Russian President Vladimir Putin has taken to gloating about Russia’s resistance to international sanctions and its supposed economic resilience, despite the best efforts of the United States and its G7 partners to choke off Moscow’s oil revenues and starve it of military technology.
Scoffing at Europe’s economies, Putin said at a recent event: “We have growth, and they have decline… They all have problems through the roof, not even comparable to our problems.”
It’s true that, as the second anniversary of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine approaches, the Russian state is earning billions from oil and diamond exports, its military factories are working flat out, and many Russian banks can still access the international financial system.
Russia has adapted to the wide range of sanctions imposed by Western nations. Far from buckling under their weight, the Russian economy is in fact 1% larger than it was on the eve of the invasion.
But the longer-term outlook is far less rosy. War is distorting the economy and sucking resources into military production at an unsustainable pace.
Things slowed down to a crawl. It’s all in trenches now and both sides had time to dig in. I don’t think anything but a miraculous fuck up can bring mayor change to the frontline. That’s more about logistics and economies surviving the growing toll of warfare. And both countries has felt an impact of that back home. By now it’s more of a question if european\american life-support to Ukraine can overdo what Russia can buy from Iran-China-NK for it’s resources under the market price.
Good news for you, probably, is that masking the changes in ruble zone becomes increasingly costy. With a third of a budget dedicated to military spendings while prices grow in spikes, Russia won’t crumble the next day, but have all it’s other systems losing maintenance, what the pandemic of blowing up heating pipes shows this winter like nothing else. It’s all a loan, and the longer they take it, the more they owe. The frontline is on the streets, and the current goal of the ‘SVO’ is to keep them calm while more services become defunct.
Today, I’ve heard a granny in a bus (that I helped to find a route to the building needed) started a tirade about how the fuck anyone wants to vote Vova in again. Probably talked on herself for a couple of decades of prison sentences, but she’s not the one to care at this age anyway. With her being a part of his most loyal fans, although it’s just an anecdote, I felt a kind of joy, I imagined myself like the ice is finally melting. After two years wishing for peace on the New Year’s Eve, I hope the tectonic change is just around the corner, even if it means I myself would suffer. I can manage missing meat, if it means the meatgrinder would reach at least ceasefire.