#161 No man is an island entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent*

Global Policy Watch: Possible End Game In Ukraine?<br/><br/>Indian perspectives on global events <br/><br/>&#8212; RSJ<br/><br/>Things have escalated a bit since I wrote last week about the economic sanctions on Russia by the West. Apart from cutting loose a few Russian banks from the SWIFT messaging system, we also had the unprecedented move to freeze the access of the Russian central bank to its forex reserves that are held with other banks in the West. Russia has been salting away about $640 billion worth of forex reserves over the past decade in anticipation of an event like this. They had reduced their exposure to the US dollar to about 15 per cent. But if it cannot now access about half of this, or maybe more, because of the freeze, it is a crippling blow. The central bank needs the forex to prevent the slide of the ruble by buying them and propping up its value. If it cannot, the ruble will continue to plunge and currency short-sellers will get into their game to drive it to dust. That apart, the Russian oligarchs and their assets are being targeted. This core group of Putin backers are being made to pay for his blunders. The idea is to drive a wedge between them and Putin. <br/><br/>Russian exports have been frozen because, without access to SWIFT, you only have barter as a trading mechanism. Russia is tightly coupled with the global economy unlike its predecessor USSR or other regimes that have faced big sanctions like North Korea, Syria or Cuba. Its economic model in the Putin era has been to focus on its comparative advantage in commodities while importing almost everything else. The sanctions will hurt ordinary Russians. Expect long queues at stores in Moscow. And long queues and Russia have an even longer history. It doesn&#8217;t end well for a regime when that happens. I could go on and on but you get the picture. This economic war unleashed by the west has turned more serious than Russia ever anticipated.<br/><br/>Review Of The Positions<br/><br/>But what I am interested in is what are the likely