.
Vernon Coleman’s book Endgame, available as a paperback and an eBook, explains the background to the great reset, explains what is happening and what they have planned for us.
Zelensky rubbishes Biden’s war on Russia
BY M. K. BHADRAKUMAR | INDIAN PUNCHLINE | MARCH 9, 2022
What was the need for all that happened in the period since mid-December when Russia transmitted to Washington its demands for security guarantee? This question will haunt US president Joe Biden long after he retires from public life. The foreign policy legacy of his presidency and the reputation of this much-vaunted 80-year old politician with a half-century’s record in public life, much of it supposedly in he domain of American foreign policy are in tatters — irreparable.
News has appeared that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has conceded that he is willing to concede to the Russian demand that his country will not seek to become a member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation! The announcement came in an interview with the ABC News where he revealed that he is no longer pressing for Ukraine’s Nato membership!
In fact, Zelensky lets the cat out of the bag by casually adding, “I have cooled down regarding this question a long time ago after we understood that… Nato is not prepared to accept Ukraine.”
Zelensky explains why: “The alliance is afraid of controversial things, and confrontation with Russia.”
This comes after his earlier revelation that he is “open to compromise” on the sovereignty of the two breakaway republics of Lugansk and Donetsk in the eastern Donbass region and on the status of Crimea.
The ABC News reportedly telecast the interview on Monday night Eastern Time. Since then, the duo in the Biden team who piloted the Ukraine strategy, those apocalyptic “sanctions from hell” and the demonisation of Vladimir Putin through the recent months — Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Undersecretary of State Victoria — are nowhere to be seen.
That duo of East European descent in the driving seat — Blinken driving and Nuland by his side navigating him — ought to offer an explanation for this charade playing out, which is virtually demolishing the American prestige as a superpower.
Questions are galore. Principally, if it is so easy to work out a compromise over Russia’s legitimate security demands, especially regarding Ukraine’s Nato membership and the alliance’s further expansion, why was Biden so very stubborn in his refusal to even discuss it, given the urgency of the matter?
Can it be that Biden was acting smart to create a fait accompli for Moscow by formalising Ukraine’s membership at the forthcoming Nato summit on June 29-30 in Madrid?
What’s the need to destabilise the European economies and rock the world oil market at a juncture when most economies are entering on a path of post-pandemic economic recovery?
What explains this unnatural obsession on the part of Biden over Ukraine’s regime?
Why such visceral hatred on Biden’s part toward Russia, something unworthy of an 80-year old world statesman?
Why is it that the economic war against Russia has become such a very personal affair for Biden, as his White House speech on Tuesday shows?
But such an ignominious end to this entire episode over Ukraine’s Nato membership was entirely to be anticipated. Fundamentally, this is an existential issue for Russia. Whereas, Biden, Blinken and Nuland are dilettantes sitting 10,000 kms away indulging in old neocon pastimes of interfering in other countries’ internal affairs, threatening them, disciplining them or punishing them for defying America’s diktat.
Even after Zelensky spoke, what has been Biden’s reaction? He scheduled a speech to announce that the US shall no longer import oil from Russia. Shouldn’t he have heaved a sigh of relief that this war in Ukraine is petering out?
Instead, he resorted to this strange toothless measure to impress the American audience that he is still on a winning streak promoting democracy in faraway lands. Isn’t such gimmick an insult to the gullible American public?
Biden took this new step after Europeans told him plainly that they are not interested in such a move against Russia, given their heavy reliance on Russian oil.
Second, Biden doesn’t seem to know or has pretended otherwise that America is actually shooting at its own feet. For, Russian prices are highly competitive and American companies will now have to pay much more to source heavy grade oil suitable for their refineries.
Biden already swallowed his pride and sent a team of officials to Venezuela, a country under crippling US sanctions, to beg for oil from President Nicolas Maduro (who was on CIA hit list not too long ago for being a socialist) to replace Russian oil.
Maduro sent them back suggesting a broader mutually beneficial relationship between Venezuela and America. All this drama took place in broad daylight witnessed by the entire Western Hemisphere. Wouldn’t they be laughing that America’s president is a man of straw?
Biden claims he is making sure that Putin won’t have money for his “war machine” if America stops buying oil from Russia. This is laughable, bordering on a lie.
