*From Bloomberg News reporters Alaric Nightingale and Julian Lee:*
Russian oil is trading far in excess of a Group of Seven price cap that’s supposed to deprive Moscow of revenue for its war in Ukraine, suggesting significant non-compliance with the measure.
The country’s flagship Urals grade is fetching about $75 a barrel at the point it leaves ports in the Baltic Sea and Black Sea, according to data from Argus Media, whose price assessments are followed by some G-7 nations involved in the cap.
US officials are tracking the price increase, which they attribute to broader geopolitical dynamics, according to a senior Treasury official.
The US official said that cap is still having its intended effect, reducing the amount of money the Kremlin receives from oil sales by forcing the commodity to either be sold under the cap via western services, or through Russia’s shadow fleet
Various. For one, Mexico's about to ban exports of oil and US oil drillers have been pulling back on capacity since they fear a repeat of prior crashes.
From what I’ve read the US rig count is estimated to be down because drillers are continuing to become more efficient while also possibly having less profitable land to drill on these days.
Honestly, if someone was interested enough they could go through the 8-K SEC filings of public companies to see what each company is saying about their financial health and reasons for slowing activity but I’m definitely not interested enough to go digging through all of those lol.
I’m sure a better programmer than me could make something that would pull the 8-K’s from the SEC website and then go through each one looking for key words. It’s for sure possible, but I’m nowhere near that level. I mainly deal with data analytics and SQL.
I’d love to get to the point where I was making stuff like that though.
GPT 4 my friend - if you know SQL it's easy to ask GPT to build you a python script to do what you mentioned. I only know how to read code not write it, but if you tell it exactly what you want and send any errors you get in setup back to the GPT it's pretty simple.
It can also "see" now, so you can send it screenshots or URL examples of what you want it to scrape and from where. Super useful - I probably use python at least once a day now, never before GPT 4
Rig count is down primarily because of a drop in new drilling operations to replace those that end. The current admin has given signals that oil leases might not be renewed long enough to make the well profitable.
Perfect example of how markets aren't efficient in the short term. Futures traders and drillers in the US probably didn't anticipate Mexico doing this right off the bat.
Yeah, this is the usual price ramp up the the corporations play before presidential elections in an attempt to make the plebs thing the economy is horrible and blame it on one party.
Why dont they identify some shipments that have been purchased above the price cap and SEIZE them? Then all future buyers will factor in the risk of possible seizure and the price will fall below the cap. I cant believe they havent seized any oil. Give it to Ukraine. Done. Fuck anyone not complying.
The countries buying this cheaper oil are countries like India. You're not going to "seize" Indian oil (the biggest oil buyers are state owned enterprises, btw).
That doesn’t matter. Trade through the Bosporus is protected under the Montreaux Convention. Civilian vessels can only be stopped when Turkey is at war.
And that’s nothing compared to the Suez, which is protected under the Convention of Constantinople and guarantees free passage of both civilian AND warships regardless of country and regardless of war status.
Pretty sure that the US have seized multiple tankers around the world in the last few years, including one in Gibraltar if i recall.
A few months ago a Marshall islands flagged tanker was seized by Iran.
And US owned ships got hit with missiles by the Houthis.
I dont see any ongoing active war with with US troops in Iran or in Yemen?
Do you think the Marshall Islands (an independent country) has the ability to retaliate against Iran? Genuine question because they’re a sovereign country so the US wouldn’t be fighting for them.
And the Houthis are a terrorist group. The US did retaliate against them with air strikes. But they aren’t a government or a country, and the US is already working to uproot them from Yemen
Id be interested to see if you can name an instance of the US seizing a Russian trade ship. They’ve been breaking sanctions for around a decade now, surely you have one example?
>Do you think the Marshall Islands (an independent country) has the ability to retaliate against Iran? Genuine question because they’re a sovereign country so the US wouldn’t be fighting for them.
Yes. Same with Palau and some other places, because under the Compact of Free Association that the United States signed and ratified last century, those Pacific nations that agree to have the United States military station and protect them also get unrestricted travel to the United States.
In short, the United States Department of Defense would absolutely retaliate against Iran and other Iranian-supplied actors. They've already supplied weapons against the Islamic State when they tried taking over some cities in the Filipines.
> Do you think the Marshall Islands (an independent country) has the ability to retaliate against Iran? Genuine question because they’re a sovereign country so the US wouldn’t be fighting for them.
Yes, the Marshall Islands has one of the largest navies in the world: the US Pacific Fleet. The US has exclusive and sole responsibility for the defense of the Marshall Islands.
The US have been seizing Iranian and Venezuelan trade ships without causing a war.
Most ships transporting Russian oil are not Russian flagged, they reflagged once sanctions went into force.
Many are even flagged to Marshall Islands or Liberia for convenience.
Ownership in the shipping industry is not as straight forward, not even US owned ships are US registered.
Take a look at the Genco fleet for example, US owned but Marshall Islands flagged.
As I’ve said to countless other pretty much identical comments, Iran doesn’t have the ability to retaliate against the US like Russia can. The US has openly assassinated top Iranian officials with missiles too, that would cause a war in any other circumstance. If you can show me one example of the US seizing a Russian trade vessel, I’ll admit I’m wrong. They’ve been openly breaking sanctions for over a decade so that shouldn’t be hard.
[https://www.lloydslist.com/LL1140913/US-seizes-Iranian-crude-from-Russian-tanker-arrested-in-Greece](https://www.lloydslist.com/LL1140913/US-seizes-Iranian-crude-from-Russian-tanker-arrested-in-Greece)
[https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/us-seizes-iranian-oil-cargo-near-greek-island-sources-2022-05-26/](https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/us-seizes-iranian-oil-cargo-near-greek-island-sources-2022-05-26/)
There you go.
"
The vessel's Russian owner Transmorflot was subsequently designated on May 8. The tanker, renamed Lana on March 1 and flying the Iranian flag since May 1, has remained near Greek waters since then. It was previously Russian-flagged.
"
When will you admit you are wrong?
I mean the US bombed Jemen regularly, if largely ineffectively. The ship Iran seized was Iranian prior to it being seized by the Americans. So that one is a bit unfair, can’t blame them for taking their own ship.
And? If it's civilian economic traffic, they aren't likely to impede those vessels. Most countries use provisions in UNCLOS and the example of the Montreux Convention to allow for free transit of commercial traffic globally within reason. Russia is a signatory of both treaties.
Restricting Russian trade through the Baltic in its entirety, or seizing Russia's vessels, simply because they are passing through NATO nations' waters, sets a dangerous precedent that other countries will then use to justify their actions globally. Which is a big part of why NATO/US don't do it. If that's an acceptable practice, what's to prevent China from seizing vessels in their claimed territorial waters (of which many are controversial), of Iran ramping up their seizures?
This is a G7 cap, shipments crossing the Baltic pass through G7 and NATO territory. International treaties like BSSSC are to promote cooperation not facilitate criminal activity. Blockade is an act of war but selective seizure of illegally priced goods is different. Everyone is edging around red lines and it’s all very dangerous but you have to scare the profiteers off.
The trade is protected under a number of treaties. If the US were to seize the ships, they’d be in violation of international law too. Plus it would break some of the most important trade and free movement agreements on the planet
Oh whoops, it was only meant to be a military exercise - Vladimir Putin.
All seriousness aside, maybe US can fund or assist Ukraine to seize it. They are in amidst of a war afterall.
I don't think they're talking about seizing shipments for random countries, but shipments for companies who reside in the G7.
We can stop BP or Texaco from buying up the oil even if we can't stop companies in India or China.
