Apparently, with world opinion and Russia's Western rivals preoccupied with the Ukraine crisis, Putin is contemplating another plan.
Author: Farid Ahmad, editor-in-chief of Sangar
The conflict, or rather a glaring catastrophe, in the middle of which Russia and Ukraine found themselves, drives not only the two countries but the whole world into a whirlpool, the way out of which no one understands. The stakes in this game increase every day, and the number of players increases in proportion to the economic sanctions imposed.
Vladimir Putin has been practiced judo all his life. There are many interesting tricks in judo. One of them is that a judoka, having attracted the attention of his opponent with one or another technique, considers another technique to defeat him. Apparently, with world opinion and Russia's Western rivals preoccupied with the Ukraine crisis, Putin is contemplating another plan.
Of course, the war, in principle, does not carry any positive emotions, but clearly indicates the presence of unsolvable contradictions between the parties, each of which has its truth, its convincing arguments, and its background to the conflict.
An analysis of the causes and outcomes of the events taking place in Ukraine should be carried out with a cool head and objectively, but now when emotions are overflowing and volleys of propaganda weapons do not stop, this is impossible. The first chancellor of the German Empire, Otto von Bismarck, has spoken about this: “There will never be said lie so much as during the war, after the hunt, and before the elections”. It is for this reason that the winner and the vanquished are first determined, and only then, the world history is made up.
But what is Putin planning?
The most interesting thing happens behind the scenes of the fighting, far from the rumble of tanks and the cannonade of artillery pieces. For the first time in recent history, Western countries have truly rallied and launched a powerful economic attack on Russia. Many Western companies have announced the suspension of their activities in the Russian Federation, severe sanctions have already been imposed on leading Russian banks, Europe has closed airspace for ships from Russia, and the process of disconnecting Russian financial organizations from the SWIFT system is underway. The measures are unprecedented. They were followed by a fall in the shares of Russian companies on world markets and a depreciation of the ruble.
Nevertheless, here Vladimir Putin unexpectedly comes into play, as if he was waiting for this moment. The President of Russia introduces a ban for shareholders of Russian companies to withdraw dividends abroad, including offshore. This move made it pointless for foreign partners to acquire assets in Russia and brought down the price of Russian shares even lower - to almost zero. Foreign companies rushed to the exit and began to get rid of Russian assets.
Having assessed the situation, Vladimir Putin conducts a second trick – buying up shares of Russian companies for insignificant prices at the expense of the National Wealth Fund of the Russian Federation ($175 billion as of February 1, 2022). The President of Russia began the nationalization of the country's natural resources, getting rid of the oligarchs, unloved by the people, who, after the collapse of the USSR, according to a similar scheme, seized valuable resources into the property and foreign investors, whose interest is only in withdrawing money from Russia to their countries.
Perhaps Vladimir Putin was waiting for such a situation during all his presidential terms, but perhaps not. But right now, Russia has a chance to change the entire economic structure of the country and transfer natural resources to those to whom they should belong by right - the multinational Russian people. The development of events according to this scenario will make it possible to increase the well-being of every citizen of the Russian Federation many times over and become not only a world leader in terms of natural resources but also a leading country in terms of the standard of living of the population.
But what to do with enlightened Europe and the United States, which were "offended" and imposed sanctions, demanding impossible conditions and respect for the right to shake their hands? Nothing. There are more than 200 states in the world, most of which are ready to cooperate on mutually beneficial terms and without unilateral ultimatums.
By the way, Otto von Bismarck also said the following: "We are all people and the government is too." So, Vladimir Putin, it is your turn now...