The US was purchasing about 12% of Russia’s total oil exports. Alright, that’s a decent figure. But, it isn’t as if Russia won’t have any other buyers in a world market where oil price has soared to $130 per barrel (thanks to Biden’s “sanctions from hell” against Russia)?
Surely, any number of potential buyers would queue up if Russia were to offer competitive prices (as it had been doing for the US companies) to divert the extra stocks due to Biden’s boycott.
At any rate, Biden can’t be unaware that Russia’s current budget is balanced on the belief that oil prices would be around $40-45 per barrel. With the current level of oil price, Russia is actually making a fortune! And the funny part is, it is a gift from Biden’s sanctions!
Fundamentally, the problem today is that the American elite are delusional. While the rest of the world knows that in a multipolar world, the US’ capacity to force its will on other countries is inexorably in decline, the American elite shut their eyes to that reality. The present ridiculous situation happened only due to this arrogance and self-deception.
The strategic defeat that Washington has suffered will dent the US prestige worldwide, weaken its transatlantic leadership, unravel its Indo-Pacific strategy and accelerate the drain of American influence in the 21st century. Biden presidency will carry this heavy cross.
US bans Russian energy imports
High gas prices displayed at a Mobil station on March 7, 2022 in Los Angeles, California. © Mario Tama / Getty Images
RT | March 8, 2022
US President Joe Biden has announced a ban on Russian oil and gas imports in response to the ongoing conflict in Ukraine on Tuesday, a move that threatens to send global gas and oil prices even higher than the record-setting costs the commodities are already fetching.
The president called on the nation to use the events as an opportunity to transition to renewable energy, insisting that if “no one has to worry about the price at the gas pump in the future, tyrants like Putin won’t be able to use fossil fuels as weapons against other nations.”
Biden warned oil and gas companies against jacking up prices unnecessarily, declaring that while “Putin’s war against ukraine is causing gas prices to rise… it’s no excuse to exercise excessive price increases or padding profits or any kind of effort to exploit the situation or American consumers.”
“Russia’s aggression is costing us all, and it’s no time for profiteering or price-gouging,” Biden said, hailing the blanket ban on all imports of Russian oil and gas as “another powerful blow to Putin’s war machine.”
Americans will have to pay “the price of freedom” in the coming weeks as the sanctions are expected to send energy prices soaring worldwide, Senator Chris Coons (D-Delaware) told CNN on Tuesday ahead of the sanctions announcement.
The Democratic senator warned that the price of oil could very well double to $300 per barrel, with gas prices more than tripling to $10-$14 per gallon.
The repercussions from the price shock will be felt worldwide, he continued, as costs continue to surge. Acknowledging that “the strength of our sanctions, of the costs we’re imposing on Putin… are more successful and more sustainable when they’re coordinated,” he praised the administration for working together with Europe on the looming import ban instead of pushing ahead unilaterally.
“We have to realize that it’s a global integrated market, it is tough to just turn on the taps and increase production quickly – it’s not like phoning up Amazon,” he explained, cautioning “we are going to see increased gas prices here in the US, in Europe they will see dramatic increases in prices, that’s the cost of standing up for freedom and of standing alongside the Ukrainian people. We need to see the cost and benefit here.”
The senator also admitted the White House has been in negotiations with its once-sworn enemies in Venezuela and Iran, two major oil producers Washington is suddenly seeing in a new light for their potential to bail out countries soon to be running on empty in the absence of Russian energy supplies, but argued the focus should be on Canada first. However, he acknowledged Putin “had Western Europe over a barrel” – literally and figuratively – regarding the highly sought-after commodities.
Russia is the second-largest oil exporter in the world, while the US is the largest oil consumer. While Moscow supplies only about 7% of US oil, Europe is much more heavily reliant on the nation for its energy supplies.
Fresh polls claim that Americans are willing to pay more at the pump in order to stick it to Putin. A Quinnipiac survey conducted over the weekend, which found 71% of Americans supported a ban on Russian oil even if it led to higher gas prices. More than half of respondents (56%) even suggested the US hadn’t gone far enough with its sanctions and called for tougher moves.
Gazprom says it fulfills all commitments to foreign customers
RT | March 7, 2022
The Russian state energy giant Gazprom said on Monday that European gas prices could rise even higher after they hit a record $3,892 per 1,000 cubic meters of gas. The reasons for such hikes “are not on Gazprom’s end,” the company has added.