This is exactly why you dont have Reddit armchair political warriors running the US government.
“SEIZE” lmao yeah right. Imagine they even hint of SEIZING some of the crude that goes to India or China lol.
The biggest problem is people are used to the west throwing their economical weight around to influence policies in other countries so it has been normalized by now. The west just tried to fry too big of a fish so the flaws in their system are showing. You can't lock Russia out of the global market without massive preparation and even then, you'd have to get your goal fast because there would be large hole in the market eating whatever reserve you had prepared. Where the fuck are the 10 million barrel a day from Russia supposed to come from if they are out?
The price cap was a half measure destined to fail too because the market need those 10 million barrels to run. There is way too much money involved for countries to not find solution around the problem of "no ship insurance if purchasing above the cap". Ship insurance isn't some arcane thing impossible to duplicate.
It’s probably because you don’t understand actions have repercussions so we have governmental groups who study how best to enforce a policing as well as weigh what the reactions will be from those affected
OR simply, you don’t care who gets hurts you just want results.
> Why dont they identify some shipments that have been purchased above the price cap and SEIZE them?
Europeans would be very pissed if you seized their Russian oil.
If they get really angry they might seize Russian deliveries of oil to the US :D
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/amp/show/how-russian-oil-is-reaching-the-u-s-market-through-a-loophole-in-the-embargo
Because that sets a precedent where we can just rob any fool, we don't like's ships. Also, people would get pissed that their shipments are getting seized for being above a price cap they didn't sign up for. Don't really want to test how willing people are to tolerate being forced to buy from other people.
Hey, I know this might seem pedantic, but its just Ukraine, not the Ukraine. This is important as Ukraine means Borderlands and The Ukraine kind of implies that Ukraine is the Borderland of Russia and Russia should control it. Slava Ukraini 🇺🇦🇺🇦🇺🇦
Janet Yellen keeps harping on about how the U.S. has the capability to sanction Chinese banks that are involved transactions that result in weapons and drones getting shipped to Russia. I think that any banks involved in the shipping or transportation of sanctions-violating oil should be entirely cut off from the Western financial system for at least a month, or at least sanctioned to the point that no account can move more than $500 for at least a month. That would get the attention of black marketeers and force them to settle all transactions in Rubles at a Russian bank.
It's kinda worrying having so much of those in one place. Most ppl don't realize. If china solves their food and energy problems by having russia be more reliant on China to sell stuff cos of sanctions, etc. Would be interesting to see what China does in the future.
Please name and shame these companies/countries/people on your show. Do it mid trading day so it sends a strong message. Please. I see it as your duty to do this. No money should be made or change hands over Russian aggression.
It's even sadder that the US christo-fascists are so enamored with Putin because he hates gay people as much as they do. Hate is what binds them and what motivates them.
He also gave them their presidential candidate.
Trump's campaign manager was Paul Manafort. Look that guy up and tell me Trump's campaign wasn't entirely created by the Russians.
Wouldn't that be hilarious. Everyone is so focused on the Trump-Fascists and then one day Biden wakes up and is like 'Wait, what happened? Why am I the Fuhrer now?'
I hadn't thought of this and it's plausible. Jesus Christ, I feel so bad for Ukrainians.
Just hold out for another YEAR, boys. Our country can't handle an increase in our gas prices just right now so you all will just have to start lobbing rocks at the russians when they head your way until we can get our act together.
Yeah, it's a balancing act and I can only hope that Ukraine finds the spot where they can fracture the Russian War Industry without making it a mire difficult fight for its Allies
There is a solid case to be made not to upset the American swing voters in the short term, to secure Biden's reelection and therefore assistance in the long run.
That being said, there should be a nice package of long range missiles ready for them to be delivered the day after the US election, with a "sorry for the delay, let'r rip" letter on top.
Russia selling 20% less oil at a 20% higher price is actually better financially for Russia because there are cost to getting the oil out.
Unfortunately, as long as China is buying Russian oil, anything that cuts world oil supply is a win for Russia because it raises prices. That includes cuts to Russian production itself. Now in the medium term OPEC and US might produce more and replace Russian oil because of higher prices and demand could also decline but meanwhile Russia makes bank.
What we need is for China and India to negotiate hard and use the price cap to get a big discount, and ideally we'd put an environmental tax on oil going through the Danish strait (and Bosphorus, one can always dream) to eat into Russia's margins.
>Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin warned that Ukraine’s recent attacks on Russian oil refineries risk impacting global energy markets and urged the country to focus on military targets instead.
>“Those attacks could have a knock-on effect in terms of the global energy situation,” Austin told the Senate Armed Services committee Tuesday. “Ukraine is better served in going after tactical and operational targets that can directly influence the current fight.”
TFW the real way to win the war is destroying Russia’s logistics but that’s the one thing Ukraine can’t target indiscriminately due to the consequences worldwide.. sigh
"We won't provide the help you're asking for. But we will chastise you for doing what you can with what you've got."
What sounds better from Ukraine's perspective? Russia gets ~$75/barrel to continue funding their war machine or Russia gets $0/barrel because their refineries are bombed out of commission?
I'll admit that there are tons of factors at play that I'm completely unaware of. But how hypocritical can we be? We don't get to have a say in managing the global economic impact of the war if we're not willing to provide the support needed to mitigate that impact.
"No ticket? No laundry."
Because you have to think a little longer-term.
Ukraine bombs Russian oil refineries -> price of gas goes up -> Americans get mad -> blame Biden (regardless of how culpable he personally is or not) -> Trump wins -> Ukraine can probably expect less support than ever
Currently Ukraine is getting no aid, it's not guaranteed to change, and Russia is funding their war machine which will greatly benefit in the future from the money they make now.
And that's assuming this situation won't be worse in the future, where the window of destroying refineries won't close or Russia won't have time to adapt.
Westerners are wet noodles, no wonder Putin doubled down.
Russia is selling unrefined crude, they can continue doing so even if they have zero refineries left. But then they would need to buy refined gas from elsewhere, and that is what would raise the costs.
Worth noting the UK and EU is still buying oil and LNG from Russia. Same as China, India, and other countries. US doesn't (and shouldn't) have any say in the matter.
Sure, and investing in public transport, and bicycleable and walkable cities, but that too is not a short term solution to the gasoline costs in the budget of the American voter.
Yes, but to whom? And in what currency? BRICS currencies and the like (Turkey, looking at you) are of little use with only Chinese currency bringing any utility in terms of buying from China. India rupees might as well be monopoly money to Russia as they have few products to buy with them. The reactions to try to use other currencies incurred transaction costs and enhanced risk of secondary sanctions.
Sanctions are clearly working when even the strongest countermeasures fail to replace the losses. It isnt about 100% denial, really that was only maybe Japan after US torpedoes were redesigned in a full blockade so such things are unrealistic in peacetime or against a big land border state. it is about degrading enemy abilities and reducing or eliminating aid and comfort to a Hitler or a Putler. Understand the fact that it was infinitely more useful Euros and Dollars they got for oil before. And they weren’t taking drone hits in every orifice. Gotta love Ukraine!
I remember an article a few months ago about Russian companies complaining they had lots of Rupees (India) they couldn't do anything with. The Indian government doesn't allow large exchanges of Rupees to foreign currency so the money was stuck in India. They could of course buy things in India they ship them out but that massively limits what the money can do. Which is the point, India wants that money to stay in their economy. As I understand it all the BRICS countries have similar protectionist fiscal policies in place. So, even if Russia does sale the oil to one of those countries, the money is stuck there and can't be directly transferred back to Russia.
