[rocqua]

I think that, in the world of nuclear powers, it is trivial to see that physical violence at war scales between nuclear powers is essentially infinitely bad.

Famine among millions of people, and general economic depression has a massive human toll. But it doesn't compare to full on nuclear war, followed by nuclear winter and Global radiation levels from fallout.

So it seems obvious to me that economic violence is the only for of violence the west can bring to bear against Russia. There is a discussion to be had on the matter of whether it should be brought to bear. Punishing the people for the actions of the elite and all that. Perhaps also a 'what does this system lead to in peace time' question, but that seems to argue 'economic sanctions are a tragedy of the commons', which means it is hard to address. At least the solution 'we just won't sanction' does not actually resolve the tragedy of the commons.

[renlo]

the question is whether economic sanctions could lead to "full on nuclear war"

[rocqua]

I had not considered that.

It seems like "dude has nukes and feels backed into a wall" is just really shite. You either give him what he wants, or you risk nuclear war.

[thr0wawayf00]

Here's the problem though: if you obliterate a country's financial system to the point that people start starving and fundamentally lack their basic needs, what incentive are you giving someone like Putin to not drop a bomb?

If people start starving en masse the way they did back during Soviet Collectivization, which saw 4-7M dead[0], what's stopping Putin from ending it all in retaliation?

0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collectivization_in_the_Soviet...