Gazprom “fills the orders on gas purchases from its foreign customers to the fullest,” the company said in a statement, adding that it will further honor all its commitments under the long-term gas contracts. It has also confirmed that it still uses “100 percent” of Ukraine’s gas transit route despite the ongoing conflict in the country.
Some 109.5 million cubic meters of gas flow through Ukraine’s territory per day, according to data cited by TASS. Earlier, Gazprom’s spokesman, Sergey Kupriyanov, confirmed that the transit proceeds “as normal.”
Gas prices in Europe fell to $2,700 per 1,000 cubic meters of gas later Monday, after German Chancellor Olaf Scholz admitted that his country would not cut off Russian supplies as of now. Energy supply for Germany “cannot be secured in any other way” at the moment, he has said. The chancellor also opposed sanctioning “essential” Russian oil and gas industries.
Earlier, some media reported that the US has been discussing a ban on Russian oil supplies to Europe with the EU.
Gas prices also rose after Washington and its allies slapped Moscow with unprecedented sanctions targeting its financial sector and its ability to engage in foreign trade. One such measure involved cutting off seven Russian banks from SWIFT. The measures came in response to Russia’s military action in Ukraine launched on February 24, which Moscow said was aimed at “demilitarizing” its neighbor, while Kiev blasted it as “unprovoked.”
Biggest financial players back net zero
United Nations | April 21, 2021
Over 160 firms with $70 trillion in assets have joined forces behind a common goal: steer the global economy towards net-zero emissions and deliver the Paris Agreement goals.
The new Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero (GFANZ), chaired by Mark Carney, UN Special Envoy on Climate Action and Finance, brings together leading net-zero initiatives from across the financial system to accelerate the transition to net-zero emissions by 2050 at the latest.
Members include major asset owners and managers as well as banks with the power to mobilize trillions of dollars behind the transition to net zero. By working together, alliance members can catalyse strategic and technical coordination on steps firms need to take to align with a net-zero future.
All members will set science-aligned interim and long-term goals to reach net zero no later than 2050 in line with the criteria of the UN Race to Zero campaign. Member-determined short-term targets and action plans will supplement these goals.
Existing and new net zero finance initiatives will be part of the Alliance. They comprise the Net Zero Asset Managers Initiative, the UN-convened Net-Zero Asset Owner Alliance and the newly launched Net-Zero Banking Alliance. The last links 43 of the world’s leading banks, and is hosted by the United Nations Environment Programme Finance Initiative and co-launched by the Financial Services Taskforce of the Prince of Wales’ Sustainable Markets Initiative.
UK Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, said: “Uniting the world’s banks and financial institutions behind the global transition to net zero is crucial to unlocking the finance we need to get there – from backing pioneering firms and new technologies to building resilient economies around the world. The Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero will lead this charge ahead of COP26 to scale-up our ambition, accelerate our shift and help us to build back greener together.”
U.S. Special Presidential Envoy for Climate John Kerry said: “The largest financial players in the world recognize energy transition represents a vast commercial opportunity as well as a planetary imperative. As countries around the world move to decarbonize, the large sums these institutions are dedicating to climate finance also reflect a growing understanding of how critical a low-carbon global economy is to their business models. Ultimately, their commitment of capital and assets, as well as adherence to high standards and reporting, will accelerate the transition to this new economy, create a massive number of new jobs, and increase our collective ability to tackle the climate crisis.
Mark Carney, UN Special Envoy for Climate Action and Finance and Prime Minister Johnson’s Climate Finance Advisor for COP26, said: “This is the breakthrough in mainstreaming climate finance the world needs. I welcome the leadership of the Financial Services Task Force and other global banks for their new commitments to net zero and for joining forces with GFANZ, the gold standard for net zero commitments in the financial sector. Most fundamentally, GFANZ will act as the strategic forum to ensure the financial system works together to broaden, deepen, and accelerate the transition to a net zero economy.”
Russia’s grain shipments drop by half
RT | March 2, 2022
Grain shipments from Russia have more than halved due to traffic restrictions in sea and river ports, the country’s grain union announced on Wednesday.
“Before the current situation [the war in Ukraine and sanctions on Russia], daily shipments of grain from Russia amounted to 100,000 tons. Now the volume is less than 40,000 tons,” the union’s president, Arkady Zlochevsky, said, as cited by RIA Novosti.
