John Maynard Keynes once remarked that there is “no subtler, no surer means of overturning the existing basis of Society than to debauch the currency.” But he could scarcely have imagined that a century later, this principle would not merely be an unintended consequence of policy but the deliberate instrument of foreign domination—a tool sharpened into a weapon by Washington itself.
Indeed, no modern empire has so effectively turned monetary policy into a geopolitical bludgeon as the United States. What Keynes described as a subtle economic force has now become an overt and unapologetic act of economic sabotage—a calculated strategy to destroy the sovereignty of disobedient nations. On January 19, the article “The US–Israel Hybrid War Against Iran” detailed the coordinated economic war waged by Washington and Tel Aviv—not just against Iran, but against any government that dares to assert independence from the Western financial order.
One day later, in a stunning display of imperial hubris, U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent stood before the world at Davos and confirmed every charge. He openly admitted—without the slightest pretense of diplomacy—that U.S. sanctions were engineered to destroy Iran’s economy from within. According to Bessent, the objective was not merely to pressure Tehran’s leadership, but to deliberately collapse the currency, shutter banks, strangle trade, and provoke mass unrest in the streets. “Economic statecraft,” he called it—a term as dishonest as it is bloodless.
“In December, their economy collapsed… the central bank has started to print money… there is a dollar shortage. They are not able to get imports, and this is why the people took to the street.” — Scott Bessent, January 20
The U.S. government openly admits to engineering a financial catastrophe to produce regime change. This is not diplomacy. It is economic warfare—plain and simple—and its victims are ordinary civilians. Food, medicine, wages, pensions: all become casualties in a silent war where bombs aren’t dropped, but societies are dismantled just the same.
These are not isolated tactics. They are part of a systematic global strategy—a doctrine of economic terrorism deployed not only against Iran and Venezuela, but against any state that resists subservience to the American empire. The Lancet has documented the staggering civilian death toll linked to such sanctions. Far from “smart” measures targeting regimes, they function as weapons of collective punishment. The casualties, always, are the poor and the powerless.
Yet the illegality of this economic aggression is beyond dispute. Under international law, and per the UN Charter, unilateral sanctions imposed without Security Council authorization—especially those designed to induce civilian suffering—are patently illegal. No number of euphemisms can disguise the fact: Washington’s actions amount to war crimes conducted through financial instruments.
But perhaps the most extraordinary aspect of this silent war is not its cruelty, but the fact that American officials boast about it in public forums. The same political establishment that lectures the world about “rules-based order” proudly weaponizes the global financial system to collapse foreign economies and trigger insurrection—then dares to call it “progress.”
Europe, for its part, has meekly gone along, either out of ideological alignment or sheer cowardice. But American economic blackmail is now being extended across the Atlantic. When Donald Trump threatened to impose 200% tariffs on French wine unless France obeyed Washington’s foreign policy agenda, it should have been clear to any sober observer: allies are only safe until they deviate.
The heart of this machinery is the U.S. dollar, and more specifically, the SWIFT payments system—controlled and monitored by Washington. Through this mechanism, the U.S. doesn’t just sanction countries directly; it bullies the rest of the world into participating under threat of secondary sanctions. Trade, finance, banking—all of it is held hostage by the Federal Reserve and the Treasury Department. This isn’t international law. It’s dollar hegemony, enforced by extortion.
But the imperial grip may be slipping. Nations long subjected to this financial coercion—Russia, China, Iran, Venezuela, and increasingly the BRICS bloc—are already building parallel systems, conducting trade in alternative currencies, and accelerating the de-dollarization of global commerce. Washington’s sanctions, while effective in the short term, have begun to breed resistance, not compliance.
The pattern is unmistakable. The United States, increasingly incapable of winning wars on the battlefield, has turned instead to economic siege warfare, enforced through financial instruments and legal fictions. But the goal remains the same: submission or destruction.
It is past time the world acknowledges the obvious. The U.S. is not promoting peace, law, or stability—it is waging economic war on any nation that resists its dominance. And the consequences—poverty, starvation, and collapse—are not side effects. They are the objective.
Until other nations find the courage to break from this system, Washington will continue to wield the dollar as a weapon—its most potent and destructive tool in a hybrid war that knows no borders and spares no innocents.
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According to Oxford dictionary of human geography, “terrorism” is:
“A premeditated act of violence and intimidation directed against civilians and intended to achieve clear political aims.”
In any war, there will be collateral damage. Of course the civilian population will suffer in any conflict, whether through actual war or economic means. Only if the means of conflict were intentionally directed against civilians would that fit the definition.
Financial systems in the west are far from ideal. We have central banks that are closely aligned with central governments. They have created a system of transferring payments of fiat currencies known as SWIFT. That is the system we have, not the system we should have. Until we reach an ideal system, we must work within the system we have.
Non-western banks and governments have also created alternate banking systems with their own methods of account settlements, and have weaponized their systems against their enemies. Yet they have escaped criticism by Leo.
Neither have a free banking system with gold backed currency transaction settlements. But suppose the relatively freer world were to adopt such a system, approximating the one we had in the 19th century. Further suppose that this hypothetical system were to stop doing transactions with communist or neo-totalitarian governments and businesses operating within the jurisdiction of such governments.
Of course that would adversely affect the civilian populations within the jurisdiction of totalitarian or neo-totalitarian governments. But that would not be “terrorism” as civilians are not the targets. Does that mean we should simply throw up our hands and adopt neo-pacifism, eschewing any war or economic conflict?
Theoretically the governments targeted could change their ways and direct their scarce resources toward support of their civilian population, instead of tools and methods of actual war directed against relatively freer governments and their civilian population. But of course they usually do not, unless compelled to do so, as the government of Venezuela has been.
But Leo opposes that too, despite that civilians in Venezuela are starting to benefit from market prices of oil, instead of lower prices designed to subsidize the likes of Castro regime in Cuba, government elites within Venezuela, and planned conquest of neighboring Guyana.
So Leo’s arguments are really against any type of forceful or economic conflict waged by the relatively freer nations, and not directed against worse actions by much worse governments.
The goal should be regime change in Iran, in order to stop their steady march toward nuclear weapons and support of war and terrorism against relatively freer nations and civilians in such nations (“Death to America! Death to Israel!”). The mullah regime spends money exporting their revolution, instead of fixing the water supply and economy of Iran. If we simply allow them to continue their jihad unstopped, we will be enslaved and civilians generally, particularly those in the “west”, will disproportionately suffer.
If Leo were in charge and able to implement his preferred policies, the likely result would be the swift collapse of civilization and a descent into a new Dark Ages, dominated by the very governments he would shield through his virtue-signaling.
I should have said “Len”; pardon my typo.