Russia hits West with food import ban in sanctions row

[Napkiraly]

Meh, lower prices for me.

And if the Russians try upping their agricultural industry, I'm sure there are some pests and chemicals we can dump to put a dent in that.

So this is the soundtrack of World War Three. I was expecting this, but whatever.

Why not both?

Meh, lower prices for me.

And if the Russians try upping their agricultural industry, I'm sure there are some pests and chemicals we can dump to put a dent in that.

Don't you think that Russians will respond in kind?

They can try.

[Shofercia]

So this is the soundtrack of World War Three. I was expecting this, but whatever.

Why not both?

Don't you think that Russians will respond in kind?

They can try.

Not sure if serious...

[Washington Resistance Army]

Why not both? They can try.

Not sure if serious...

Murica's anti bug network will shoot down any attempted Russian retaliation, dontcha know?

[Shofercia]

Not sure if serious...

Murica's anti bug network will shoot down any attempted Russian retaliation, dontcha know?

That reminds me of the Daily Show making fun of Ukraine's Nap-Based Defense System.

[Washington Resistance Army]

Murica's anti bug network will shoot down any attempted Russian retaliation, dontcha know?

That reminds me of the Daily Show making fun of Ukraine's Nap-Based Defense System.

Truly the West and it's new lapdog in Ukraine have developed defense networks of impeccable design. So has anything new happened with this or should I hop over to the Ukraine thread?

[Napkiraly]

Why not both? They can try.

Not sure if serious...

Que?

[The Alma Mater]

Now they want to starve?

That's a bit over the top, Russia has only banned food from nations that critised it, not the whole world, besides, methinks Russian food production is probably adequate, however, there are some things that will either become scarce (and thus more expensive) or vanish from the markets.

Yep, like animal food. Moscows zoo is already pleading to be exempt from the ban, before the animals die.

[-Carthage-]

Does this mean that Russia won't sell us any more corn bread? Because that would be bogus dudes.

[Central Slavia]

Now they want to starve?

You are wrong on one count.
This will bring prices *down* due to market oversaturation since a whole fuckton of stuff won't be able to go out of the EU and will have to be sold locally.

Slovakia's agriculture is gonna be fucked... but hey, Carnogursky and the EU screwed us up completely already on this front, so I care less than I ordinarily would.
Go Putin!

True. Besides, I doubt these will last longer than 3 months. I think in 3 months' time the EU will magically discover some atrocities committed by the Poroshenko Administration, and change their direction for several reasons. First, the sanctions hurt the EU much more than the US. Second, there's nothing stopping the US and Russia from dumping Rump Ukraine on the EU; the US already did that with Kosovo during the Clinton Administration, see EULEX, the shining symbol of incompetence. Third, in addition to all of those sanctions, the EU could end up in a trade war with Russia, while implementing austerity, and something tells me that EU voters aren't going to be thrilled about a drop in their living standard to support Ukrainian Oligarch Faction A over Ukrainian Oligarch Faction B. Fourth, the EU will end up being perceived as America's bitches if they keep this up in places like the SCOO (SCO + Observers,) ASEAN, Latin America and some places in Africa. That's not going to be good for the EU's future development. Fifth, nah, I'll mention this one a bit later. Don't want to give everything away

Hah! I kinda love how US modus operandi is pulling hot chestnuts from the fire with EU's hand.

[Central Slavia]

Meh, lower prices for me.

And if the Russians try upping their agricultural industry, I'm sure there are some pests and chemicals we can dump to put a dent in that.

Good luck going through the russian air defense perimeter.

[Napkiraly]

Meh, lower prices for me.

And if the Russians try upping their agricultural industry, I'm sure there are some pests and chemicals we can dump to put a dent in that.

Good luck going through the russian air defense perimeter.

Large border. Not enough border guards. Trucks, cars, boats. Don't gotta go by air. Maybe the Chechens could also help out...

[Central Slavia]

Good luck going through the russian air defense perimeter.

Large border. Not enough border guards. Trucks, cars, boats. Don't gotta go by air. Maybe the Chechens could also help out...

Sure, and fuck themselves up.
Plus, well. as Shof said this can go in both directions, and I have great trust in Russian bioweaponry stores.

