U.S. Contemplating Isolating Russia from SWIFT Banking System

[titular]

If you keep up with world news, you know there are some serious tensions between Russia and Ukraine.

Russia has shown several acts of aggression towards the people of Ukraine. Most notably the cyberattacks on Ukraine's power grid. Many think this was just a "practice run" aimed at perfecting these kinds of attacks for when they want to do some real damage.

In response to Russia's more recent actions, the United States proposed cutting Russia off from the SWIFT banking system should they mount any type of invasion on Ukraine. This would be detrimental to Russian businesses and consumers alike.

Assuming Russia has no intentions of invading Ukraine, there isn't really much to talk about. But what happens if they do?

Would it be political suicide? Would they develop their own banking/payment system? Would they look to an open-source monetary network?

I can't see Russia putting itself in a position to collapse its own economy. However, I also can't see Russia not harassing Ukraine.

Would our decentralized ledger be able to aid Russia in the event they are unable to use SWIFT?

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[jackg]

Apparently Russia is a net exporter of agricultural food (from a few random Internet sources, not sure on how accurate they are).

At minimum a country's population needs: food, water, shelter, education and human relationships - Russia should be able to provide all of these for itself and manage quite well at it.

Also Russia is one of the largest producers of oil in the world, why wouldn't they use something backed by oil as a currency internationally (or something that can stably be made with oil that doesn't have as large a price fluctuation).

I think Russia, like China, went imperialist though recently which might be something that could cause issues for a lot of other countries - imperialism may be more efficient than capitalism and socialism under certain circumstances.

[paxmao]

This forms part of the pack of threats currently being considered by US and NATO due to the massive concentration of troops on the Ukraine border as you say. The geopolitical problem here is complex. Rusia is quite used to consider Ukraine as a possession and a critical one if you consider food supply. Europe is as usual trying to increase its influence on this country as a measure to contain Rusia and prefereably keep it away from sensible European borders.

The problem is that Rusia may just be too big for these type of sanctions - they only work well on small economies... or perhaps never work well.

[Ozero]

The main reason not for tension, but for the hybrid war between Ukraine and Russia, is that Ukraine has chosen a course of joining the European Union and NATO. The Putin regime regarded this as a threat to its borders from the expanding NATO, and in 2014, using the fact that at that time there were many supporters of Russia and spies of its special services on the territory of Ukraine and in the higher structures of power, it occupied the Ukrainian peninsula of Crimea and part of western territories of Donbass. A significant role in Russia's success was played by the fact that in 2014 Ukraine did not actually have its own army, and the Ukrainians were psychologically not ready to shoot their Russian brothers.

By this year, the situation has changed a lot and Ukraine has become stronger. Seeing that they were failing to intimidate Ukraine, the Putin regime, which by that time had killed about 15,000 Ukrainians on their own territory, began to blackmail Europe and the whole world with a war, so that they themselves could influence the position of Ukraine with its foreign policy.
Now the situation has escalated to the limit and threatens to turn into open war. Therefore, the United States is considering the possibility of disconnecting Russia from the SWIFT global banking system, among other economic sanctions. Russia, foresaw this, and previously took certain steps for an alternative to this international system. However, such a shutdown will all the same give serious economic damage to the Russian economy.

[cabron]

Cutting Swift for Russia was done a long time ago that's why they do have their own. Russia isn't afraid of that anymore. No sanctions can make them back out from US.

Apparently, you got the news from a media that simply is producing news in favor of Ukraine and US. You got it all wrong. There is no invasion there nor hacking, the US just needs a bogeyman to start a war for their failing Empire which thier money comes from wars that always fail. If it isn't the weak Biden that is their president today, things like this wouldn't be happening, US should replace that guy. Otherwise, they will continue to fail even when they lure Ukraine to join NATO that isn't allowed in the treaty they have signed.

[Rruchi man]

Since Ukraine is a break out from Russia and after being so long under their control and influence for a while, Russia must feel threatened by this further move to become more independent and free from their influence by seeking an inclusion and alliance with the strongest military alliance in the world - NATO. An alliance by Ukraine with NATO, will mean that an external military under strong influence of the United States has edged closer to Moscow, this is a big threat to Russia. if you have been following up on the news, you will hear that in the past days, Russia has significantly increased the number of troops on the border of Ukraine, am indication of maybe an invasion, the planned isolation of Russia from the SWIFT banking system may just be a tool to keep Russia in check until the tension and issues can be properly discussed. Putin now wants NATO not to expand its operations to Ukraine .

