Russia would face wide range of sanctions if it invades Ukraine

The government of USA You have several options to fulfill your promise to financially affect Russia if President Vladimir Putin invades UkraineFrom sanctions targeting the Russian president’s partners to removing Russia from the global financial system.

The United States and its European allies have not publicly mentioned any military plans to respond if Putin sends the soldiers gathered along the border to Ukraine, a former Soviet republic with close historical and cultural ties to Russia, but which is now willing to ally with NATO and the countries of the West.

Instead, the retaliation could be around money.

The US Secretary of State Antony Blinken promised this week that there would be financial effects, “measures of high economic impact that we have refrained from implementing in the past.” On Friday, President Joe Biden said the United States has developed “the broadest and most significant set of initiatives to make things quite difficult for Mr. Putin.”

Over the past decade, the United States has already implemented a variety of sanctions on Russian entities and individuals, many of them for Russia’s invasion and annexation of Crimea and for its support of armed separatists in eastern Ukraine in 2014. US sanctions have also sought to punish Russia for interfering in elections, for malicious cyber activities and for human rights violations.

Since 2014, Western countries have also helped Ukraine build its army. So while Putin denies any intention to launch an offensive, his soldiers could face a Ukrainian army much more capable of withstanding combat.

The sanctions that have so far been imposed on Russia include asset freezes, bans on doing business with American companies, and denial of entry to the United States. But in order to punish Russia, the West has for many years weighed much greater financial penalties.

That includes the so-called nuclear option: Block Russia from SWIFT, which is based in Belgium and is a financial payments system that moves money between thousands of banks around the world.