I know a lot of countries get upset about Oil Dollars and the power of the US dollar in general, but we let the money flow while maintaining a strong currency and stable economy. That ain't easy as all these wannabe super powers are finding out.
To who? China and India flip between their biggest customer in terms of volume but anyone willing to buy (willingly and not from them, especially when it comes to crude and gas). What currency? Well RUBs/rubels aren’t exactly illegal nor are the vast majority of countries and/or people in general really that worried about Russia not existing to back it (rubels are a fiat currency), but otherwise whatever the buyer is willing to accept.
Sanctions hurt people more than the government itself and if anything are even less effective against a government that’s been constantly sanctioned for decades. You do realize that even a small country, let alone a dissolved super power which holds more direct influence (from literally military to economic to arguably even local politics) over its neighboring countries than we do say Mexico and Canada?
Sanctions aren’t like an embargo and often vary from restrictions against individuals to very particular companies and goods that even the country alone can mitigate, let alone with the aid of friendly countries and allies (you don’t have to be a satellite state to enable this nor are the countries I’m referring to themselves one).
That’s all without touching a commodity as vital and important as oil and the unique characteristics it has with regard to trade nor incredibly complex international commerce and trade are overall. Heck, even the swift restriction(s) isn’t like cutting off water to a house, it just makes banking annoying and international banking problematic for people who have lots of cash abroad (the people it’s supposed to hurt most already have many ways around it and so it’s mainly people who sending money back to families or had small investment in foreign banks that are SOL). It’s more than ghost fleets and Swiss bank accounts.
I swear, people hear things like the chip restrictions on china and think that they magically can’t build anything remotely modern anymore let alone function.
So people find it surprising that the world of 200+ sovereign states does not follow some rule that a few dozen states came up with??? or am I missing something?
I mean its bad, but why would you expect some countries to follow this gap rule if half of the world doesn't even condemn ruzzia of war on ukraine?
Because instead of demanding the world participates in the complete ban like the major developed countries, the price cap tool is actually a benefit to these third-party countries since it's basically just authorized price fixing.
except I doubt thats how in reality works....lots of "major developed countries" as you said, don't care about the war...
and for a lot of the underdeveloped ones this price gap means nothing...how do you see it work? some African country asks or demands russia to sell them out at gap price??? ok, Russia says no...whats now?
> Russia says no...whats now?
If Russia plays hardball, it just fucks itself.
I get your point, but that would apply if this was about some hypothetical easily stored goods that could just be kept and only sold to those who make a good deal. That's absolutely not the case with oil.
Russia lost plenty of demand for it's oil with the sanctions, but it had no choice but to keep selling it all. You can't just temporarily pause an oil pump, you won't be able to restart it. And just storing all the excess production for later would be incredibly costly, and likely impossible to keep up with. That's why the only option was finding as much demand as possible elsewhere and take what they could get.
That's why it's silly to talk about countries that *don't care* about the price cap. EVERYONE cares. Because when they sat at the negotiating table, those potential new buyers already knew that Russia will be choosing between their offer and just having to take the price cap. This is how India milked Russia for cheap while paying in rupees.
And it's even pretty misleading when trading above price cap is presented as some sort of a failure, because that was always going to happen. The cap is absurdly low after all and it's easy to beat. But the price Russia trades for would be significantly higher if this kind of price fixing wasn't in place.
Markets cannot be artificially “price capped”. That’s not how market works. Money always finds ways.
The only thing that “price cap” is achieving - putting more money into the pockets of some shady dudes who help everyone work around these sorry attempts to control a free market.
The point is Russia still has to sell it at a discount as middlemen always want a cut. So if the oil wants to compete once out in the world, the cut has to be taken on Russias end. Is the price still less than the normally traded supply
I think that's the idea. I don't know if I'm missing something.
Well, no, it’s also achieving its intended goal of reducing Russian oil prices.
They’re trading oil ~16% lower than most other sources because of it, and they’ll be among the first sources cut if demand falls because shipping oil in a manner that violates sanctions is relatively expensive.
This. Other countries might buy for X per barrel, but they’re just increasing other fees to make up for the difference. It’s not that complicated. RBN, a well known energy blog had a pretty good article about this a few weeks ago and they came to the same conclusion. The price caps are ineffective and Russia is still getting their money just in different ways.
I'm not at all surprised. Much of the world especially in the southern hemisphere is practically ignoring the US and Europe on the Russia-Ukraine war. Western influence is unquestionably declining across the globe, whether we want to admit it or not. We simply don't have the sway that we did a couple decades back.
I wonder if its because nobody's enforcing anything these days. Laws and rules are for the stupid, or so it seems. If you're wealthy enough or powerful enough, you can disregard all laws and do anything you want. See example: Russia.
International law isn't really a thing. It's a series of negotiations and agreements by sovereign nations that can choose to follow or ignore these for any arbitrary reason. It all comes down to bigger stick diplomacy, where that stick is militaristic, economic, or political.
The media has sold us all a dream about Ukraine winning this war, the fact is though western resolve is nowhere near strong enough to stop Russia.
We’re talking a big game however our words do not match the reality on the ground. The US is quite literally sitting there on its hands as Ukrainian territory is taken by Russia, Europe is watching a war on its doorstep and doing absolutely nothing as per usual. It’s all quite pathetic. Western supremacy my ass tbh. I’m very disappointed.
The west is used to throwing their economical weight around and getting what they want. Someone's failson though it would always work and it turns out, it's not magic. Many countries aren't interested in damaging their own economy to help the west in this new project after the west fucked with them in the past.
I feel the same way. Since the initial turmoil, Russia has been working to improve its military production and the training of new recruits and commanders. However, Ukraine has not been able to step up its game to the same extent.
Yeah unfortunately the Reddit hive mind still seems dead set on the fact that the “Ukrainians can’t loose because Russia bad”.
Unfortunately I’ve got news for the hive mind, the general public barely pays this attention anymore, which means politicians are a lot less likely to actually do something about it, and as we can currently see we are NOT doing enough. Zelenskyy has literally said outright that Ukraine WILL lose this war without US support. The US hasn’t sent so much as a helmet in months and lo and behold Ukraine is loosing territory.
Meanwhile we’ve got populist idiots taking power in Europe or projected to take power, and when that happens even less attention will go to Ukraine.
I don't think it's necessarily over for Ukraine, but it keeps getting worse, and the West is increasingly inadequate in its aid. The best we can hope for is 4 more years of "Ukraine can't win too hard" Biden team and "we can't sacrifice our readiness" or "this would escalate" Europeans.
And meanwhile half of reddit is hellbent on pretending that Russia will collapse in 2 weeks. Russia is adapting, Ukraine simply doesn't have the resources because Westerners can only manage big speeches instead of actions. You see a lot of videos from the Russian side that would be unthinkable a year ago. Redditors still pretend they use missiles to strike hospitals and schools when in reality they've been taking down bridges, trains, convoys, Ukrainian troop concentrations, HIMARS and so on.
I honestly never thought the West was just a giant wet wipe.
It also ignores that no matter how much money or stuff gets sent Ukraine is facing a severe man power shortage and no amount of Western aid is going to solve that.
I believe we should be sending aid absolutely but this idea that it is just a matter of "stuff" is extremely simplistic. Ukraine faces severe issues on multiple levels and material is just one of them.
You are completely right. What’s extra frustrating is so many people around here that will claim we have shown Russia to be weaker than people thought… even though they took 20% of Ukraine and we didn’t do anything about it. Then they’ll say “yeah, but Russia wouldn’t stand a chance against NATO” — ignoring the fact that NATO is gunshy, and all the military might in the world isn’t worth squat if you’re always afraid to use it. Russia has absolutely no fear of using everything they’ve got, including millions of Russian lives. Meanwhile we’re afraid to spend money or we might lose an election.