Not only has navigation via the Sea of Azov, which hosts several large Russian ports, been halted, but also shipments on river-sea routes in the Azov Basin, Zlochevsky explained, adding that only long-term contracts were currently permitted to be fulfilled.
Russia is the world’s largest exporter of wheat, accounting for over 18% of international exports. Together with Ukraine, which has also stopped shipping grain, the two countries account for about 30% of global wheat supplies. The crisis threatens to push food prices across the world to an all-time high.
USPS Shuns Biden’s EV Dreams With Massive Gasoline-Powered Mail Truck Purchase
By Tyler Durden | Zero Hedge | February 23, 2022
The Biden administration has been pressing the U.S. Postal Service (USPS) to make a massive purchase commitment of electric delivery vehicles, though such plans were derailed Wednesday when the agency announced a majority of its next-generation fleet would be powered by gasoline rather than a battery, according to Bloomberg.
USPS’ record decision memo states that the agency will move ahead with its purchase of 165,000 mail trucks over the next decade. At least 90% of these trucks will be gasoline-powered built by Oshkosh Corp., and 10% will be electric.
This action steamrolls the Biden administration’s pledge to replace its federal fleet of 600,000 cars and trucks with electric power. USPS operates 230,000 vehicles, which is approximately 33% of the government fleet. Postmaster General Louis DeJoy, a Trump ally, has firmly said the full electrification of the USPS fleet wouldn’t happen under his watch. Last year, he committed to converting only 10% of its new trucks to electric power.
The decision allows USPS to purchase gasoline-powered trucks from Oshkosh under a $6 billion contract awarded last February. USPS rejected a bid from electric-vehicle manufacturer Workhorse Group Inc. to electrify its fleet. Workhorse shares slumped as much as 3.5% today on the USPS news to purchase Oshkosh mail trucks.
USPS wrote that given its financial condition, “the battery-electric option has a significantly higher total cost of ownership than its combustion-engine counterpart.”
USPS under DeJoy appears to be locking in decades of fossil fuel consumption as the president’s “Build Back Better” green plan appears to be faltering. Gasoline mail trucks are more reliable than electric ones, and ownership is cheaper.
‘US sanctions on Russia over Ukraine will cost Americans dearly’
Press TV – February 23, 2022
A popular pro-Republican cable TV host in the US has questioned Joe Biden administration’s raison d’être in confronting Russia over developments in Ukraine, saying it will prove counter-productive.
Tucker Carlson, host of “Tucker Carlson Tonight” on Fox News, in a lengthy diatribe on his most-watched cable TV show Tuesday, blasted Joe Biden and said his attempts to take on Russian President Vladimir Putin will come at a heavy cost for American taxpayers.
The controversial TV show host asserted that there are no actual reasons for Americans to hate Putin, even if the leftist media outlets tell them that “anything less than hating Putin is treason”.
“Why do Democrats want you to hate Putin? Has Putin shipped every middle-class job in your town to Russia? Did he manufacture a worldwide pandemic that wrecked your business,” Carlson said in his prime-time monologue.
US President Joe Biden on Tuesday announced a slew of fresh sanctions against Russia, calling its recognition of two breakaway regions in eastern Ukraine as independent the “beginning of a Russian invasion” of that country.
Putin on Monday recognized the Donetsk and Luhansk regions as independent and ordered troops into the restive Donbas region. On Tuesday, Russian lawmakers approved a request by Putin to use military force outside of Russia.
“If Russia goes further with this invasion, we stand prepared to go further as with sanctions,” Biden said.
“Who in the Lord’s name does Putin think gives him the right to declare new so-called countries on territory that belongs to his neighbors? This is a flagrant violation of international law and demands a firm response from the international community.”
Carlson, a staunch critic of Biden’s foreign policy, said his latest move over developments on the Ukrainian border “will have costs” at home.
He emphasized that Biden’s resolve to confront Russia over Ukraine was motivated by personal and family corruption, rather than geostrategic concerns.
The cost of sanctions on Russia, the TV host noted, will be paid by Americans, who will see a rise in gas prices, a concern shared by many across the political spectrum in the US.
He also slammed Biden for moving to freeze the Nord Stream 2 pipeline connecting Russia and Germany, which is likely to fuel the global energy crisis.
