I see this repeated as a matra, in a way of Carthago delenda est.
But it is not true. Said warmongering dictators do not need dollars or euros to wage any war. The entire chain of the war machine is in local currency, backed by local resources. They do not need anything there, that has to be bought for dollars or euros. They are not some third would countries that have to buy their weapons abroad.
By repeating this mantra, we are only lying to ourselves.
> The entire chain of the war machine is in local currency, backed by local resources.
Not really. There are already signs that the Russian military industry is in hot water now because there are no Russian semiconductor fabs that can supply the type of chips needed for anything beyond dumb ballistic missiles [1]. And it's not just chips, but also other basic electronic components or modules whose manufacturing has long since gone to China and other countries, some of which are under the scope of international sanctions against Russia.
> They are not some third would countries that have to buy their weapons abroad.
They are buying a ton of drones from Iran, for example, or Soviet-era stocks of artillery munition from North Korea [2].
> Said warmongering dictators do not need dollars or euros to wage any war.
Oh yes they do. No country on this planet is self-sufficient, not even the US. And it's not just about military equipment, it's about basic necessities of life, especially medicine and food. Russia needs money to buy these abroad, and for that they need foreign currency.
Western reports have to be taken with grain of salt; it was demonstrated that western journalists know exactly zero about the war and what you read is more wishful thinking than news. For example, there were reports of Russia running out of gas in march, and out of ammo in april, and our (I'm EU citizen, that's why "our") Ursula was talking about cannibalizing chips from wash machines. And yet, here we are, this all turned out to be nonsense.
Same goes for "iranian" drones. Iran would have no idea how to start integrating them with russian C4ISR (note how the "mopeds" are observed by lancet drones); non-integrated drones would be OK for tactical, but not operational level of war-waging.
Russia is closest thing to autarchy that you can find on this planet (US isn't even a player here, US deindustrialized itself in the name of cost cutting). The 2014 sanctions only helped in building such economy. Medicine is easy to clone, if you are not bothered with intellectual property (see also India) and they are net food exporter. Sure, some french cheese or wines could be missing, but they are not necessary for the war.
But back to our topic: none of this means that buying energy is financing the war. It is there for conditioning western population to get used to more expensive energy (basic economic theory: the supply was cut, demand was preserved, the equilibrium moves). The oligarchs are going be laughing all the way to the bank. It is just surprising that someone with intelligence to be discussing on HN would be taking part of such conditioning, without realizing it.
> Not really. There are already signs that the Russian military industry is in hot water now because there are no Russian semiconductor fabs that can supply the type of chips needed for anything beyond dumb ballistic missiles […]
I don't know what your definition of «the type of chips needed for anything beyond dumb […]» is, but – if I were to infer – all chips manufactured for military needs are the dump chips, be it in China, or in Russia, or in South Korea, or in the US etc.
Military does not chase cutting-edge, smallest nanometer manufacturing facilities nor do they look for fancy 3D stacked L1 CPU caches and alike, the ones we encounter in consumer tailored microchips (MC's). MC's produced for the military sector 1) are always several generations behind the consumer counterparts; 2) are slower; 3) get subjected to extreme and very rigorous testing, e.g. getting baked in specially designed ovens; 4) they come with hardened shells to later get subjected to irradiation; 5) likely something else. Surviving specimens make it into missiles and elsewhere, for all is required for a missile is a chip that will be guaranteed to not have failed a mission.
Freescale (ex-Motorola) and Texas Instruments are two of the largest MC manufacturing contractors in the US. They have separate lines set up for consumer and military needs, with the military contracts taking a priority. I can't be bothered to check whether Intel or AMD have clandestine US DoD contracts but it is safe to assume so. When Motorola used to manufacture their own MC's, they also had two separate lines for the highly sought after DSP's, 56k and 96k series. There were two versions, a hardened one (prohibited for export out of the US), and the consumer version (with somewhat more relaxed export controls for the 56k series but not for the 96k series). Tolerance specs of the hardened version were classified at the time.