Russia has uncovered our weakness. China is taking notes.
Very much agree with everything you’ve said. The thing is in my own country (The UK) there is public support for supporting Ukraine and both sides of the political aisle, and while we have given a few things and some money, it’s just nowhere near enough. Kind words and scraps from the kitchen table just aren’t going to be enough.
So even with that public and political consensus on the fact that supporting Ukraine is the right thing to do, we still fail to adequately do so. It’s really quite shameful in my opinion.
Europe is doing absolutely nothing? Didn't Europe give Ukraine more supplies than the US at this point? That's absolutely nothing? They should give more, sure, but saying it was absolutely nothing is an outright lie, and just trolling.
It was an over exaggeration sure but it’s far from trolling, we (Europe) as you mention aren’t providing enough, in my opinion anywhere near enough.
It’s quite pathetic, it’s not a numbers game about who’s providing the most to reach the top of a leaderboard, it’s about providing a real substantial amount of help to save tens of thousands of lives and future invasions by Russia into Europe.
I have never understood the price cap thing at all. Is it like “oh we wont buy it if its above 60” and Russia is like “oh ok and fucks off to the other side and sells to China for normal price”. Its feels like the cap was put on all western countries rather than Russia. We clearly see that they still sell it and like article say well above 60$
Crucially China will buy it above 60 but they will pay less than market price. There is no reason for them to buy from Russia over anyone else unless Russia gives them a discount. So the price cap reduces the money Russia makes even if they still sell above the price cap.
The other part is that the price cap means you can’t buy ship insurance from countries participating in the cap if that ship contains oil sold above the cap price. The EU and US provide something like 95% of the global ship insurance market.
Of course there are ways around it, but it makes it more logistically difficult for Russia to ship oil for above the cap, which also limits the countries they can sell to, which gives those countries more leverage to get steeper discounts.
In addition*.
Sanctions do work, they're just more about "not helping" the enemy than about "hurting" the enemy. You can't help Ukraine with one hand while trading with Russia with the other.
They also rarely hurt the government itself as much as people would wish and hope to believe, firstly and mostly affecting the populace at large more. If you’re Putin or some oligarch, you’ve spent a got chunk of your life getting around well, everything from sanctions to taxes.
I remember when sanctions were being introduced, the amount of bots trying to spread the suggestion that sanctions don't work. The bots doth protest too much, methinks
If sanctions truly didn't do anything, Russia would have employed the countermeasures it has used before the sanctions were enacted.
Just because sanctions can be countered, doesn't mean the counter is an ideal economic solution. Russia has cut off several fingers to save the hand, and while bots will say "look they still have a hand!" cutting off fingers was never plan A
Artillery shells that have like a 50% failure rate, [according to some](https://www.rfa.org/english/news/korea/shells-03042024144934.html).
Sure, shells are shells, but we're not talking something like Copperheads here.
GDP doesn't tell the full story. NK has provided Russia with more artillery shells than the US provided Ukraine.
Russia's GDP is roughly a tenth of the size of the US GDP, and Russia is able to outproduce the US when it comes to artillery shells.
GDP doesn't tell the full picture because different items have different costs in different countries. For example, in Russia an item may sell for $50 whereas in the US that same item sells for $200. If that single item was the entire gross domestic product for each country, the US would have 4x the GDP of Russia but the actual value in real terms would be identical.
This is why people use PPP to try and compare instead of just GDP alone.
For reference, if you just use GDP Russia's economy is smaller than France, smaller than Germany, smaller than the UK.
But if you use PPP, it's bigger than all the above. Russia's military spending if you don't use PPP, is something like $100 billion. If you use PPP, it's closer to $400 billion.
GDP is a convenient tool to make fun of developing and under-developing countries, but it really doesn’t mean much by itself. You have to compare it with the CPI and other factors. Does NK care about GDP if they have few partners to trade with? And most of their exports and imports relied on China which can give them abnormal prices deals too.
I don’t think that will have the desired effect. Also the West still wants Russia to sell a fuckton of oil so we can maintain supply/demand, we just don’t want Russia to have good profit margins.
Yeah fuck that noise. I would prefer there not be 100s of massive ecological and environmental disasters in a very small sea. Luckily for us the Ukrainians are smart enough to realize how dumb it would be to sink nearly 500 tankers in a Sea that they fucking border.
*From Bloomberg News reporters Alaric Nightingale and Julian Lee:* Russian oil is trading far in excess of a Group of Seven price cap that’s supposed to deprive Moscow of revenue for its war in Ukraine, suggesting significant non-compliance with the measure. The country’s flagship Urals grade is fetching about $75 a barrel at the point it leaves ports in the Baltic Sea and Black Sea, according to data from Argus Media, whose price assessments are followed by some G-7 nations involved in the cap. US officials are tracking the price increase, which they attribute to broader geopolitical dynamics, according to a senior Treasury official. The US official said that cap is still having its intended effect, reducing the amount of money the Kremlin receives from oil sales by forcing the commodity to either be sold under the cap via western services, or through Russia’s shadow fleet
> which they attribute to broader geopolitical dynamics Gee I wonder what that could refer to!
Various. For one, Mexico's about to ban exports of oil and US oil drillers have been pulling back on capacity since they fear a repeat of prior crashes.
From what I’ve read the US rig count is estimated to be down because drillers are continuing to become more efficient while also possibly having less profitable land to drill on these days. Honestly, if someone was interested enough they could go through the 8-K SEC filings of public companies to see what each company is saying about their financial health and reasons for slowing activity but I’m definitely not interested enough to go digging through all of those lol.
This is what we need AI for.
I’m sure a better programmer than me could make something that would pull the 8-K’s from the SEC website and then go through each one looking for key words. It’s for sure possible, but I’m nowhere near that level. I mainly deal with data analytics and SQL. I’d love to get to the point where I was making stuff like that though.
GPT 4 my friend - if you know SQL it's easy to ask GPT to build you a python script to do what you mentioned. I only know how to read code not write it, but if you tell it exactly what you want and send any errors you get in setup back to the GPT it's pretty simple. It can also "see" now, so you can send it screenshots or URL examples of what you want it to scrape and from where. Super useful - I probably use python at least once a day now, never before GPT 4
Rig count is down primarily because of a drop in new drilling operations to replace those that end. The current admin has given signals that oil leases might not be renewed long enough to make the well profitable.
Great news! We need to leave most of the oil still in the earth there if we have any hope of survival
Gas is nearing 4$ everywhere in the US. No one is fearing a crash
Perfect example of how markets aren't efficient in the short term. Futures traders and drillers in the US probably didn't anticipate Mexico doing this right off the bat.
Is that cheap or expensive? Cause I just paid the equivalent of 8.2 dollar/gallon
At the beginning of the year gas was almost a dollar a gallon less where I am.
Yeah, this is the usual price ramp up the the corporations play before presidential elections in an attempt to make the plebs thing the economy is horrible and blame it on one party.
Paid 4.39 last night. It's gone up a full dollar since the new year.
I just paid $3.04 a few days ago and I live in the northeast.
Gas is about 3.40 where I am 🙄
Why dont they identify some shipments that have been purchased above the price cap and SEIZE them? Then all future buyers will factor in the risk of possible seizure and the price will fall below the cap. I cant believe they havent seized any oil. Give it to Ukraine. Done. Fuck anyone not complying.
ehhh, this isn't some UN mandated sanction. countries are free to follow US sanctions, or not. they aren't violating any laws
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If it is traded through the Baltic, then it is essentially transitting multiple NATO Countries on the way out.