[Napkiraly]

Large border. Not enough border guards. Trucks, cars, boats. Don't gotta go by air. Maybe the Chechens could also help out...

Sure, and fuck themselves up.
Plus, well. as Shof said this can go in both directions, and I have great trust in Russian bioweaponry stores.

I don't really see how they'll fuck themselves up by driving some trucks full of...mutant locusts or something.

Yeah but we have all the insecticides now.

[Central Slavia]

Sure, and fuck themselves up.
Plus, well. as Shof said this can go in both directions, and I have great trust in Russian bioweaponry stores.

I don't really see how they'll fuck themselves up by driving some trucks full of...mutant locusts or something.

Yeah but we have all the insecticides now.

I dunno, like, relying on russian food if it cuts imports?
Causing famine in your own country ranks among darwin award ideas unless you're very rich.

[Gravlen]

Norway has decided to join sanctions the European Union imposed on Russia, the Foreign Ministry said in a statement late Monday. The response comes after Russia banned food imports from Norway along with food imports from the EU.

[Napkiraly]

I don't really see how they'll fuck themselves up by driving some trucks full of...mutant locusts or something.

Yeah but we have all the insecticides now.

I dunno, like, relying on russian food if it cuts imports?
Causing famine in your own country ranks among darwin award ideas unless you're very rich.

I'm talking about the Chechen separatists and/or mafia but okay.

[Dumb Ideologies]

Norway has decided to join sanctions the European Union imposed on Russia, the Foreign Ministry said in a statement late Monday. The response comes after Russia banned food imports from Norway along with food imports from the EU.

The Black Metal Special Forces are being sent in for special ops against Orthodox churches.

[Napkiraly]

Norway has decided to join sanctions the European Union imposed on Russia, the Foreign Ministry said in a statement late Monday. The response comes after Russia banned food imports from Norway along with food imports from the EU.

The Black Metal Special Forces are being sent in for special ops against Orthodox churches.

Colonel Lugdush shall lead the assault.

[Immoren]

Apparently this should have beneficial effect to Finns in way, that now that Finnish companies can't export food to Russia, they have to sell it cheap in home market.

Brb. Smuggling Finnish dairy products to Russia.

[Tahar Joblis]

It's typical for a Ukrainian nationalist to talk about socioeconomic inequality within Russia

That's nice. I'm not a Ukrainian nationalist. I'm an American socialist who thinks nationalism is silly.

But don't let that get in the way of your rant.

they're suddenly showing such great care for the Russian lower and middle classes.

Let me underline, again, the basic point: When food prices rise, it increases socioeconomic inequality. It was true in 18th century France, 1st century Rome... 21st century Russia is not exempt.

Which in turn means it is spectacularly ironic for you to point to a rising middle class and rising food prices at the same time. The latter tends to impede the former.

Of course they could ask their government to stop bombing stuff around the Russian border, since it's usually the poor in Russia who get hurt,

Do you know how many Russians in Russia have been killed?

As far as all news reports are concerned, one. One Russian civilian has been killed by artillery. Which may not have even been fired by Ukrainians.

but then the care suddenly vanishes. Thing is, the Russians know this is coming. We're ready for it. It's better to take a hit now, and tell the EU to fuck off with their sectoral sanctions, then to just keep on taking sanction after sanction after sanction.

See, it's attitudes like that which make me think that Putin isn't actually making a wrong political move - in terms of his domestic position. By "fighting back," he's scoring points, even if his method of fighting back is reminiscent of the Soviets' triumphant action against the Nazis in the summer of 1941.

Why, nearly one German tank was destroyed for every ten Soviet tanks destroyed!

Of course, the USSR had enormous reserves of manpower and supply to draw upon. Here, Putin is strutting about positioning himself to take 10:1 economic casualties while he has an economy less than a tenth the size of the people he's waging economic war with. But trade warfare doesn't work the same as military warfare - Putin can win politically (in terms of domestic policy) while losing horribly economically. Case in point: The Kim dynasty still has a solid grip on North Korea.

