[rb808]

Of course Russia has had its own version of GPS for decades. Those ICBMs need some way to find their destination. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GLONASS

World Bank has never been important to Russia. You're right the US is dominating financial world right now which most of the world hates and its inevitable for something else to compete.

[Nasrudith]

Really the world bank's role is to be the scapegoat for fiscal misrule as the lender of last resort. They may or may not be "fair" (a subjective standard) and there are legitimate things to disagree with such as assignment of debts from previous regimes but crucially they lack the power to do much. They are judges without ballifs or executioners. They wield no force but saying no to loans and telling others what they think.

If the countries could sustain themselves without credit from them then they have no need to be involved. The worst is essentially snarky comments pointing out that the current management goes against orthodoxy/still hasn't paid them back from 1977. If the country succeeds despite going against their judgement then they just look silly until either the world bank revises their conventional wisdom or they get to say "told ya so!" when the shoe drops.

Austerity may do worse than an open credit pipeline in terms of growth and human impact but there are no guarantees that the creditor wouldn't mess that up as well and solvency is required to function in their role. While nice they literally can't be an infinite credit that never needs paid back fountain.

[gdy]

I don't think ICBMs need glonass. They use astro and probably inertial guidance.