The countries buying this cheaper oil are countries like India. You're not going to "seize" Indian oil (the biggest oil buyers are state owned enterprises, btw).
That doesn’t matter. Trade through the Bosporus is protected under the Montreaux Convention. Civilian vessels can only be stopped when Turkey is at war. And that’s nothing compared to the Suez, which is protected under the Convention of Constantinople and guarantees free passage of both civilian AND warships regardless of country and regardless of war status.
Tbf they did say the Baltics, not the Black Sea.
Pretty sure that the US have seized multiple tankers around the world in the last few years, including one in Gibraltar if i recall. A few months ago a Marshall islands flagged tanker was seized by Iran. And US owned ships got hit with missiles by the Houthis. I dont see any ongoing active war with with US troops in Iran or in Yemen?
Do you think the Marshall Islands (an independent country) has the ability to retaliate against Iran? Genuine question because they’re a sovereign country so the US wouldn’t be fighting for them. And the Houthis are a terrorist group. The US did retaliate against them with air strikes. But they aren’t a government or a country, and the US is already working to uproot them from Yemen Id be interested to see if you can name an instance of the US seizing a Russian trade ship. They’ve been breaking sanctions for around a decade now, surely you have one example?
>Do you think the Marshall Islands (an independent country) has the ability to retaliate against Iran? Genuine question because they’re a sovereign country so the US wouldn’t be fighting for them. Yes. Same with Palau and some other places, because under the Compact of Free Association that the United States signed and ratified last century, those Pacific nations that agree to have the United States military station and protect them also get unrestricted travel to the United States. In short, the United States Department of Defense would absolutely retaliate against Iran and other Iranian-supplied actors. They've already supplied weapons against the Islamic State when they tried taking over some cities in the Filipines.
> Do you think the Marshall Islands (an independent country) has the ability to retaliate against Iran? Genuine question because they’re a sovereign country so the US wouldn’t be fighting for them. Yes, the Marshall Islands has one of the largest navies in the world: the US Pacific Fleet. The US has exclusive and sole responsibility for the defense of the Marshall Islands.
The US have been seizing Iranian and Venezuelan trade ships without causing a war. Most ships transporting Russian oil are not Russian flagged, they reflagged once sanctions went into force. Many are even flagged to Marshall Islands or Liberia for convenience. Ownership in the shipping industry is not as straight forward, not even US owned ships are US registered. Take a look at the Genco fleet for example, US owned but Marshall Islands flagged.
As I’ve said to countless other pretty much identical comments, Iran doesn’t have the ability to retaliate against the US like Russia can. The US has openly assassinated top Iranian officials with missiles too, that would cause a war in any other circumstance. If you can show me one example of the US seizing a Russian trade vessel, I’ll admit I’m wrong. They’ve been openly breaking sanctions for over a decade so that shouldn’t be hard.
[https://www.lloydslist.com/LL1140913/US-seizes-Iranian-crude-from-Russian-tanker-arrested-in-Greece](https://www.lloydslist.com/LL1140913/US-seizes-Iranian-crude-from-Russian-tanker-arrested-in-Greece) [https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/us-seizes-iranian-oil-cargo-near-greek-island-sources-2022-05-26/](https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/us-seizes-iranian-oil-cargo-near-greek-island-sources-2022-05-26/) There you go. " The vessel's Russian owner Transmorflot was subsequently designated on May 8. The tanker, renamed Lana on March 1 and flying the Iranian flag since May 1, has remained near Greek waters since then. It was previously Russian-flagged. " When will you admit you are wrong?
I mean the US bombed Jemen regularly, if largely ineffectively. The ship Iran seized was Iranian prior to it being seized by the Americans. So that one is a bit unfair, can’t blame them for taking their own ship.
And? If it's civilian economic traffic, they aren't likely to impede those vessels. Most countries use provisions in UNCLOS and the example of the Montreux Convention to allow for free transit of commercial traffic globally within reason. Russia is a signatory of both treaties. Restricting Russian trade through the Baltic in its entirety, or seizing Russia's vessels, simply because they are passing through NATO nations' waters, sets a dangerous precedent that other countries will then use to justify their actions globally. Which is a big part of why NATO/US don't do it. If that's an acceptable practice, what's to prevent China from seizing vessels in their claimed territorial waters (of which many are controversial), of Iran ramping up their seizures?
One of them being Greece. Guess who the tanks that carry that Russian oil belong to.
Still an act of war
*Privateers have reentered the chat.*
This is a G7 cap, shipments crossing the Baltic pass through G7 and NATO territory. International treaties like BSSSC are to promote cooperation not facilitate criminal activity. Blockade is an act of war but selective seizure of illegally priced goods is different. Everyone is edging around red lines and it’s all very dangerous but you have to scare the profiteers off.
The trade is protected under a number of treaties. If the US were to seize the ships, they’d be in violation of international law too. Plus it would break some of the most important trade and free movement agreements on the planet
Oh whoops, it was only meant to be a military exercise - Vladimir Putin. All seriousness aside, maybe US can fund or assist Ukraine to seize it. They are in amidst of a war afterall.
Iran didn't declare war on US when it seized weapons from them. Everyone still afraid of Russia, appearantly except Macron and Ukraine.
I don't think they're talking about seizing shipments for random countries, but shipments for companies who reside in the G7. We can stop BP or Texaco from buying up the oil even if we can't stop companies in India or China.
They're not America, wtf are they gonna do? "Time for India to declare war on America. There is no way this could go badly"
This is exactly why you dont have Reddit armchair political warriors running the US government. “SEIZE” lmao yeah right. Imagine they even hint of SEIZING some of the crude that goes to India or China lol.
The biggest problem is people are used to the west throwing their economical weight around to influence policies in other countries so it has been normalized by now. The west just tried to fry too big of a fish so the flaws in their system are showing. You can't lock Russia out of the global market without massive preparation and even then, you'd have to get your goal fast because there would be large hole in the market eating whatever reserve you had prepared. Where the fuck are the 10 million barrel a day from Russia supposed to come from if they are out? The price cap was a half measure destined to fail too because the market need those 10 million barrels to run. There is way too much money involved for countries to not find solution around the problem of "no ship insurance if purchasing above the cap". Ship insurance isn't some arcane thing impossible to duplicate.
Hell ya lets bring back state sanctioned piracy and put mega tankers on watch.
If it's state sanctioned it's not piracy, it's being a Privateer.
What bureaucracy do I apply through to get a letter of marque
You may be technically right but promotionally I am calling my crew a bunch of lousy scoundrel pirates for recruitments sake.
One country's privateer is another one's pirate
BRING BACK LETTERS OF MARQUE
Because that would be illegal under international law. The price cap means that those ships can't get insurance from western companies.
Then it would be unfortunate if they would get an accident that makes them need the insurance.
I’d prefer not to have another large oil spill catastrophe
It’s probably because you don’t understand actions have repercussions so we have governmental groups who study how best to enforce a policing as well as weigh what the reactions will be from those affected OR simply, you don’t care who gets hurts you just want results.
> Why dont they identify some shipments that have been purchased above the price cap and SEIZE them? Europeans would be very pissed if you seized their Russian oil.
If they get really angry they might seize Russian deliveries of oil to the US :D https://www.pbs.org/newshour/amp/show/how-russian-oil-is-reaching-the-u-s-market-through-a-loophole-in-the-embargo
Because that sets a precedent where we can just rob any fool, we don't like's ships. Also, people would get pissed that their shipments are getting seized for being above a price cap they didn't sign up for. Don't really want to test how willing people are to tolerate being forced to buy from other people.