[DrBeer]

As a resident of Ukraine, I will explain the situation. The start of this process began in 2014, when mass demonstrations began in Ukraine against the rotten power of President V. Yanukovych. Reason: in 2013-2014, the key goals of the country for the nearest period were agreed and spelled out, namely the European vector, integration into the economic and political processes of Europe and Western ideas and values. The key idea was to avoid any binding and imposed alliances with Russia. For some reason, Russia believes that all neighboring countries are OBLIGED to enter into an alliance with it, to become a supplier of cheap resources and a buyer of its low-quality products. Alliances with the Russian Federation have never been mutually beneficial. Well, many decades of occupation, and the mass destruction of Ukrainian citizens by Russia / USSR also influenced the choice of Ukrainians. But without the resources and potential of Ukraine, Russia is very uncomfortable. And the worst thing for Russia is an example of the fact that a country from its inner circle can show an example of how you can drive out a president a thief and a criminal, and start free changes to improve life! By the way - at the moment, despite the fact that both direct hostilities from Russia and terrorist actions are taking place against Ukraine, the level of the Ukrainian economy is growing, and in 2021, the minimum income level exceeded the same level in Russia, the richest country world
And the tales about Putin worrying about the security of Russia are a bluff for his sheep At the same time, he himself constantly, and all propaganda channels, tell how powerless NATO is, backward, lazy and cowardly, and a huge number of super-weapons have been invented in Russia, which will destroy in seconds any enemy, his missiles, tanks, ships, aircraft. You cannot imagine how much money Russia is investing in propaganda channels that carry these crazy tales to the masses!
Well, to the main topic - if Russia manages to capture Ukraine, although we will definitely resist this, Russia will not stop there. They openly declare that they want to create a new empire, and forcibly annex ALL the territories that were in the USSR - that is, ... return back to Ukraine, Moldova, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, punish Poland for its desire to live well, establish its own rules for Europe, monopolize the gas market in the EU. Do not be lazy - listen / read state official propaganda channels such as RT, ORT and the like, you will hear a lot of interesting things both about yourself and about the whole world, where "kind and decent Russia" is, and the rest of the world is angry with her
Therefore, sanctions, including disconnection from SWIFT, are a deterrent mechanism to prevent the spread of RASHISM (Russian fascism) around the world.

[cabron]

~

What you are saying is that Putin is lying in the media channels saying Russia doesn't want war.  Like this video?

If Ukraine will allow the US to set up a military base in Ukraine near the borders of Russia which is likely possible, this will lead to a real war. It's your country that will be ruined with such kind of action. It has to stop to avoid conflict otherwise another country will fail. The US will be there for war not building a nation just as how Biden said in Afghanistan.

[lovesmayfamilis]

You're right. President Putin has been declaring everywhere that he does NOT want war. But Ukraine stubbornly proves to everyone that Russia regularly attacks it. Russia does not know that it is at war with Ukraine. It seems that Ukraine, which has depended on Russia all its life, wanted to change its owner, but it is very funny to observe that other owners do not need it, but only to become a bargaining chip for unleashing war and new sanctions
The topic is shifting to the policy section

[fillippone]

Cutting Swift for Russia was done a long time ago that's why they do have their own.

Which system are you talking about? I genuinely ignore that one.
The real problem is that they might have an alternative, proprietary system alternative to SWIFT, but those systems are useful if and only if they are globally well connected between every banking system participant. If the alternative system is used only by Russian Banks, then it will be pretty useless!

[Mauser]

I can't see Russia putting itself in a position to collapse its own economy. However, I also can't see Russia not harassing Ukraine.

Would our decentralized ledger be able to aid Russia in the event they are unable to use SWIFT?