Back onto Russia. To cut it short, it is a case of hypocrisy on both sides as propaganda has been busy working on both sides. Soviet Union (and later, Russia) has been self-sustained, self-contained and has been manufacturing their own chips since late 1960s - early 1970s with always prioritising military needs over the consumer needs. They have never chased the latest designs or developments, but their stuff has been reliable where required.
It is not easy to assess their current situation due to the information disclosure suppresion and also due to prior reports of embezzlement on a unfathomable scale having taken place in Russia specifically when it comes to military contracts. What it is known with a fairly high degree of certainty is that Russia had commenced a 90 nm manufacturing facility as early as 2014[•]. There have also been sketchy reports that they have since moved on to a 28 nm process. Finding a reliable source is not easy, though.
Either way, chips that have been produced to a 90 (or 28 nm) process and have been subjected to hardcore testing requirements are good enough to drive missiles (likely, other military equipment too). Provided chip manufacturing facilities are still operating in Zelenograd, their output will be prioritised in the current political environment, and it will receive a priority funding in the local currency. One ought not to underestimate the adversary and ought to be wary of the creativity they may come up with once having been cornered.
Emperor Poo of All Russia has been demonstrating the world that he is willing to drive his never be, imaginary empire into the ground at any cost – in order to fulfil his ultimate wet dream of crowning himself as the first Galactic Emperor Poo, and, since Russia has been making their own silicon wafers, the MC manufacturing situation is not all that black or white – until more is known for sure.
> They do not need anything there, that has to be bought for dollars or euros. They are not some third would countries that have to buy their weapons abroad.
they had their local currency forever. yet they developed very fast exactly at the same time as we started buying their goods. its not a coincidence. and yes China is a third world country by all metrics, its not because you have very modern centers like Shanghai, Beijing and more big cities like that that there is not utter misery in the countryside that would make you blush
Its not like those who are paid in roubles would have any use for any other currency. Everything they need can be paid for in roubles, turtles all the way down.
Sure, you won't get iphone, porsche or gucci wares for that, but those are not necessary to wage the war.
> Sure, you won't get iphone, porsche or gucci wares for that
This is where your argument breaks down. Russia imports vast amounts of manufactured goods that it doesn't have the capacity to make itself, including basic military and basic consumer goods, and for which it needs something that their trade partners might conceivably want. Which ain't roubles, for the most part.
This just doesn't reflect reality at all. There are vast drops in the domestic production of things like cars (-85%), motors (-70%), and white-goods (-50%) due to a collapsed import chain. (Russian government source: https://rosstat.gov.ru/storage/mediabank/87_01-06-2022.html) Key economic indicators are flashing red - e.g. non-tax/oil tax revenues are down 20% YoY (Russian Finance Ministry figures from last week). If these are the official Russian government stats, it's likely the real numbers are much worse.
Cars and motors are dual use goods (so the collapse of Russian domestic manufacturing of them is militarily relevant), but even setting those aside and looking purely at single-use military goods, there's persuasive evidence that the Russian military is increasingly reliant on Iranian drones and equipment (https://www.al-monitor.com/originals/2022/10/russias-use-ira...). Vast numbers of Russian equipment have been confirmed destroyed or captured by observers such as Oryx, and those are just the visually confirmed losses you can check the evidence for yourself (https://www.oryxspioenkop.com/2022/02/attack-on-europe-docum...). No country would be able to replace those losses without switching to a full war economy, which Russia has not done (and which would only be a necessary but not sufficient condition for replenishing these kinds of losses).
I see this repeated as a matra, in a way of Carthago delenda est.
But it is not true. Said warmongering dictators do not need dollars or euros to wage any war. The entire chain of the war machine is in local currency, backed by local resources. They do not need anything there, that has to be bought for dollars or euros. They are not some third would countries that have to buy their weapons abroad.
By repeating this mantra, we are only lying to ourselves.