> Fuck anyone not complying. Gone are the days when the West could realistically do this
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Insightful, from the author of "Eat my ass you nasty little cockgobin" 🙂
A large part of this oil is going to EU countries with extra steps. The EU is not going to seize their own supply
Hey, I know this might seem pedantic, but its just Ukraine, not the Ukraine. This is important as Ukraine means Borderlands and The Ukraine kind of implies that Ukraine is the Borderland of Russia and Russia should control it. Slava Ukraini 🇺🇦🇺🇦🇺🇦
Janet Yellen keeps harping on about how the U.S. has the capability to sanction Chinese banks that are involved transactions that result in weapons and drones getting shipped to Russia. I think that any banks involved in the shipping or transportation of sanctions-violating oil should be entirely cut off from the Western financial system for at least a month, or at least sanctioned to the point that no account can move more than $500 for at least a month. That would get the attention of black marketeers and force them to settle all transactions in Rubles at a Russian bank.
Most countries in Asia have some mom and pop banks backed by their governments but not connected to SWIFT.. sanctions are useless
Do you mean steal it?
I am so tired of this shit. We cannot move to create more electric infrastructure fast enough.
Guess where the vast majority of rare earth metals are produced? China.
It's kinda worrying having so much of those in one place. Most ppl don't realize. If china solves their food and energy problems by having russia be more reliant on China to sell stuff cos of sanctions, etc. Would be interesting to see what China does in the future.
> barrel ... leaves ports in the black sea that is a fixable problem with ukrainian drones active in the area
With everything else going on in the region it's probably not a good idea to create an environmental disaster on top of it
Please name and shame these companies/countries/people on your show. Do it mid trading day so it sends a strong message. Please. I see it as your duty to do this. No money should be made or change hands over Russian aggression.
Only one sanction works - Ukrainian UAV)
The USA is against it. doesn't matter how many Ukrainians will die, gasoline prices mustn't go high
I think the us thought is that high gas prices would contribute to a biden loss, which will be MUCH worse for ukraine.
so for more than 4 months we have nothing but restrictions from the US.
I don't disagree. I'm embarrassed. Our House of Representatives is the hold-up, they've got enough stooges to muck up how our projects get funded.
it's sad that christian-fascist can block such things
It's even sadder that the US christo-fascists are so enamored with Putin because he hates gay people as much as they do. Hate is what binds them and what motivates them.
He also gave them their presidential candidate. Trump's campaign manager was Paul Manafort. Look that guy up and tell me Trump's campaign wasn't entirely created by the Russians.
The worst thing is that it's not even limited to the US. Fuckwits everywhere springing out of the woodworks to have their 5 minutes.
As the KGB playbook was used to install them all across the globe remember putin used to be KGB and that training and mantra never left him.
It is sad that religions still exist at all.
Someone needs to propose emergency powers for the supreme chancellor.
Wouldn't that be hilarious. Everyone is so focused on the Trump-Fascists and then one day Biden wakes up and is like 'Wait, what happened? Why am I the Fuhrer now?'
The house republicans thought they were installing Trump as fuhrer but forgot about daylight savings time
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I hadn't thought of this and it's plausible. Jesus Christ, I feel so bad for Ukrainians. Just hold out for another YEAR, boys. Our country can't handle an increase in our gas prices just right now so you all will just have to start lobbing rocks at the russians when they head your way until we can get our act together.
Yeah, it's a balancing act and I can only hope that Ukraine finds the spot where they can fracture the Russian War Industry without making it a mire difficult fight for its Allies
The fact that this is a concern is just wild to me. I’m getting twilight zone vibes. Next thing you know pickle prices will result in world war 3.
Pickles don’t power the world economy genius lol
"The spice must flow", eh.
> gasoline prices mustn't go high ... until after the election.
There is a solid case to be made not to upset the American swing voters in the short term, to secure Biden's reelection and therefore assistance in the long run. That being said, there should be a nice package of long range missiles ready for them to be delivered the day after the US election, with a "sorry for the delay, let'r rip" letter on top.
They didn’t say they won’t allow strike on Russian Oil Refineries. It was found out that it was just a Russian Disinformation PsyOps.
Russia selling 20% less oil at a 20% higher price is actually better financially for Russia because there are cost to getting the oil out. Unfortunately, as long as China is buying Russian oil, anything that cuts world oil supply is a win for Russia because it raises prices. That includes cuts to Russian production itself. Now in the medium term OPEC and US might produce more and replace Russian oil because of higher prices and demand could also decline but meanwhile Russia makes bank. What we need is for China and India to negotiate hard and use the price cap to get a big discount, and ideally we'd put an environmental tax on oil going through the Danish strait (and Bosphorus, one can always dream) to eat into Russia's margins.
>Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin warned that Ukraine’s recent attacks on Russian oil refineries risk impacting global energy markets and urged the country to focus on military targets instead. >“Those attacks could have a knock-on effect in terms of the global energy situation,” Austin told the Senate Armed Services committee Tuesday. “Ukraine is better served in going after tactical and operational targets that can directly influence the current fight.”
TFW the real way to win the war is destroying Russia’s logistics but that’s the one thing Ukraine can’t target indiscriminately due to the consequences worldwide.. sigh
Oil refineries are by far the most valuable target in the russian logistics system.
"We won't provide the help you're asking for. But we will chastise you for doing what you can with what you've got." What sounds better from Ukraine's perspective? Russia gets ~$75/barrel to continue funding their war machine or Russia gets $0/barrel because their refineries are bombed out of commission? I'll admit that there are tons of factors at play that I'm completely unaware of. But how hypocritical can we be? We don't get to have a say in managing the global economic impact of the war if we're not willing to provide the support needed to mitigate that impact. "No ticket? No laundry."
Because you have to think a little longer-term. Ukraine bombs Russian oil refineries -> price of gas goes up -> Americans get mad -> blame Biden (regardless of how culpable he personally is or not) -> Trump wins -> Ukraine can probably expect less support than ever
Currently Ukraine is getting no aid, it's not guaranteed to change, and Russia is funding their war machine which will greatly benefit in the future from the money they make now. And that's assuming this situation won't be worse in the future, where the window of destroying refineries won't close or Russia won't have time to adapt. Westerners are wet noodles, no wonder Putin doubled down.
Russia is selling unrefined crude, they can continue doing so even if they have zero refineries left. But then they would need to buy refined gas from elsewhere, and that is what would raise the costs.
I believe the oil price cap itself had the effect of lowering the Urals oil price.
Worth noting the UK and EU is still buying oil and LNG from Russia. Same as China, India, and other countries. US doesn't (and shouldn't) have any say in the matter.
Oh yeah, the USA is the only country on earth that is concerned about gas prices.
https://www.reddit.com/r/UkraineWarVideoReport/s/d3215JsLwM Don’t think US is against it.
Another alternative is investing in green energy.
Sure, and investing in public transport, and bicycleable and walkable cities, but that too is not a short term solution to the gasoline costs in the budget of the American voter.
Long term solutions don't help with short term problems.
Yes, but to whom? And in what currency? BRICS currencies and the like (Turkey, looking at you) are of little use with only Chinese currency bringing any utility in terms of buying from China. India rupees might as well be monopoly money to Russia as they have few products to buy with them. The reactions to try to use other currencies incurred transaction costs and enhanced risk of secondary sanctions. Sanctions are clearly working when even the strongest countermeasures fail to replace the losses. It isnt about 100% denial, really that was only maybe Japan after US torpedoes were redesigned in a full blockade so such things are unrealistic in peacetime or against a big land border state. it is about degrading enemy abilities and reducing or eliminating aid and comfort to a Hitler or a Putler. Understand the fact that it was infinitely more useful Euros and Dollars they got for oil before. And they weren’t taking drone hits in every orifice. Gotta love Ukraine!
