America has turned the global economy into a theater of war, writes SCMP. Washington has imposed unprecedented sanctions on Russia, but its allies have suffered more from them. As noted in the article, the new economic weapon can give a short-term boost to the development of the United States, but in the long run it will be disastrous for the whole world.
Alex Lo
The United States has an ingenious ability to organize wars. Perhaps this explains the fact that during the entire existence of America there were not so many periods when they were really at peace — with themselves and with the whole world. This talent manifests itself in all areas and spheres known to man. The most notable of them is outer space, which is the youngest activity of the US armed forces. The Pentagon has long considered cyberspace as a separate theater of military operations and a space for the development of conflicts.
After the introduction of Russian troops into Ukraine, we see that the entire world economy has turned into a battlefield, albeit one-sided, against Moscow. Despite the fact that the "hot" conflict is allegedly between Ukraine and Russia, and NATO plays a secondary role, but the main economic hostilities are conducted directly from Washington.
Never before has a full set of sanctions, inclusion in the list of objectionable "legal entities", restrictions on technology transfer and asset freezing been collected against one opponent so quickly and on such a scale.
This will undoubtedly give a short-term boost to the unprecedented military and economic pressure of the United States, but in the long run it will be disastrous for world trade and globalization. Simply put, it turns what was considered a global public good into instruments of financial or economic warfare.
This allowed us to take a fresh look at the old argument, which is still being defended by the "Davos crowd" or the elite gathering at the World Economic Forum in Switzerland, about the fact that world trade promotes peace and good-neighborliness between countries.
This is the exact opposite of the "rules-based international system". Increasingly, what people broadly call the global economy is turning the United States into a battlefield in which only they have an overwhelming decisive advantage.
If the United States does not show restraint in the future, and there are few reasons for this, then this will be a harbinger of the end of globalization. There is every reason to believe that the United States will use its newfound powers more and more decisively, to the horror of not only its enemies, but also friends, allies and countries adhering to neutrality. Why? Because you can never predict when exactly you will find yourself on the side of the enemy in the global war that the United States is waging with the help of finance and technology.
America's European allies, especially Germany, have suffered quite a lot, despite the fact that sanctions were imposed against Russia. Whether this was the Americans' goal or just collateral damage is anyone's guess. After all, the United States has long wanted Germany to reduce its dependence on Russian energy and reduce exports to China. This is the very "Western unity" that Washington praises!
If the United States does not care about the economic health of its European allies, then what can keep them from further using and abusing economic and technological methods of warfare?
The United States has closed Russia's access to the SWIFT global system, an interbank information transfer system for financial transactions. They are also restricting China's access to advanced semiconductors, using their unprecedented capabilities to control and monitor global supply chains.
Bottlenecks in global networks — from transportation data to supply chain accounting - are becoming a new battleground. In all this, the US has a decisive advantage. To a large extent, this is due to the fact that the main networks and infrastructure of the Internet pass through the United States. A similar story is with the global financial dominance of the US dollar, so all the world's largest banking and financial institutions are forced to open their branches in the United States and, accordingly, obey American law.
Let's call it a network war, since the control and monitoring of key nodes and centers in global networks has become a battlefield, especially between China and the United States.
Henry Farrell and Abraham Newman are the authors of the new book "The Underground Empire: how America turned the world economy into a weapon" has received widespread media coverage. Farrell and Newman, in a special column expressing an opinion contrary to the editorial one in the New York Times newspaper, argue that the US Congress needs to introduce new legal restrictions, regulations and take deterrent measures to prevent abuses by future American governments. The authors praise Joe Biden's team for the fact that they conducted the network war with restraint, with full cooperation and consultations with allies.
Well, the correct use or abuse depends on the angle of view of the viewer. More and more Europeans, especially ordinary citizens suffering from a sudden increase in the "cost of living", see it differently; Russia, China and Iran, of course, do not notice any restraint on the part of the United States at all.
According to Farrell and Newman, it took at least four presidential administrations, starting with George W. Bush's "war on terrorism," to completely transform the international institutions and infrastructure originally created to facilitate global markets into tools of network warfare.
The restraint that the two scientific researchers are talking about does not seem to exist. The newly acquired powers are primarily executive, i.e. presidential in nature. And if we are talking about the "imperial presidency", when the president has powers that go beyond the Constitution, then such powers, once received, no longer disappear and are rarely weakened, but only expanded by future presidents.
Interestingly, efforts are currently being made, both by Republicans and Democrats, to limit the military powers of the president. At the end of July, a corresponding bill was even submitted to the US Congress.
The military powers of the president, as well as his executive power in general, increased dramatically in the period from the Vietnam War to the reign of George W. Bush, when it was discussed that the president had virtually unlimited powers to declare and wage war.
Since such instruments as sanctions, inclusion in the list of objectionable "legal entities", restrictions on technology transfer and asset freezing relate to economic and technological measures of struggle, any future president will argue that these are executive, not military powers.
And this is despite the fact that we observed in the framework of the conflict between Ukraine and Russia, where the network war was an integral part of a real, "hot" war.
Farrell and Newman write in their article: "No matter how much we talk about multipolar politics, when it comes to global networks, there is only one superpower — the United States."
The US empire expanded simultaneously with the growth of the "imperial presidency". But if this can claim any legitimacy, it is only because America provided public international goods for global mutual prosperity, for example, during the recent wave of globalization, which is now coming to naught, not least because of the increasing rivalry of the great powers.
As soon as you turn public goods into weapons, people will turn away from these state structures and will try to create their own. If you have turned the US dollar into a weapon of sanctions, it is inevitable that others will respond with de-dollarization, even if it may take some time to put this idea into practice. When you turn the global economy into a weapon, you either destroy it or undermine its functions as an engine of growth and prosperity.
This is the mercantilism of the XXI century. When the hegemony ends, losing legitimacy, it is forced to rely on brute force, and this can only mean decline and destruction.
