The New US Sanctions: Moving From Sanctions to Economic War
As usual Trumps words don’t match reality. The latest sanctions may be described as economic warfare.
What’s in the New Executive Order
When reading President Trump’s comments on the new Executive Order (EO) imposing new sanctions on North Korea, the author’s initial reaction was that they are, in part, a logical, intelligent next step after the passage of the recent UN Security Council Resolution (2375), which named additional North Korean economic sectors to the international sanctions campaign. …
But upon reading the text of the Executive Order, this view is 180 degrees at variance with the truth. The EO includes within it provisions that will allow the US to impose a full trade and financial embargo on North Korea unilaterally through the use of secondary sanctions. Section 1 (a) (iii) of the order permits the Secretary of Treasury to seize the assets or property of any person who “engages in one successful importation from or exportation to of any goods, services or technology.” Section 4 of the EO brings the full power of the US Treasury to bear against any bank that facilitates any trade with North Korea. Financial dealings with essentially any element of the government of North Korea are sanctionable (Section 4 (a) (i)). Facilitating any trade with North Korea is equally sanctionable (Section 4 (a) (ii)). The penalties prescribed are fatal to any bank using the dollar. They can have their assets seized and can be banned from the US financial system (Section 4 (b) (i) and (ii). In short, the United States is asserting the intention and right to ban from the US financial system and the dollar any entity from any country that trades with or finances trade with North Korea.
In combination with the President’s UN speech, we are witnessing the final phases of an effort to use sanctions against North Korea. Sanctions are no longer to be international instruments to coerce North Korea to the negotiating table. They are now unilateral instruments of a US economic war against North Korea in which states and firms will all have to comply or be US targets. This is consistent with the President’s UN speech in which he slammed the door on any hope of a negotiated settlement of this crisis (the subject of a separate article). They are, of course, not in the least consistent with his hymns to national sovereignty in that speech. Based on this EO, sanctions are no longer to bring North Korea to the negotiating table. Their only purpose can be to force the regime to capitulate under crushing economic pain or to create the conditions for regime collapse if it does not capitulate.
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