One of the sanctioned banks happens to do quite a bit of development, so sanctioning that hurts the middle class, and our patience is nil. And if the agricultural sector can benefit - all the better! As for this increasing inequality - and? I'd take Putin's inequality over Yeltsin's, Gorbachev's, Brezhen's, Khrushchev's, Stalin's, Lenin's, Csar Nicolas', Csar Alexander's economics any day of the week. The economic conditions under Putin are above expectations for the Russians. Half of his current approval rating, if not more, comes from his management of the economy. We knew it wasn't going to keep on growing and growing and growing without a dip here and there. The Russians are ready. Kiev isn't. Is the EU? We'll find out in three months.

Most of his approval rating comes from the Russian economy having stayed largely healthy during his regime... and making sure that all of Russia's nouveau riche either support him or become ex-riche.

Obama has chosen to wage economic warfare against Putin. It's a very direct strike against Putin's power base.

I'll take mercantilism over whatever snake oil Poproshenko's selling, although I don't see Putin going to Africa and establishing overseas colonies. Thing is, the EU imposed sectoral sanctions. Sure, the EU can pretend otherwise, and call these sanctions the "shiny, happy, sanctions of joy", but the effect is sectoral. Russia's response is also sectoral. Furthermore, I was specifically talking about the agricultural sector.

Which represents a small (and not particularly healthy) sector of the Russian economy.

Is the commercial farmer really that much better?

More efficient and productive? Yes.

"Better"? Well, there's a movement in the US afoot to essentially move back to the yeoman farmer, on the grounds that local organic produce is the way to go. But it is more expensive.

I'm not talking about the yeoman farmer tilling the soil with the cotton gin. I'm talking about a yeoman farmer with modern technology and a small workforce. Most economic sectors work best when you have big companies, medium companies and small companies, all competing with one another. If all you have are a fuckton of "Farmer Johns Incorporated," that's not going to be good for the farming sector, because that will raise the barrier to entry to farmers with more innovative techniques. You need balance, not mass commercialization of everything in sight. In California, we're trying to figure out how to preserve the middle farming class, because if all you have are massive commercialized farms, what's the stop them from forming an oligopoly? It happened in the US with a certain sector, and said sector's lobbying for the Iraq War tipped the scales in favor of disaster.

Putin is not in the habit of promoting market competition. He's in the habit of squelching anything that looks like it might be funding political opposition, and providing unfair breaks to his supporters.

Basic fact remains: Saying that you're going to implement the Stolypin reforms to advance the agricultural sector is essentially nonsensical at this point. There's no reason to even try to pretend what you're doing is the same, because neither the starting point nor the ending point are remotely similar.

Furthermore, when I refer to reforms, such as Stolypin's, I'm talking about those reforms being implemented with modern technology. When I say "direct democracy", exit polling through the internet is a given. When I talk about mobility and modern tactics, I'm referring to ifvs and tanks, not elephants and flaming pigs. Thus, when I talk about Stolypin's reforms, I'm not talking about some yeoman out there with the cotton gin; I'm talking about a modern small farm, which has its own small workforce, and operates like a small business.

France - 3 percent. Qatar - 1 percent.

In general. France exports food; Qatar imports food. Let's not be too silly, shall we?

Could Russia stand to benefit by modernizing its agriculture? Yes. Is this going to create a new politically stabilizing class? No, because Russia isn't backwards enough for the farming class to make up a major share of the population.

Oh wow, I guess the French better fear that Qatari farming workforce, they're three times as efficient according to the standard that you just made up. Gaza's is 12 percent, which is substantially less than Ukraine's 17 percent. Then again, maybe Poroshenko's goal is to "catch up" to the Gazan standard. Latvia's 8 percent, Kosovo's 5 percent; is Kosovo that much more awesome than Latvia? I can do this all day, but here's the thing: as long as it's not subsistence farming, the percent of people being employed by the farming industry doesn't matter that much. The goal isn't to be super awesome and employ 2 percent of your people on the farms. The goal is to produce enough to feed your country and make a buck or two, (or a few million/billion,) for exports. And whether it's 2 percent, 4 percent or 8 percent, that doesn't really matter. You're coming up with all of these metrics, but you're missing the point: under the Putin Administration, the economy showed a massive improvement. It's currently stagnating and in 2008 it fell, and it recovered by 2010. The Russians did just fine in 2011 and in 2012 and in 2013.

