Tag Archives: foreign policy

Economic Coercion

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The subheadline on The Wall Street Journal‘s Sunday editorial summarizes one spin on the case.

The best defense would be for the West to work together against Beijing’s bullying.

The editors then summarize the related conclusion of a Center for Strategic and International Studies report:

All of this suggests that the West can work together to deter China by increasing the costs of economic coercion.

No.

Rather than wasting time resisting the Peoples Republic of China’s bullying or “deterring” the PRC from its economic coercion, the better move would be for the West to work together to eliminate the PRC’s ability to economically coerce at all: cancel trade relations with the PRC and move supply chains—from dirt in the ground to product components and finished products—out of the PRC altogether.

Time to Stop

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Despite sanctions, Russia is succeeding in importing technical products like computer chips, lasers, and the like, products which are usable in the barbarian’s weapons systems as well as his more general economy. Russia is doing so with the active complicity of a few ex-Soviet republics that remain in the sway of the barbarian.

In total, US and EU goods exports to Armenia, Georgia, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, and Kazakhstan rose to $24.3 billion last year from $14.6 billion in 2021. These countries collectively increased their exports to Russia by nearly 50% last year to around $15 billion.

They brag about it, too.

Imex-Expert offers to “import sanctioned goods from Europe, America to Russia through Kazakhstan.” Its website boasts: “Bypassing sanctions 100%.”

This graph illustrates the extent of the problem.

It’s time to stop exporting any tech products—all of which are dual-usable—to these nations (Georgia’s complicity is especially disappointing). Not cut sales off company by company; that’s just nickel and dime quibbling. Cut off tech sales to these nations altogether.

Stepping Up

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Great Britain is sending Storm Shadow cruise missiles to Ukraine. British Defense Secretary Ben Wallace has said that the missiles are now going into or are in the country itself, although it’s unclear how many are being sent or whether there are more in the pipeline.

The export version of the cruise missile (which I ass-u-me is the version being sent) has a range of 155 miles, cruises at 100 feet above ground, and carries a 1,000lb warhead.

Wallace also said that We simply will not stand back while Russia kills civilians. The missiles will allow Russian launch sites to come under attack, and they will facilitate deeper interdiction of the barbarian’s supply lines, fuel and ammunition depots, and troop staging areas.

Now the question remains, especially in light of Wallace’s overt refusal to simply abide while the barbarian commits his atrocities: Where in the world is Joe Biden?

And They Accused Trump of Being Soft on Russia

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Progressive-Democrat President Joe Biden’s Janet Yellen-run Treasury department has—once again—extended a waiver to a rule barring import of Russian oil and gas that was instituted ‘way back in March 2022. Even at the time of the rule’s institution, Treasury created a waiver to allow financial institutions to continue processing dollar-currencied payments for Russian energy in other countries.

The waiver was supposed to expire by that June, but Yellen extended it to early December. She said, through a Treasury spokeswoman,

This license [extension] will provide for an orderly transition to help our broad coalition of partners reduce their dependence on Russian energy as we work to restrict the Kremlin’s revenue sources[.]

After that she extended the waiver again, until the middle of this month.

Now Yellen is extending the waiver yet again, to November, and this time she’s not even pretending she has a reason:

Treasury didn’t respond to a request for comment Friday [5 May 23].

Biden and his cronies in Party and his supporters on the Left all zealously decried former President Donald Trump’s playing to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s ego with all of Trump’s pretty words about Putin.

Here is Biden and his Treasury person actively propping Putin’s energy economy by not closing off payments for Russian energy. Any orderly transition has long since been effected, or should have been; there no longer is any reason for extending the thing beyond Biden’s concrete softness on Russia.

The Joe Biden Version of Immigration Reform

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Now the CBP is being ordered by the Biden administration to release illegal aliens into our nation’s interior on illegals’ lick and promise: their “Notice to Appear/Warrant to Appear” forms with immigration court dates no earlier than 2026. Apparently, this is to clear the border of the current buildup in preparation for the even larger flood that’s building in anticipation of the removal of the last of the Title 42 restrictions later this week.

The Center Square obtained documents provided in a packet to foreign nationals who were processed by Border Patrol agents in Brownsville, Texas, were released and later apprehended in Jackson County, 260 miles north. Highway 59 is a major human smuggling route where an Operation Lone Star Task Force is operating to interdict criminals.

Jackson County Sheriff Kelly Janica and his deputies have made a number of arrests of illegal aliens, but he’s had to release them all because CBP won’t—can’t, isn’t allowed to—come get them so long as they have those Notices/Warrants. For instance,

one of his deputies noticed a silver Toyota Tundra heading north on Highway 59 with five people sitting in the bed of the truck. The deputy pulled over the vehicle believing the group to be foreign nationals being smuggled north from the border.
The deputy asked if all the occupants in the vehicle were in the US legally and the driver said they were family members from Honduras who they picked up in Brownsville, Texas, and were driving to North Carolina.
All 11 being transported had Honduran identification cards or passports and were between the ages of 5 and 73, including four men and four women each, two boys, and one teenage girl. Three were minors, ages 5, 9, and 16.
They all had manila envelopes including “Notice to Appear/Warrant to Appear” papers, which are what Border Patrol agents give foreign nationals when they release them into the US.

Under normal circumstances, if federal law were being enforced, Janica said his deputy would have arrested the driver and front passenger and they would’ve been charged with human smuggling. The reason they couldn’t arrest them is because Border Patrol said they wouldn’t come and get them; a court date in 2026 was enough to release them, he said.

Biden is having illegal aliens released into our nation with court dates—but the illegals don’t have to appear in court to answer for their illegal entry for three years. At the earliest. This is aiding and abetting the crime of illegal entry into our nation.