I agree with you that Russia is not going to back down with their pressure towards Ukraine. It all comes down that Putin wants to prevent Ukraine from joining NATO. If Ukraine is going to join than the conflict could escalate quickly. All the sanctions from the West don't seem to have much effect on Russia. The economy is important for Putin, but with rising energy prices Russia should profit from it.
Removing Russia from the SWIFT system is a bad idea in my opinion. We should try and find ways to settle for a compromise instead of escalating it more. Crypto currencies and decentralised ledgers could help Russia to get around all these problems. Isolating Russia more is not a good thing, it will just drive them closer to China.

[Fortify]

If you keep up with world news, you know there are some serious tensions between Russia and Ukraine.

Russia has shown several acts of aggression towards the people of Ukraine. Most notably the cyberattacks on Ukraine's power grid. Many think this was just a "practice run" aimed at perfecting these kinds of attacks for when they want to do some real damage.

In response to Russia's more recent actions, the United States proposed cutting Russia off from the SWIFT banking system should they mount any type of invasion on Ukraine. This would be detrimental to Russian businesses and consumers alike.

Assuming Russia has no intentions of invading Ukraine, there isn't really much to talk about. But what happens if they do?

Would it be political suicide? Would they develop their own banking/payment system? Would they look to an open-source monetary network?

I can't see Russia putting itself in a position to collapse its own economy. However, I also can't see Russia not harassing Ukraine.

Would our decentralized ledger be able to aid Russia in the event they are unable to use SWIFT?

It seems like Putin is on the war path and this might be the only thing that could disrupt his plans short term. He has given an unacceptable list of demands which is, as usual, trying to impose Russia's will on independent countries that are free to decide their own future. Maybe if the Russian leadership were not constantly trying to bully everyone and the whole country was not mired in corruption of the political elite then it might have a more rounded economy. Every step he takes is for his own selfish gains and the average Russian loses out as it becomes more disconnected from the world. Let's hope the threat of financial isolation is enough to stop this warmonger of a leader, because the Russians and Ukrainians could easily be friends by choice without such aggression. Putin and Xi Jinping are truly leading the world into WW3, when will people ever learn. Bitcoin is really insignificant as a payment model for a country of that size and if that became a workaround it would be banned by EU/USA in response - thereby wiping out huge amounts of money stored in it, so be careful what you wish for.

[stompix]

At minimum a country's population needs: food, water, shelter, education and human relationships - Russia should be able to provide all of these for itself and manage quite well at it.

Yeah, in theory, in practice....it has failed to do so two times already in the past half-century.
Russia might export more food than it imports but the is in the process of managing on doing so, because you see, when you exports 8 billion of what but you import 4 billion of tractors and agricultural machinery you have a serious problem longterm.
You can check their imports, everything that is needed to run a country at a basic level is imported, from computer parts to machinery, medicine even paper, they export tons of raw iron and aluminum and import the finished goods.

Basically, all the cars in Russia are made by foreigners, even Lada is owned now by Renault, look for example at their new civilian plane:

Key suppliers were selected in October 2003, including Thales for avionics, Messier-Bugatti-Dowty for landing gear, Honeywell for the auxiliary power unit, Liebherr for flight controls, Intertechnique for fuel systems, Parker Hannifin for hydraulic systems, B/E Aerospace for interiors.[8]

If you want to run a country on bread and water, yes you can, but don't wonder in a decade or two if it's nothing left there.

Cutting Swift for Russia was done a long time ago that's why they do have their own. Russia isn't afraid of that anymore.

Russia was never cut from SWIFT, do your research before posting stuff like this.
And developing your own system means *** if the others won't want to use it.
It's like threatening AT&T that a new ISP based in Norilsk would take all their customers.

If Ukraine will allow the US to set up a military base in Ukraine near the borders of Russia which is likely possible, this will lead to a real war. It's your country that will be ruined with such kind of action.

So what, Ukraine shouldn't be allowed to join whatever organization it wants because Russia is not agreeing on it? I love it when it comes to politics everyone forgets where they are, on bitcointalk and why they are here, and start about dictating to others what to do!
I just love this stuff, so a country next to Russia should not be allowed to arm itself or join an organization because .....reasons!

