Whilst Putin and his Russian army destroys Ukraine militarily — they will never scratch the essence of the indomitable patriotic spirit of Ukraine — the United States, NATO, and the European Union, with some other allies such as Australia, South Korea, and Japan, are authoring sanctions. Putin will not be dismayed or swayed by sanctions — particularly these sanctions.
Putin has stockpiled $700,000,000,000 in convertible currency reserves with which to weather the storm that Putin anticipates his timid opponents will fashion. He has done this with energy exports. This was premeditated and betrays the stark calculated plan to invade Ukraine.
He was always going to invade. It was baked in from Day One. This is what happens when America is poorly led.
It is time for some real sanctions, folks.
Observation: Look at Putin’s weasel face. It is thin in this picture. Look at him now. His face is fat and old. This pic is from less than two years ago. Something is going on with the shithead.
Vision
Let’s put Putin and Russia on an island wherein they are disconnected from the civilized world just like North Korea. Vlad Il Sung?
Seems fair, no? Putin and Russia are behaving uncivilized, so let’s help them along. Let’s take them back to the Dark Ages.
Let’s let the Russian people realize exactly who Putin is and what their nation has become.
Mission
The United States and its allies must disconnect Putin and Russia from the global world in such a fashion they enjoy not a single element of commerce, cooperation, and communication such that they become a Hermit Despotism stripped naked of any element of national pride. Ultimately, the Russian people will not stand for this.
Strategy
Let’s do the following at the strategic level:
1. Isolate Putin and Russia from everything.
2. Disconnect Putin and Russia from every international body of cooperation and communication.
3. Deny Russia the cornucopia of good and services that are available beyond Russia’s borders.
4. Deny Russia access to markets beyond their own borders.
5. Conduct an international campaign of information thereby putting the horror of Putin and Russia’s invasion of a sovereign nation in the proper place of history alongside Hitler, Lenin, Stalin, Mussolini, Mao, Pol Pot, and the world of dictators and despots.
6. Let’s show the Russian people — who are a good and fair people — who Putin is and what their nation has become. They will do the rest.
Punitive tactics
At the tactical level, let’s do the following:
1. Stop trading with Russia. No imports from Russia. No exports to Russia. Cold turkey.
Seize and destroy all Russian goods in current inventory. Do this with great fanfare.
Make all such losses tax deductible and offer a tax credit for the lost profits.
2. Turn off all energy pipelines from Russia and replace Russian energy with American energy at a price that is 10% less than Russian pricing.
Forbid the use of any Russian sourced energy — oil, gas, coal, everything.
Energy is the critical source of Russian government revenue that funds their war machine. Turn off the bloody tap.
The Russian economy is the same size as Italy’s. Let’s make it smaller still. This is their huge vulnerability. Let’s stick a dagger into it.
Do you know that right now, the United States is buying almost 700,000 barrels a day of Russian oil and that it represents almost 8% of the American crude consumption.
Half of all Russian government revenues are tied directly to energy. Let’s shrink that tumor. At $20/bbl, Russia cannot afford this mischief.
3. Disconnect Russia from the world financial system by throwing them out of the SWIFT system while kicking every Russian owned or affiliated financial organization in the US out. Send them home.
SWIFT — the Society for Worldwide Interbank Finance Telecommunications headquartered in Belgium with more than 42,000,000 messages daily connecting more than 11,000 banks. It is not controlled by the United States.
[Know why this is such a heavy lift? European and American companies have half a trillion dollars of investments in Russia and they are afraid Russia will seize these assets. Capitalism trumps patriotism.]
4. Stop allowing the ruble, the Russian currency, to be a “convertible” currency meaning to destroy its use in international transactions. Make the ruble into toilet paper, low grade toilet paper.
Prohibit all FOREX in the ruble.
5. Delist every Russian company from any stock market in the world and disallow trading on the Russian stock market.
Ban all Russian public company principals from ever being involved with a publicly traded company for life. Make it personal.
6. Stop shipping transport to and from Russia by denying any shipping company access to US, European, and allied ports if they service any Russian port or ship Russian goods.
This includes oil tankers from Russian ports to Chinese ports.
7. Stop all flights to and from Russia. Deny landing privileges for all flights originating in Russia.
8. Kick Russia out of the international flight control system thereby denying Russian aircraft access to the international flight control system.
9. Disconnect all Russian rail from the European system at the border, a physical barrier to go beyond the Russian border.
10. Cut all Internet ties to Russia. Make Russia go blind. Start doing this for a day at a time and increase it to create maximum note.
11. Prohibit all insurance companies from insuring any risk for Russian owners or in Russia. Make insurance unavailable to Russia.
12. Freeze and then seize all overseas assets owned by any individual or company that is Russian. Liquidate these assets and use the money to buy ammunition for Ukraine.
13. Kick Russia out of all international organizations — air traffic control, the Olympics, the World Health Organization, the United Nations, sports, and educational.
14. Deny all technology originating from outside Russia from being imported into Russia. This includes Tesla. Make Russia into a “no tech” society.
This is a big one, y’all. No chips for Russia.
If done in concert, Russia will bleed through its convertible currency reserves in less than a year. Make it very, very, very expensive to be Russia and make sure the Russian people know why.
Proactive measures
It is not enough just to isolate Russia though it is a great start. We have to take proactive measures to shore up American and allied resolve and capabilities.
1. Reinvigorate NATO membership and spending. Make the required GDP contribution to defense two percent until further notice.
2. Remove all Biden admin regulatory actions that destroyed American energy and thereby drove the price of crude oil from $20/bbl to $100/bbl.
a. Approve Keystone XL pipeline — this one addition will replace all the Russian crude oil currently being imported today.
b. Drill in ANWR.
c. Conduct and award monumental Federal energy leasing on government lands.
d. Remove all field rules limiting production.
When crude gets back to $20/bbl, it will break the Russian bank.
3. Subsidize all American energy shipped to Europe to replace Russian energy with a 10% payment and a 10% Federal tax credit.
Make American crude oil and refined products the cheapest in the world with the objective of starving the Russian treasury and war machine.
4. Double the size of the US Army and Marine Corps through the reinstatement of the draft. Add at last fifteen divisions to the force and deploy at least six in Europe in support of NATO.
Double the size of the American air fleet with an emphasis on advanced bombers and fighters. Forward deploy a substantial portion of this force in Europe.
5. Lean forward in the NATO saddle by positioning combat units of substantial magnitude on the periphery of the NATO – Russia border.
6. Put American tank and artillery production onto a World War II footing with the objective of selling thousands of tanks to NATO countries bordering Russia.
7. Move NATO short range nuclear launch capabilities closer to the NATO – Russia border.
8. Pry India from the clutches of their Russian relationship like Kissinger did with Egypt after the Yom Kippur War of 1973.
9. Fund and arm the Ukraine Resistance.
If Russia attempts to occupy Ukraine, it will take 500,000 Russian troops to control that massive country.
Afghanistan was about 39MM people when Russia invaded and then left. Ukraine is 44MM people with a vastly higher standard of living and education. It is a modern nation.
Bottom line it, Big Red Car
You want sanctions? You want to modify Putin and Russia’s behavior? Here it is.
Wow, these sanctions will really take some cojones. Maybe I better re-write that State of the Union speech?
Prediction: Done correctly, Putin will not be the President of Russia for Life in less than two years.
But, hey, what the Hell do I really know anyway? I’m just a Big Red Car rooting for freedom and Ukraine.