- Russia’s yuan reserves are nearly depleted due to Chinese banks’ fear of US sanctions.
- Lenders have urged Russia’s central bank to address the yuan deficit, causing the ruble to drop.
- China’s hesitance stems from US threats of secondary sanctions over Russia’s Ukraine war financing.
Sanctions work.
Like a constrictor, squeezing everywhere, untill you can’t breathe.
Not fast enough. I agree they work, but often times it hurts all the people, and the ones that have “say” often are slow to help their fellow people.
Hence, the point of sanctions.
How is hurting everyone the point?
Who else will march the street in protest?
Do you have examples of sanctions resulting in protests which have changed something for the better?
There is no other way
What examples of sanctions on a country have seen change? Regime, attitudes, or the like.
If people are gonna down vote at least have the guts to propose a different option. Down voting doesn’t change reality.
To piggyback on @Syntha@sh.itjust.works, the point of sanctions is to create an extreme economic cost to a state as a bargaining chip. Stop doing the thing we don’t like and you get your trade back. Unfortunately, states control the national currency (most of the time), which means anyone who uses that currency also gets hit. There is no way around that.
Politically speaking, a majority of Russians have been utterly disenfranchised from politics, repeating the refrain “I’m not political” like it’s a magic spell that will ward off the consequences of their government. Consequently I’m not that sad about them experiencing a bit of economic hardship. Maybe it’ll help them realize that politics isn’t just for politicians.
Their country, their responsibility.
The Germans learned that lesson the hard way.
Exactly. In any semi-functional democracy the government isn’t some abstract entity you have no power over, and it’s not monolithic either (you have municipal, regional and national levels). You vote for the people in it and they represent you.
Incrimental economical hardships get obfuscated by the state so no one draws a line between that and the war, or if they do, they have 1000+1 reasons why it went this way thanks to propaganda. Until it is a direct shock treatment at some industries, it would be toned down by the effort of local economical institutions. I’m the outlier in buying things in non-chinese services and following western media it seems, and slowing down the YouTube was the first event when I noticed many previously apolitical person to find their ways to circumvent the ban.
The most energized groups are those of recent soldiers and their families, and their protests get shut down fast. It’s genuinely afraid of them. And it feels like the way it would happen.
Maybe. The point of the sanctions isn’t to cause unrest though, as I said, it’s to apply pressure to the state. If it happens to cause some unrest, that’s an unlikely side-benefit.
What can hurt it in your opinion?
Military stuff is out of the picture since they established their trade with CCP and NK for rockets and found their ways to get European chips. They are investigated, but slowly.
My guess is that a lot of ingredients used in their production lines of food are imported, like specific kinds of yeast to make bread and beer or something like that. I wonder if sanctions targeting non-consumer products critical to producing them can lead to long pauses I’d read about in military once some key suppliers got cut off.
Not all rockets are made equally. The NK rockets, artillery barrels and artillery shells are much worse than they could manufacture with western components. A degradation in quality leading to less accuracy which lessens the battlefield impact is still a positive step.
It also means that China can take advantage of Russia to get much more than it could usually get for their gear. China is not helping Russia out of the goodness of it’s heart or some ideological reason. They’re taking advantage.
Interesting question. I have no idea. I’m pretty confident all sanctions so far are for military and dual-use technology.
No, you’re right, we can’t do anything beyond harsh criticism, no, even that’s too far, what if we hurt some of the genocider’s feelings?
They’re sending their kids into a meat grinder because they hope other people’s kids will feel more pain in that same meat grinder.
I didn’t say that.
How have sanctions changed anything?
China is pulling all their funding from Russia due to sanctions. That’s the article we’re in the comments of.
You can’t avoid that in a dictatorship or oligarchy. You freeze all of their money? They will just steal more from the population.
This is what frustrates me so much about people in the US arguing against supporting Ukraine. At the end of the day, while China might be willing to help Russia, the US is by far it’s largest customer. Add to that China’s own economy is contracting, and supporting Ukraine against Putin, along with the severe sanctions that have been in place, is the smartest most cost effective way of hopefully removing him from power. I have a co-worker who got out of Russia a little over a year ago, and he said it was pretty bad before he and his family left. Unfortunately, it’s a slow process because the goal is to get the Russian people to oust him. We all know that’s not going to happen at the ballot box, so all that’s left is the people overthrowing their leaders. Things have to get pretty dire before a population like Russia’s gets to that tipping point.
This is a marathon. The main thing is keeping Ukraine strong and able to defend itself. I’m really liking the offensives into Russian territory they’ve been carrying out. I just want them to remember a defensive position is easier to maintain/win than an offensive one. In other words, don’t try to go to far into Russia. Way way too many great generals have made that mistake!