Does Bitcoin weaken the Wests ability to fight enemies of freedom?

[zander1983]

One of the most valid criticisms of Bitcoin is that it reduces the ability of the Unite States to sanction enemies of the West e.g. the billions of dollars in accounts belonging to Russians confiscated last year after the invasion, and the kicking off of Russian banks from the SWIFT network.

Given we are now moving back to the war portion of the war-peace geopolitical cycle, using the dollar and the traditional monetary network to sanction enemies is going to become more important. Does Bitcoin weaken the West's position? It's obvious to most people that the West has a growing number of enemies whose values are antithetical to freedom - mainly Russia, China and Iran. Therefore the problem Im outlining is going to become more into focus.

What's a good argument here, beyond "well the dollar-based sanctions weren't very effective anyway"?

Note:  I dont want to go down the road of whatabouttery and arguments about how the West is no better than Russia/China. It clearly is, and needs defending.

[tbct_mt2]

One of the most valid criticisms of Bitcoin is that it reduces the ability of the Unite States to sanction enemies of the West e.g. the billions of dollars in accounts belonging to Russians confiscated last year after the invasion, and the kicking off of Russian banks from the SWIFT network.

Please don't distort the usability of Bitcoin like this.

Bitcoin serves everyone, every nation want to use it and it was not created to support terrorists or dictators or help any country to exploit sanctions.

If you think of Bitcoin like this, weaken the sanctions against bad countries that break world standard about freedom or any standard, please think of guns and gun powder. They were not created to kill people and to create wars by Nobel but later people use those discoveries in many different ways.

Bitcoin is the same and it can be used for many use cases and has wide usability. It can help many people and it is a biggest helpful usability of Bitcoin. Think of positive contribution from Bitcoin please. For negative effects, we can not control it and initially Bitcoin was not created to serve bad or immoral activities.

[Jet Cash]

The US is the military arm of the WEF, and as such is one of the greatest enemies of freedom. Bitcoin gives us the chance to resist the banking oligarchs, who are seeking to restrict our freedom.

[KingsDen]

One of the most valid criticisms of Bitcoin is that it reduces the ability of the Unite States to sanction enemies of the West e.g. the billions of dollars in accounts belonging to Russians confiscated last year after the invasion, and the kicking off of Russian banks from the SWIFT network.

Bitcoin was created with many things in mind but one of the most famous reasons bitcoin was created is to be an alternative currency used by humanity in purchase of goods and services and also in other transactions. This clearly means that bitcoin is money.
And having an alternative of spending money other than the Fiat money is a good one.
For instance in my local banking, one of the banks was febiting people's account for no reason. And since I had an account in another bank, I simply moved my money to the other bank and stopped using the former bank.

This is the situation with the west as you discussed in the topic. If you are stopped from using one pattern of payment, you have no option than to embrace bitcoin because it is an alternative and the representative of freedom.

[zander1983]

The US is the military arm of the WEF, and as such is one of the greatest enemies of freedom. Bitcoin gives us the chance to resist the banking oligarchs, who are seeking to restrict our freedom.

Prefer to live in Russia, Iran or China would you?

[zander1983]

One of the most valid criticisms of Bitcoin is that it reduces the ability of the Unite States to sanction enemies of the West e.g. the billions of dollars in accounts belonging to Russians confiscated last year after the invasion, and the kicking off of Russian banks from the SWIFT network.

Please don't distort the usability of Bitcoin like this.

Bitcoin serves everyone, every nation want to use it and it was not created to support terrorists or dictators or help any country to exploit sanctions.

If you think of Bitcoin like this, weaken the sanctions against bad countries that break world standard about freedom or any standard, please think of guns and gun powder. They were not created to kill people and to create wars by Nobel but later people use those discoveries in many different ways.

Bitcoin is the same and it can be used for many use cases and has wide usability. It can help many people and it is a biggest helpful usability of Bitcoin. Think of positive contribution from Bitcoin please. For negative effects, we can not control it and initially Bitcoin was not created to serve bad or immoral activities.

Im not being negative, Im a big Bitcoin advocate. The question Im posing is going to become more and more important. I understand your retort, that a money isn't a good way to sanction an enemy country. I agree, but currently it is being used as a tool, though it hasnt been very effective.