The Fox News host went on to ask why Ukraine’s borders were more important for Biden than his own country’s southern border – adding that the US president’s priorities were determined by his son who made huge money while working on the board of a Ukrainian gas company.
“It seems like a pretty terrible deal for you and for the United States. Hunter Biden gets a million dollars a year from Ukraine, but you can no longer afford to go out to dinner”, Carlson remarked.
While Washington has outlined its fresh offensive against Russia over Ukraine, a group of Republican and Democratic lawmakers told Biden in a letter on Tuesday that he must seek authorization from the Congress before sending in troops or ordering military attacks.
“If the ongoing situation compels you to introduce the brave men and women of our military into Ukraine, their lives would inherently be put at risk if Russia chooses to invade,” the letter reads.
“Therefore, we ask that your decisions comport with the Constitution and our nation’s laws by consulting with Congress to receive authorization before any such development.”
Reps. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.), Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.), and Warren Davidson (R-Ohio), among others, signed the letter.
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Former Insiders Criticize Iran Policy as U.S. Hegemony
By GARETH PORTER | CounterPunch | February 27, 2013
“Going to Tehran” arguably represents the most important work on the subject of U.S.-Iran relations to be published thus far.
Flynt Leverett and Hillary Mann Leverett tackle not only U.S. policy toward Iran but the broader context of Middle East policy with a systematic analytical perspective informed by personal experience, as well as very extensive documentation.
More importantly, however, their exposé required a degree of courage that may be unparalleled in the writing of former U.S. national security officials about issues on which they worked. They have chosen not just to criticise U.S. policy toward Iran but to analyse that policy as a problem of U.S. hegemony. … continue
Blog Roll
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- Chinese jet fuel and the myth of energy independence
- Ukraine Sea Drone Fired From Libya Hit Russian Tanker in Mediterranean
- IRGC: Iranian forces launched no attacks during ceasefire hours
- Trump Administration Moves To Automate U.S. Military Draft Registration
- Spain orders reopening of Tehran embassy, condemns Israel’s carpet bombing of Lebanon
- Israel faces ‘unsustainable’ strategic crisis following 40-day war against Iran: Analyst
- Iran restricts Hormuz access to 15 vessels per day under ceasefire terms: Report
- The ‘Opposition Party’ Has Done Nothing to Stop the Iran War and Much to Goad Trump Into Continuing It
- Moscow backs Tehran on status of Lebanon in US-Iran deal
- If Americans Knew
- Amnesty: Urgent – Protect Lebanese civilians from brutal escalation in Israeli attacks
- Is The War Against Iran Over?
- Inside the Israeli army’s propaganda wing
- Hundreds of Gaza Amputees Stranded in Legal Limbo
- The gallows law: Israel moves toward executing Palestinian children
- Tucker Carlson: The Path to Peace requires ending ‘special alliance’ with Israel
- This is ceasefire? Israel’s biggest massacre yet in Lebanon, another journalist killed in Gaza – Daily Update
- Tucker Carlson on Israel: This Is the Behavior of an Ally? Really?
- Gazans face a triple crisis: severe shortages of water and bread, healthcare in tatters
- NY Times reports how Netanyahu took the US into Iran War
- No Tricks Zone
- An Inconvenient Tree: Uncovered In Alps… Europe Much Warmer Than Today 6000 Years Ago
- New Study Reports A 60% Slowdown In Greenland’s Ice Loss Rate In The Last Decade
- Low Intensity Tornado Wrecks Major Solar Farm, Creating A Potential Toxic Dump
- New Study Finds Warming Saves Lives…Cold Temperatures 12 Times More Deadly Than Excess Heat
- German Science Blog Accuses PIK Climate Institute Of Hallucinating Climate Tipping Points
- Devastating Assessment Of Comirnaty Vaccine By Former Senior Pfizer Europe Toxicologist
- New Study: CO2 Is ‘Effectively Negligible’ As An Explanatory Climate Change Factor Since 2000
- Former Pfizer Toxicologist Dr. Helmut Sterz Tells Bundestag Hearing Pfizer Vaccine Should Have Never Been Approved
- Energy Expert: Germany’s Nuclear Phaseout Was A “500 Billion Euro Mistake”
- New Research: South Australia’s Mid-Holocene Sea Surface Temperatures Were 4°C Warmer Than Today
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