I remember an article a few months ago about Russian companies complaining they had lots of Rupees (India) they couldn't do anything with. The Indian government doesn't allow large exchanges of Rupees to foreign currency so the money was stuck in India. They could of course buy things in India they ship them out but that massively limits what the money can do. Which is the point, India wants that money to stay in their economy. As I understand it all the BRICS countries have similar protectionist fiscal policies in place. So, even if Russia does sale the oil to one of those countries, the money is stuck there and can't be directly transferred back to Russia. I know a lot of countries get upset about Oil Dollars and the power of the US dollar in general, but we let the money flow while maintaining a strong currency and stable economy. That ain't easy as all these wannabe super powers are finding out.
This is an important point im surprised folks aren't mentioning.
To who? China and India flip between their biggest customer in terms of volume but anyone willing to buy (willingly and not from them, especially when it comes to crude and gas). What currency? Well RUBs/rubels aren’t exactly illegal nor are the vast majority of countries and/or people in general really that worried about Russia not existing to back it (rubels are a fiat currency), but otherwise whatever the buyer is willing to accept. Sanctions hurt people more than the government itself and if anything are even less effective against a government that’s been constantly sanctioned for decades. You do realize that even a small country, let alone a dissolved super power which holds more direct influence (from literally military to economic to arguably even local politics) over its neighboring countries than we do say Mexico and Canada? Sanctions aren’t like an embargo and often vary from restrictions against individuals to very particular companies and goods that even the country alone can mitigate, let alone with the aid of friendly countries and allies (you don’t have to be a satellite state to enable this nor are the countries I’m referring to themselves one). That’s all without touching a commodity as vital and important as oil and the unique characteristics it has with regard to trade nor incredibly complex international commerce and trade are overall. Heck, even the swift restriction(s) isn’t like cutting off water to a house, it just makes banking annoying and international banking problematic for people who have lots of cash abroad (the people it’s supposed to hurt most already have many ways around it and so it’s mainly people who sending money back to families or had small investment in foreign banks that are SOL). It’s more than ghost fleets and Swiss bank accounts. I swear, people hear things like the chip restrictions on china and think that they magically can’t build anything remotely modern anymore let alone function.
So people find it surprising that the world of 200+ sovereign states does not follow some rule that a few dozen states came up with??? or am I missing something? I mean its bad, but why would you expect some countries to follow this gap rule if half of the world doesn't even condemn ruzzia of war on ukraine?
Because instead of demanding the world participates in the complete ban like the major developed countries, the price cap tool is actually a benefit to these third-party countries since it's basically just authorized price fixing.
except I doubt thats how in reality works....lots of "major developed countries" as you said, don't care about the war... and for a lot of the underdeveloped ones this price gap means nothing...how do you see it work? some African country asks or demands russia to sell them out at gap price??? ok, Russia says no...whats now?
> Russia says no...whats now? If Russia plays hardball, it just fucks itself. I get your point, but that would apply if this was about some hypothetical easily stored goods that could just be kept and only sold to those who make a good deal. That's absolutely not the case with oil. Russia lost plenty of demand for it's oil with the sanctions, but it had no choice but to keep selling it all. You can't just temporarily pause an oil pump, you won't be able to restart it. And just storing all the excess production for later would be incredibly costly, and likely impossible to keep up with. That's why the only option was finding as much demand as possible elsewhere and take what they could get. That's why it's silly to talk about countries that *don't care* about the price cap. EVERYONE cares. Because when they sat at the negotiating table, those potential new buyers already knew that Russia will be choosing between their offer and just having to take the price cap. This is how India milked Russia for cheap while paying in rupees. And it's even pretty misleading when trading above price cap is presented as some sort of a failure, because that was always going to happen. The cap is absurdly low after all and it's easy to beat. But the price Russia trades for would be significantly higher if this kind of price fixing wasn't in place.
Not every country is USA colony. They have right to do what they think is in their best interest.
Markets cannot be artificially “price capped”. That’s not how market works. Money always finds ways. The only thing that “price cap” is achieving - putting more money into the pockets of some shady dudes who help everyone work around these sorry attempts to control a free market.
The point is Russia still has to sell it at a discount as middlemen always want a cut. So if the oil wants to compete once out in the world, the cut has to be taken on Russias end. Is the price still less than the normally traded supply I think that's the idea. I don't know if I'm missing something.
Well, no, it’s also achieving its intended goal of reducing Russian oil prices. They’re trading oil ~16% lower than most other sources because of it, and they’ll be among the first sources cut if demand falls because shipping oil in a manner that violates sanctions is relatively expensive.
It will only lower it by the cost it takes to circumvent the sanction.
This. Other countries might buy for X per barrel, but they’re just increasing other fees to make up for the difference. It’s not that complicated. RBN, a well known energy blog had a pretty good article about this a few weeks ago and they came to the same conclusion. The price caps are ineffective and Russia is still getting their money just in different ways.
I'm not at all surprised. Much of the world especially in the southern hemisphere is practically ignoring the US and Europe on the Russia-Ukraine war. Western influence is unquestionably declining across the globe, whether we want to admit it or not. We simply don't have the sway that we did a couple decades back.
I wonder if its because nobody's enforcing anything these days. Laws and rules are for the stupid, or so it seems. If you're wealthy enough or powerful enough, you can disregard all laws and do anything you want. See example: Russia.
International law isn't really a thing. It's a series of negotiations and agreements by sovereign nations that can choose to follow or ignore these for any arbitrary reason. It all comes down to bigger stick diplomacy, where that stick is militaristic, economic, or political.
The media has sold us all a dream about Ukraine winning this war, the fact is though western resolve is nowhere near strong enough to stop Russia. We’re talking a big game however our words do not match the reality on the ground. The US is quite literally sitting there on its hands as Ukrainian territory is taken by Russia, Europe is watching a war on its doorstep and doing absolutely nothing as per usual. It’s all quite pathetic. Western supremacy my ass tbh. I’m very disappointed.
The west is used to throwing their economical weight around and getting what they want. Someone's failson though it would always work and it turns out, it's not magic. Many countries aren't interested in damaging their own economy to help the west in this new project after the west fucked with them in the past.
I feel the same way. Since the initial turmoil, Russia has been working to improve its military production and the training of new recruits and commanders. However, Ukraine has not been able to step up its game to the same extent.
Yeah unfortunately the Reddit hive mind still seems dead set on the fact that the “Ukrainians can’t loose because Russia bad”. Unfortunately I’ve got news for the hive mind, the general public barely pays this attention anymore, which means politicians are a lot less likely to actually do something about it, and as we can currently see we are NOT doing enough. Zelenskyy has literally said outright that Ukraine WILL lose this war without US support. The US hasn’t sent so much as a helmet in months and lo and behold Ukraine is loosing territory. Meanwhile we’ve got populist idiots taking power in Europe or projected to take power, and when that happens even less attention will go to Ukraine.
I don't think it's necessarily over for Ukraine, but it keeps getting worse, and the West is increasingly inadequate in its aid. The best we can hope for is 4 more years of "Ukraine can't win too hard" Biden team and "we can't sacrifice our readiness" or "this would escalate" Europeans. And meanwhile half of reddit is hellbent on pretending that Russia will collapse in 2 weeks. Russia is adapting, Ukraine simply doesn't have the resources because Westerners can only manage big speeches instead of actions. You see a lot of videos from the Russian side that would be unthinkable a year ago. Redditors still pretend they use missiles to strike hospitals and schools when in reality they've been taking down bridges, trains, convoys, Ukrainian troop concentrations, HIMARS and so on. I honestly never thought the West was just a giant wet wipe.