[zander1983]

One of the most valid criticisms of Bitcoin is that it reduces the ability of the Unite States to sanction enemies of the West e.g. the billions of dollars in accounts belonging to Russians confiscated last year after the invasion, and the kicking off of Russian banks from the SWIFT network.

Bitcoin was created with many things in mind but one of the most famous reasons bitcoin was created is to be an alternative currency used by humanity in purchase of goods and services and also in other transactions. This clearly means that bitcoin is money.
And having an alternative of spending money other than the Fiat money is a good one.
For instance in my local banking, one of the banks was febiting people's account for no reason. And since I had an account in another bank, I simply moved my money to the other bank and stopped using the former bank.

This is the situation with the west as you discussed in the topic. If you are stopped from using one pattern of payment, you have no option than to embrace bitcoin because it is an alternative and the representative of freedom.

Which is a good thing in oppressive regimes that oppress their own people - the people now have a way our of financial prison - but not so good when that oppressive regime is being targeted by sanctions - they now have a way out of those: Bitcoin. And Im hearing this more as a valid critcism of Bitcoin from people in important think-tanks. My retort is usually "the money based sanctions werent very effective anyway". Which is true but usually not satisfactory.

[mendace]

The criticism that Bitcoin undermines the US ability to sanction the enemies of the West is legitimate, but it must be seen in the context of the larger landscape.

 First, financial sanctions are just one of many foreign policy tools at the disposal of the United States and its allies.  There are many other forms of pressure that can be exerted, such as diplomatic isolation, trade embargo, international cooperation to increase pressure on the enemy, economic warfare, and so on.

[goldkingcoiner]

Sanctions should not be used as weapons, like the US is doing. Sanctions should have a preventative effect not a destructive, coercive one.

We know what weaponized sanctions do. Just like at what happened to Germany before WW2. In fact I would go as far as to say sanctions were the main cause of WW2. Had the Germans not been bled dry and left to their doom, then they may have not followed a maniac who wanted to exact revenge on those exact people and steal what he considered rightfully theirs.

And Bitcoin cannot be used to overcome sanctions that easily. In fact, Fiat is way more useful in money laundering and sanction evading because its not on a public ledger, unlike Bitcoin. Nobody knows where Fiat goes.

[Upgrade00]

Who determines what freedom is, who is an enemy of freedom and who should be allowed to act certain ways?
There's no global police nation with the moral rights to hand out sanctions and restrictions to erring countries.

Bitcoin offers freedom, freedom to the West and every other part of the work, freedom to make your own choices and use as you wish, freedom to spend and transact without restrictions.

[Aanuoluwatofunmi]

One of the most valid criticisms of Bitcoin is that it reduces the ability of the Unite States to sanction enemies of the West e.g. the billions of dollars in accounts belonging to Russians confiscated last year after the invasion, and the kicking off of Russian banks from the SWIFT network.

Russia has not been bypassing 5he sanction made because of Bitcoin except if we are not going to address the e tire situation as it is, Russia never made Bitcoin a legal tender even though most of the citizens engage the use of Bitcoin on their daily activities but the government here still suffers alot due to the impact of the sanction on them.

Given we are now moving back to the war portion of the war-peace geopolitical cycle, using the dollar and the traditional monetary network to sanction enemies is going to become more important

There are many areas of the economy whereby the country on sanction can enjoy nothing than total restrictions because there are materialize economics that needed the role of currency and Bitcoin could have been an alternative but Russia here is possibly building on how it can introduce it's own digital fiat cbdc

Does Bitcoin weaken the West's position?

No, but Russia could have taken that very option with Bitcoin as an advantage, but yet they suffers the international collaborations they had built with other countries as a result of this sanction.

[dkbit98]

One of the most valid criticisms of Bitcoin is that it reduces the ability of the Unite States to sanction enemies of the West

Oh please... give me a break  
There is no East or West, they are all political puppet controlled by small group of people, and we should all be aware of that after things that happened in last few years and decades.
Military industrial complex machinery is running full steam and I only see paid people putting more gasoline on this wild fire.
Bitcoin can be used by anyone without limits, and sanctions are not doing anything btw, they made much more damage to the ''West''.
All this circus reminds me a lot on George Orwell's book (and movies) 1984, with Oceania ''fighting'' Eurasia, and in reality few rich lunatics are in war with majority of regular people.

The US is the military arm of the WEF, and as such is one of the greatest enemies of freedom. Bitcoin gives us the chance to resist the banking oligarchs, who are seeking to restrict our freedom.