[kryptqnick]

I've just looked through poll results in Ukraine, and almost half a population (it's a representative sociological poll) believes that the Russian military threat is very real.
I'd also say that the most notable acts of aggression of Russia are probably taking Crimea and supporting the military intervention in the Eastern part of the country, rather than cyberattacks, but ok.
Restricting SWIFT is probably the best economic sanction there can be because Russia depends quite heavily on it, and this will not play well with many influential people as well as the Russian middle-class people, so to speak. If they do invade, I think they'll try to move to an alternative system, and since Russia's big on some products for export, other countries will probably play along and adopt that system for deals with Russia specifically. Also, isn't SWIFT only for international transfers, so all payments inside the country won't be affected? So, while it's big in terms of sanctions, it's probably not devastating for Russia.
As for the war threat, I really hope it wears off or, if it doesn't, that the West won't make the same mistake they made with Hitler, assuming he'd just stop after annexing this or that territory.

[Lucius]

I see this whole situation as a war between the West and the East in which on the one hand we have the US + UK and all their vassals, and on the other hand the eternal enemies of the West led by Russia, China, Iran and some smaller countries that favor them. However, I do not believe that there can be a real war between these alliances, because the balance of power is such that no one could expect victory - and the costs of such a war would be huge, at a time when the world is suffering from the economic consequences of a pandemic.

In the end, it all comes down to how much money you will invest, and what you can get out of it all - for the US and more than certainly, war is not an option, because as Putin said at his big press conference a few days ago, it is impossible to defeat Russia by military means, but only by some kind of internal political war.

Ukraine has unfortunately found itself between the interests of the West and the East, and Putin has been more than clear that he will not allow NATO expansion to the east - while the West has made it clear that it will not act militarily in the event of an attack. The point is more than clear, Russia can conquer all of Ukraine and most of Europe before Western gentlemen agree on whether NATO should act or not. Like it or not, the EU relies heavily on US help, and the question is whether Americans will die again, as was the case in WW2.

Economic sanctions are something that Russia can live with, especially with the help of China and Iran and some other countries. This is not their first or last time in such a situation.

[el kaka22]

I would say that this would create another economical warfare between the two. We also saw USA dealing with Saudi Arabia before getting the price of oil to drop a lot, and I mean A LOT and used it as a weapon against Russia which is known to make a lot of money from oil, gas and many other energy stuff. So all in all I have to say that there is a good case to be made to show that USA is once again trying to lower the power of Russia.

I have to say USA shouldn't worry about Russia anymore, they are still a big nation but they are not enemies of USA all that much if you ask me. I would assume that China is a lot bigger in that sense, we are talking about china becoming world's biggest country, something regarding them would be a lot better for the future of USA.

[Sithara007]

Russia is the second top largest exporter of crude oil and the top exporter of natural gas. Given this, I think isolating Russia will do more harm to the SWIF system compared to Russia itself. Russian exports of natural gas and oil are mostly directed towards Europe (with an increasing share flowing nowadays to East Asia). The European countries are dependent on Russia for natural gas and petroleum (their own fields are in perpetual decline). If the SWIFT payment system doesn't work, then Russian exports will be directed to Asia and Europeans will be forced to cut down on their consumption of these commodities (Qatar, US.etc doesn't have enough capacity to replace a large portion of the Russian exports).

[DrBeer]

~

What you are saying is that Putin is lying in the media channels saying Russia doesn't want war.  Like this video?

If Ukraine will allow the US to set up a military base in Ukraine near the borders of Russia which is likely possible, this will lead to a real war. It's your country that will be ruined with such kind of action. It has to stop to avoid conflict otherwise another country will fail. The US will be there for war not building a nation just as how Biden said in Afghanistan.

Well, let's go back to reality and look at this problem in chronological order? In 2014, Ukrainians only wanted to choose a pro-European vector of development. No NATO, no missiles, nothing. But Russia just took the annexed Crimea and partly captured the Donetsk and Lugansk regions. What rockets? What is the threat?
The only threat to Russia is if, next to one of the republics from the former USSR, it suddenly starts to live well and with high quality !!! This will be the end of Russia itself, since the population of this so-called "great country" has lived all their lives as residents of a third world country. And if they suddenly realize that even a country like Ukraine, which does not have "the natural resources of the whole world" like Russia, can prosper, it will simply destroy this power of thieves and criminals. No, Putin is not afraid of missiles, not of missiles ...