And? Russia's economy was severely depressed before Putin took the reins, and some of that growth was recovery from disorganization and disaster in the early to mid 90s. Don't delude yourself into thinking Putin has magic pixie dust that will make the economy always grow.

Now, the question is this: Will Putin back down, or will Putin fight an economic war with the EU + US until the Russian economy tanks?

[Cartalucci]

These sanctions are indicative of how the world is going to develop over the next few decades. The US and EU will gradually become more and more isolated economically and politically and their share of global wealth and influence declines while countries like Russia, China and Brazil will focus on internal development and trade with each other. Time and again we have seen how sanctions do no harm to the target country but instead harm the instigators. I welcome the West's sanctions and Russia's import restrictions as they will only hasten the inevitable decline of the west and its corporate economic system.

[Napkiraly]

These sanctions are indicative of how the world is going to develop over the next few decades. The US and EU will gradually become more and more isolated economically and politically and their share of global wealth and influence declines while countries like Russia, China and Brazil will focus on internal development and trade with each other. Time and again we have seen how sanctions do no harm to the target country but instead harm the instigators. I welcome the West's sanctions and Russia's import restrictions as they will only hasten the inevitable decline of the west and its corporate economic system.

I honestly love how you think that the corporate economic system doesn't exist in China, Russia, or Brazil.

[Cartalucci]

These sanctions are indicative of how the world is going to develop over the next few decades. The US and EU will gradually become more and more isolated economically and politically and their share of global wealth and influence declines while countries like Russia, China and Brazil will focus on internal development and trade with each other. Time and again we have seen how sanctions do no harm to the target country but instead harm the instigators. I welcome the West's sanctions and Russia's import restrictions as they will only hasten the inevitable decline of the west and its corporate economic system.

I honestly love how you think that the corporate economic system doesn't exist in China, Russia, or Brazil.

The economic systems of the US and EU on one hand and Russia and China on the other are completely different.

In the US and EU corporations effectively control the government so that political and economic decisions are made to the benefit of the elite who control the major businesses. Ordinary people have no real choice in the major decisions and work so that the ultra rich can get richer.

In Russia and China the people control the government and so corporations work to benefit society in general. The wealth created by the economic growth of these societies is spread fairly among the population which is why economic and social equality is so much greater in Russia and China than supposedly "rich" countries.

[Nervium]

I honestly love how you think that the corporate economic system doesn't exist in China, Russia, or Brazil.

The economic systems of the US and EU on one hand and Russia and China on the other are completely different.

In the US and EU corporations effectively control the government so that political and economic decisions are made to the benefit of the elite who control the major businesses. Ordinary people have no real choice in the major decisions and work so that the ultra rich can get richer.

In Russia and China the people control the government and so corporations work to benefit society in general. The wealth created by the economic growth of these societies is spread fairly among the population which is why economic and social equality is so much greater in Russia and China than supposedly "rich" countries.

Okay, I might not be the biggest fan of corporate lobbying in the West but to claim China is controlled by it's people and corporations work there to benefit society is intellectual dishonesty.
Also that social in Russia, yeah, I don't actually think that's right either.
Hell, even RT says that social inequality is higher than ever.

[The Alma Mater]

I honestly love how you think that the corporate economic system doesn't exist in China, Russia, or Brazil.

The economic systems of the US and EU on one hand and Russia and China on the other are completely different.

In the US and EU corporations effectively control the government so that political and economic decisions are made to the benefit of the elite who control the major businesses. Ordinary people have no real choice in the major decisions and work so that the ultra rich can get richer.

In Russia and China the people control the government and so corporations work to benefit society in general. The wealth created by the economic growth of these societies is spread fairly among the population which is why economic and social equality is so much greater in Russia and China than supposedly "rich" countries.

While this should be true (and is mostly true where the western nations are concerned), reality sadly teaches that the economies of Russia and China are just as much focussed on the elite - who also care very little about the people.

Examples of a caring system like you paint could be found in South America a few decades ago, but sadly foreign "aid" destroyed them.