I could be wrong, but I think they are still allowing us to play with Bitcoin until they release their stupid CBDC crap.
For some people it will be easier to accept that slave CBDC money, now when they got used to Bitcoin and QR codes.
Again, I hope I am wrong... but let's check back on this post in 5 or 7 yearsm, and see if I was wrong.

[Hydrogen]

Please consider the following.

Millions in Bitcoin pouring into Ukraine from donors

Cryptocurrency analysts say at least $13.7m (£10.2m) has so far been donated to the Ukrainian war effort through anonymous Bitcoin donations.

Researchers at Elliptic, a blockchain analysis company, say the Ukrainian government, NGOs and volunteer groups have raised the money by advertising their Bitcoin wallet addresses online.

More than 4,000 donations have been made so far, with one unknown donor gifting Bitcoin worth $3m to an NGO.

The median donation is $95.

On Saturday afternoon, the official Twitter account of the Ukraine government posted a message: "Stand with the people of Ukraine. Now accepting cryptocurrency donations. Bitcoin, Ethereum and USDT."

It posted addresses for two cryptocurrency wallets which collected $5.4m in Bitcoin, Ether and other coins within eight hours.

https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-60541942

Another interesting case.

Turkish financial watchdog stretched rules to allow crypto donations to help with disaster relief on Feb. 7.

The crypto community donated over $4.5 million in seven days to help Turkey with disaster relief.

Three wallets were created to collect donations on Feb. 7. Total amount donated sits at slightly over $4.5 million at the time of writing.

Donations

Avalanche (AVAX), which Turkish professor Emin Gün Sirer founded, donated $1 million, while Waves (WAVES) founder Sasha.waves donated $50,000 on the first day.

Crypto exchange platforms operating in the region Icrypex, Bitget Turkey, Bitci, MexC Turkey, Bitfinex Turkey, OKX, and Gate.io collectively donated $371,499, which equates to 7 million Turkish Lira.

Turkish and global crypto influencers and many others also contributed thousands of dollars in crypto to help with disaster relief in the region.

Background

After three significant earthquakes struck Turkey, a Turkish singer Haluk Levent persuaded the country’s financial watchdog (MASAK) to allow collecting crypto donations, which is currently illegal in the country.

MASAK allowed three crypto wallets to collect donations for a week. Wallets belong to Levent, who publishes all significant contributions and expenses on his Twitter account.

https://cryptoslate.com/crypto-aids-for-turkey-exceed-4-5m-in-one-week/

There have been many cases like these over the years. Even the UN (united nations) has accepted cryptocurrency for many years to fund projects aimed at helping the poor in africa and abroad.

Could bitcoin's humanitarian and philanthropic trends go unnoticed by the public?

I often wonder how many people across the globe are aware of events such as these.

Bitcoin has a long history to it, even if its measured in little more than a decade.

[pooya87]

Does Bitcoin weaken the Wests ability to fight enemies of freedom?

Yes. Bitcoin weakens and even eliminates West's ability (and other similar anti-freedom regimes) to fight freedom seekers. That is why bitcoin is known as the solution for those who seek financial freedom. Specially when you consider that the most corrupt banking system exists in the West like in United States and also the most privacy invading regimes are in the West (eg. NSA which is a military department of US) who are against anything that is remotely related to freedom.

[Kakmakr]

I do not want to say that Bitcoin is not used to evade sanctions, but there are some evidence that it might be happening, but I think the amount we are talking about is small, compared to what is being told in the media. 

I also see people saying that economic sanctions are useless, but I will take that over full scale war ....any day. It must be seen as one of the preventative tactics to prevent full scale war, so we should not condone the use of Crypto currencies to bypass these sanctions.

[Gyfts]

Well, it's true that Bitcoin would weaken the ability to implement economic sanctions. I don't think it's possible to argue otherwise.

But the argument I would make is that sanctions don't only include economic restrictions. And even with economic restrictions, asset forfeitures and penalties are only part of the sanctions that could be issued. You wouldn't necessarily need decentralized currencies to implement successful sanctions and there are other ways to gut a country's economy even if they were to circumvent such measures through Bitcoin.

For example -- if the U.S. provides military aid to a country, merely withdrawing that aid would be sufficient to compel compliance. And of course, the U.S. has military holdings all over the world which direct influence over other countries.