You're right. President Putin has been declaring everywhere that he does NOT want war. But Ukraine stubbornly proves to everyone that Russia regularly attacks it. Russia does not know that it is at war with Ukraine. It seems that Ukraine, which has depended on Russia all its life, wanted to change its owner, but it is very funny to observe that other owners do not need it, but only to become a bargaining chip for unleashing war and new sanctions
The topic is shifting to the policy section

A great example of a victim of Russian propaganda )))
The person KNOWS that Russia with the ARMED forces occupied and annexed the Crimea at the Krajina. KNOWS that in the east of Ukraine there are several thousand regular military men who lead local separatists and terrorists. Photo, video, testimony of captured regular army soldiers. But in his "reality" - no, there is no war, moreover, Ukraine is going to attack Russia!

Regarding the fairy tale about "Ukraine's dependence on Russia" - I will answer very simply - after the economic relations were curtailed. Russia, on which Ukraine allegedly depends, has suffered greatly from the fact that ... it depends on Ukraine, Ukrainian technologies Gas turbine engines for new warships - guess who supplied them to Russia? The aviation industry - "great Russia" suddenly lost the ability to serve the fleet of aircraft of the "AN" brand. Can you tell me why? Do you know why Russia, in times of crisis, has to burn excess gas on a global scale? And because Russia does not have the necessary volumes for storing gas, all the largest storage facilities are Ukrainian, and they were used and is being used by "the great Russia on which Ukraine depends" I can continue to give other examples that refute this lie, but it will take a very long time. But, a victim of propaganda, he will not be able to give an example so that some industries that allegedly "depended" on Russia collapse in Ukraine!

[Ozero]

Cutting Swift for Russia was done a long time ago that's why they do have their own. Russia isn't afraid of that anymore. No sanctions can make them back out from US.

Apparently, you got the news from a media that simply is producing news in favor of Ukraine and US. You got it all wrong. There is no invasion there nor hacking, the US just needs a bogeyman to start a war for their failing Empire which thier money comes from wars that always fail. If it isn't the weak Biden that is their president today, things like this wouldn't be happening, US should replace that guy. Otherwise, they will continue to fail even when they lure Ukraine to join NATO that isn't allowed in the treaty they have signed.

Neither Ukraine nor the United States have ever signed any agreements on Ukraine's commitment not to join NATO or not to accept Ukraine into NATO. But Russia signed the Budapesh Treaty with Ukraine's voluntary renunciation of its nuclear weapons and pledged to respect Ukraine's borders and sovereignty. And just a few years later, it perfidiously violated this treaty by introducing its troops into the territory of Ukraine, including using the fact that Ukraine, brotherly, allowed the Russian armed forces to rent bays on the territory of Ukraine in the Sevastopol region for anchorage of warships and nearby training grounds from all over the necessary infrastructure for this. Therefore, in order to capture the Crimean peninsula, the Russian military had enough to withdraw its troops and equipment previously concentrated there from these leased territories. For this, it was not even necessary to cross the border of Ukraine. Russia used the hospitality and good neighborly relations with Ukraine to suddenly attack it.
Therefore, the introduction of economic sanctions against Russia, including its disconnection from the international SWIFT system, is necessary and advisable, despite the false statements of the Putin regime that no sanctions will harm it.

[fullhdpixel]

Removing Russia from the SWIFT system is a bad idea in my opinion. We should try and find ways to settle for a compromise instead of escalating it more. Crypto currencies and decentralised ledgers could help Russia to get around all these problems. Isolating Russia more is not a good thing, it will just drive them closer to China.

This is where crypto shows how great it can be. USA has the power to take out Russia from a whole banking system, I don't know if they will do it or not but it just shows you that how centralized power causes a lot of issues. With crypto there is no USA that can stop you, if you want to send money from one wallet to another wallet you are free to do that.

So instead of using SWIFT and give people some regulations, if USA bans Russia then Russians could simply send crypto to people in USA which people in USA could deposit into Coinbase and withdraw to their bank account anyway. It could be a bit more expensive or not, depending on the amount, but it would certainly be a lot more freely done so without government getting in your business.