The immovable and movable assets of Muscovite oligarchs understandably became the easiest of targets owing to their being scattered across the US, non-Russian Europe, Cyprus, Dubai and other foreign destinations
The title of the book authored by veteran journalist Stephanie Baker speaks for itself. It’s about the story of retribution by the West, a ferocious financial war declared against Vladimir Putin which spans the seizure of yachts of Russian oligarchs to oil politics and the arms bazaar.
“Never before has this arsenal of economic weapons been turned against a major market economy.” Without doubt Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022 and equally inexorably did grow the fast-moving situations preceding the conflict. But once violence erupted, the entire West pounced on Russia. The immovable and movable assets of Muscovite oligarchs understandably became the easiest of targets owing to their being scattered across the US, non-Russian Europe, Cyprus, Dubai and other foreign destinations.
Thus, arrived on scene the US-led super sleuths’ team to seize super-yachts, the virtual floating mansions of billionaire Russian oligarchs; the various sanctions imposed on the economic fortress of Russia (affecting its entire banking system); and the hunting of Moscow’s kleptocrats. Yet, interestingly, but unsurprisingly, the Russians outsmarted the redoubtable US agents in this cat-and-mouse game. When Deripaska, the Russian metal tycoon the US sanctioned in 2018, hoodwinked the FBI and made its former head of counterintelligence in New York Charles McGonigal work for the Moscow man, it exposed the role of money in a war transcending all borders. While loyalty, nationalism, professionalism and probity all succumbed to the lure of lucre, the Ukraine war once again showed that the thin line separating friend or foe could be eradicated any time in pursuit of one’s own agenda born out of unaddressed injustice.
The hunting of the Russians and the crippling of their finances nevertheless went on relentlessly. McDonald’s and Coca Cola were made to leave Moscow. The war goes on even in “a glittering Moscow on the Gulf” and in London’s Chelsea football club owned by the Muscovite Roman Abramovich.
What then is the endgame as the US today tries hard, pressing for a ceasefire to be in the realm of possibility? Well, it’s now time to count and calculate losses. Russia’s the invader and yet it’s lost more than 350,000 troops. Russia’s brain drain has reached epic proportions and there are major Russian industrial projects derailed by the US bans. Moscow’s rouble value fell 20 per cent in two years. Increasingly, the Russian economy grows more dependent on China. Already, Moscow has expressed concerns on the spurt of Beijing-made motor vehicles rampaging Russian roads.
All said, the Ukraine-Russia war has also hit the West hard as can be seen in the desperation of the leading European powers reeling from the punch of Moscow’s three-year bear-boxing. Despite the contemporary nature of these events, Baker has pleasantly surprised the reader with a compelling read.
Punishing Putin: Inside the Global Economic War to Bring Down Russia
Stephanie Baker
Mudlark
pp. 352; Rs 699