[zander1983]

Please consider the following.

Millions in Bitcoin pouring into Ukraine from donors

Cryptocurrency analysts say at least $13.7m (£10.2m) has so far been donated to the Ukrainian war effort through anonymous Bitcoin donations.

Researchers at Elliptic, a blockchain analysis company, say the Ukrainian government, NGOs and volunteer groups have raised the money by advertising their Bitcoin wallet addresses online.

More than 4,000 donations have been made so far, with one unknown donor gifting Bitcoin worth $3m to an NGO.

The median donation is $95.

On Saturday afternoon, the official Twitter account of the Ukraine government posted a message: "Stand with the people of Ukraine. Now accepting cryptocurrency donations. Bitcoin, Ethereum and USDT."

It posted addresses for two cryptocurrency wallets which collected $5.4m in Bitcoin, Ether and other coins within eight hours.

https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-60541942

Another interesting case.

Turkish financial watchdog stretched rules to allow crypto donations to help with disaster relief on Feb. 7.

The crypto community donated over $4.5 million in seven days to help Turkey with disaster relief.

Three wallets were created to collect donations on Feb. 7. Total amount donated sits at slightly over $4.5 million at the time of writing.

Donations

Avalanche (AVAX), which Turkish professor Emin Gün Sirer founded, donated $1 million, while Waves (WAVES) founder Sasha.waves donated $50,000 on the first day.

Crypto exchange platforms operating in the region Icrypex, Bitget Turkey, Bitci, MexC Turkey, Bitfinex Turkey, OKX, and Gate.io collectively donated $371,499, which equates to 7 million Turkish Lira.

Turkish and global crypto influencers and many others also contributed thousands of dollars in crypto to help with disaster relief in the region.

Background

After three significant earthquakes struck Turkey, a Turkish singer Haluk Levent persuaded the country’s financial watchdog (MASAK) to allow collecting crypto donations, which is currently illegal in the country.

MASAK allowed three crypto wallets to collect donations for a week. Wallets belong to Levent, who publishes all significant contributions and expenses on his Twitter account.

https://cryptoslate.com/crypto-aids-for-turkey-exceed-4-5m-in-one-week/

There have been many cases like these over the years. Even the UN (united nations) has accepted cryptocurrency for many years to fund projects aimed at helping the poor in africa and abroad.

Could bitcoin's humanitarian and philanthropic trends go unnoticed by the public?

I often wonder how many people across the globe are aware of events such as these.

Bitcoin has a long history to it, even if its measured in little more than a decade.

This is a good point and a good retort to the question I posed.

[zander1983]

Well, it's true that Bitcoin would weaken the ability to implement economic sanctions. I don't think it's possible to argue otherwise.

But the argument I would make is that sanctions don't only include economic restrictions. And even with economic restrictions, asset forfeitures and penalties are only part of the sanctions that could be issued. You wouldn't necessarily need decentralized currencies to implement successful sanctions and there are other ways to gut a country's economy even if they were to circumvent such measures through Bitcoin.

For example -- if the U.S. provides military aid to a country, merely withdrawing that aid would be sufficient to compel compliance. And of course, the U.S. has military holdings all over the world which direct influence over other countries.

Agreed. Sanctions that target commodities - stuff the target of the sanctions needs to make stuff - are a more effective form of sanction than targeting currency.

[franky1]

funny part is
russias reaction to sanctions is a 2.5% GDP loss
compared to their 2020 level is still above 0% of a 3 year average)

yet 2020-21-22 has seen them same sanctions affect "the wests" economics by more then 2.5% negatively

yep the inflation due to russian sanctions has made all peoples "value" shrink by 13%+

..
the sanction were supposed to make russian citizens lives worse for them to revolt and want a new president

the results though is the wests economics got hit harder making people want different leaders around the world
..

the funny parts are whilst the west are saying "hate the middle east, hate russia, hate china" we are now seeing how reliant the west is/was on the east. due to all the effects the east has had on the west

[Raflesia]

I think in this case the intention is definitely not that because indeed with the current state of affairs to say bitcoin is like that would obviously make them seem like an absolute crime.
Bitcoin exists and was created for everyone (who wants it) and its purpose is also definitely not to support terrorists or create a scam farm because these can be accusations that are actually groundless and very easy to debunk so indeed I think it's enough not to corner bitcoin as if this is get bad.