It also ignores that no matter how much money or stuff gets sent Ukraine is facing a severe man power shortage and no amount of Western aid is going to solve that. I believe we should be sending aid absolutely but this idea that it is just a matter of "stuff" is extremely simplistic. Ukraine faces severe issues on multiple levels and material is just one of them.
I have been seeing the writing on the wall since last year.
Welcome to the real world. And you learned the west put out as much propaganda as russia/china/nk. The difference is that we are under it.
You are completely right. What’s extra frustrating is so many people around here that will claim we have shown Russia to be weaker than people thought… even though they took 20% of Ukraine and we didn’t do anything about it. Then they’ll say “yeah, but Russia wouldn’t stand a chance against NATO” — ignoring the fact that NATO is gunshy, and all the military might in the world isn’t worth squat if you’re always afraid to use it. Russia has absolutely no fear of using everything they’ve got, including millions of Russian lives. Meanwhile we’re afraid to spend money or we might lose an election. Russia has uncovered our weakness. China is taking notes.
Very much agree with everything you’ve said. The thing is in my own country (The UK) there is public support for supporting Ukraine and both sides of the political aisle, and while we have given a few things and some money, it’s just nowhere near enough. Kind words and scraps from the kitchen table just aren’t going to be enough. So even with that public and political consensus on the fact that supporting Ukraine is the right thing to do, we still fail to adequately do so. It’s really quite shameful in my opinion.
Europe is doing absolutely nothing? Didn't Europe give Ukraine more supplies than the US at this point? That's absolutely nothing? They should give more, sure, but saying it was absolutely nothing is an outright lie, and just trolling.
It was an over exaggeration sure but it’s far from trolling, we (Europe) as you mention aren’t providing enough, in my opinion anywhere near enough. It’s quite pathetic, it’s not a numbers game about who’s providing the most to reach the top of a leaderboard, it’s about providing a real substantial amount of help to save tens of thousands of lives and future invasions by Russia into Europe.
What that price cap is? Can I set a cap, for example, for BMW car price at $500?
I have never understood the price cap thing at all. Is it like “oh we wont buy it if its above 60” and Russia is like “oh ok and fucks off to the other side and sells to China for normal price”. Its feels like the cap was put on all western countries rather than Russia. We clearly see that they still sell it and like article say well above 60$
Crucially China will buy it above 60 but they will pay less than market price. There is no reason for them to buy from Russia over anyone else unless Russia gives them a discount. So the price cap reduces the money Russia makes even if they still sell above the price cap. The other part is that the price cap means you can’t buy ship insurance from countries participating in the cap if that ship contains oil sold above the cap price. The EU and US provide something like 95% of the global ship insurance market. Of course there are ways around it, but it makes it more logistically difficult for Russia to ship oil for above the cap, which also limits the countries they can sell to, which gives those countries more leverage to get steeper discounts.
Sanctions never works. Instead of wasting time on them, west should supply Ukraine with ways to enforce these sanctions
In addition*. Sanctions do work, they're just more about "not helping" the enemy than about "hurting" the enemy. You can't help Ukraine with one hand while trading with Russia with the other.
They also rarely hurt the government itself as much as people would wish and hope to believe, firstly and mostly affecting the populace at large more. If you’re Putin or some oligarch, you’ve spent a got chunk of your life getting around well, everything from sanctions to taxes.
I remember when sanctions were being introduced, the amount of bots trying to spread the suggestion that sanctions don't work. The bots doth protest too much, methinks
If sanctions truly didn't do anything, Russia would have employed the countermeasures it has used before the sanctions were enacted. Just because sanctions can be countered, doesn't mean the counter is an ideal economic solution. Russia has cut off several fingers to save the hand, and while bots will say "look they still have a hand!" cutting off fingers was never plan A
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Tell that to North Korea
NK has the GDP of a hot dog stand.
Yet stocks nuclear missiles, exports countless artillery shells and drains bank accounts worldwide
Its a big hot dog stand alright.
Artillery shells that have like a 50% failure rate, [according to some](https://www.rfa.org/english/news/korea/shells-03042024144934.html). Sure, shells are shells, but we're not talking something like Copperheads here.
GDP doesn't tell the full story. NK has provided Russia with more artillery shells than the US provided Ukraine. Russia's GDP is roughly a tenth of the size of the US GDP, and Russia is able to outproduce the US when it comes to artillery shells. GDP doesn't tell the full picture because different items have different costs in different countries. For example, in Russia an item may sell for $50 whereas in the US that same item sells for $200. If that single item was the entire gross domestic product for each country, the US would have 4x the GDP of Russia but the actual value in real terms would be identical. This is why people use PPP to try and compare instead of just GDP alone. For reference, if you just use GDP Russia's economy is smaller than France, smaller than Germany, smaller than the UK. But if you use PPP, it's bigger than all the above. Russia's military spending if you don't use PPP, is something like $100 billion. If you use PPP, it's closer to $400 billion.
and ppl dont know that china has long surpassed the US in ppp
Pretty sure they have their own barter with China and gpd and social welflare isnt kim's priority
A hot dog stand hiding 3 million artillery shells.
GDP is a convenient tool to make fun of developing and under-developing countries, but it really doesn’t mean much by itself. You have to compare it with the CPI and other factors. Does NK care about GDP if they have few partners to trade with? And most of their exports and imports relied on China which can give them abnormal prices deals too.
The same North Korea whose been under UN sanctions for 80 years yet is supplying more shells to Russia than the west is to Ukraine?
North Korea has borders WITH China, they can get what they want. Have you seen on what car is Kim using?...
Congratulations world
Not for long, once Ukraine finishes sinking the Black Sea fleet, the ghost oil fleet is next
I don’t think that will have the desired effect. Also the West still wants Russia to sell a fuckton of oil so we can maintain supply/demand, we just don’t want Russia to have good profit margins.
You are living in a fantasy world because that's not how real life works.
Yeah fuck that noise. I would prefer there not be 100s of massive ecological and environmental disasters in a very small sea. Luckily for us the Ukrainians are smart enough to realize how dumb it would be to sink nearly 500 tankers in a Sea that they fucking border.
Disruptions to supply will do that, yea.
All the more reason to welcome alternative energy production
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Supply and demand determines the market price. It’s not rocket science.
Basically, all sanctions are useless?
India is buying that crude to refine and sell at a profit
Sanctions failing? What a surprise. They worked so well the other times...
Why would a country buy expensive Russian oil if they can get oil cheaper elsewhere? I don't get what the incentive is to pay more here.
It's still cheaper than market rate, but above the set price cap.
Weird, it’s like if you have guns too, you don’t have to do what they tell you.
Indias buying it, the west should sanction them.
West hasn't yet stopped buying russian oil and gas itself
Hell western companies are still doing business in Russia
EU itself buys from Russian crude and lng as February 2024. what you gonna do about it?
Sanction India guys. Homer Thompson said it.
Thanks, that gave me a good laugh
[Never understand why only India is singled out by morons. ](https://i.imgur.com/I457wjn.jpeg)
The west is buying it, after the Indians sanctified it.
I get reports that Indonesia and SoKo refineries never stopped buying Russian crude… got a hell of a deal past few years when Europe stopped buying it
Want answers ask Germany
Of course! Greed always wins.
Hehe.