Former U.S. President Barack Obama once said of Joe Biden – “Don’t underestimate Joe’s ability to fuck things up.” Indeed, president Biden has screwed up so spectacularly that he’s sleepwalking off a 100-metre cliff, without any clue whatsoever that he is leading the world to the first Nuclear War – challenging Russia and provoking China for wars at the same time.

 

In January, the IMF (International Monetary Fund) projected global growth to fall from 3.4% in 2022 to 2.9% in 2023. Two major reasons contributed to the new prediction – interest rate hike to fight inflation and Ukraine War. Well, guess what, both factors aren’t going away any time soon. And the U.S. president will definitely fuck things up again when the world thought the worst was over.

 

Sure, inflation has decreased in the U.S. for six consecutive months, leading to the belief that it is a sign that the Federal Reserve’s aggressive interest rate hiking is working. The American inflation peaked in June 2022 at 9%, and then fell to 6 months in a row to 6.5% by the end of the year. Investors and punters have jumped into the stock market, betting the inflation has been tamed.

Yet, despite his optimistic tone about containing inflation, Chairman Jerome Powell said there could be a couple more rate hikes. However, something weird is happening in the job market – unemployment is at its lowest level in 53 years. This leaves the Fed undecided whether or not to continue raising interest rates when jobless is low, but the salary growth is cooling down.

 

So, is the U.S. experiencing economic hardship? If the economy is booming, why isn’t the salary growing? On the other hand, if the economy is deteriorating, why are there jobs everywhere? In truth, we have yet to see the full effect of last year’s interest rate hikes. The impact will be felt only this year, translating into fewer jobs, less spending and ultimately a slower economy.

 

The housing market has already begun showing the effect, with crashing sales. To make matters worse, last year’s layoffs continue in 2023. Tens of thousands of tech workers have lost their jobs in the tech sector – Amazon, Facebook, Microsoft, Google, IBM, Zoom, Facebook, Twitter, Dell, PayPal, Spotify, Salesforce, and so on. But tech companies are not the only one affected.

Citigroup and General Motors too have slashed their respective workforce, as well as telecommunication company Ericsson. Even investment banking giant Goldman Sachs, consulting firm McKinsey and accounting firm KPMG are retrenching, as well as Disney, FedEx, Philips and Boeing. More than 120 large U.S. companies cut nearly 125,000 jobs in 2022 alone.

 

This could only mean one thing – a recession is coming. A survey by Primerica says 81% of middle-income Americans believe a recession will strike in 2023. However, some have argued that we might manage to avoid a recession because so far there isn’t any sign of recession. Just because the inflation is slowing down, it’s not a guarantee that it will not skyrocket again.

 

Let’s assume the genius Federal Reserve could pilot the U.S. to a soft landing, which it can’t. There’s another critical factor that could trigger the inflation to suddenly reverse its current downtrend – Ukraine War. Despite the Western media’s best effort to create the narrative that Ukraine is winning, the painful truth is the opposite. The Ukrainian forces are losing.

From news that “Russia is running out of ammunition” in 2022 to “Ukraine is running out of ammunition” this year. That’s how the West spreads disinformation initially, and backfires eventually. CNN, for example, is blaming Ukraine for burning through ammunition faster than the U.S. and NATO can produce it. The Pentagon has allocated US$3 billion alone to buy ammunitions.

 

Yet, despite the might of the U.S. and NATO behind Ukraine, hilariously, Putin is still alive and kicking whilst Russia continues to rain missiles on Ukraine. That’s an alliance of 54 countries against 1 country, not bad for Russia that has been slapped with economic and financial sanctions. And the Chinese have yet to join forces with the Russians in a potential escalation, mind you.

 

The biggest humiliation, and the most dangerous trigger of skyrocketing inflation is the imminent defeat of Ukraine in Bakhmut. No matter how the media twists and spins, the fact remains that the Kremlin had destroyed two key bridges in Bakhmut, effectively cutting the city’s last main supply route from the Ukrainian-held town of Chasiv Yar. Today, Bakhmut is surrounded by Russian forces.

After a 7-month battle for Bakhmut, it appears the only option left for Ukraine is to surrender the city, which Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky has described as a “strong fortress”. The defeat, which the West is trying to frame as a “strategic withdrawal” to save face, will allow Moscow to use Bakhmut as a stepping stone to complete its objective of capturing the Donbas industrial region.

 

According to Scott Ritter, former U.S. Marine Corps intelligence officer, Ukraine cannot win this war, and it’s purely “fantasy” to think it could. Despite U.S. media celebrating Russia’s previous withdrawal – trumpeted as defeat – from its position in Kherson, the truth is Moscow was strategically trading territories for Russian lives, holding to the strong points to defend it to the last man.

 

The Russians were more than happy to withdraw, trade territory, save lives, consolidate their defensive positions whilst inflicting maximum damage to the Ukrainian forces. While consolidating, Putin reinforces his troops with reservists and reorganizes fresh combat units to optimize operational capacity. The U.S. has underestimated Russian’s soft approach as weakness.

It doesn’t take a genius to see how Ukraine has been lured by Russia into Bakhmut, before systematically slaughtered. This is a page from Sun Tzu’s Art of War – appear weak when you are strong, and strong when you are weak. After trapping Ukrainian forces in Bakhmut, the Russian military bombards their enemy positions from long distances instead of engaging in close combat battles.

 

A Ukrainian commander, Volodymyr Nazarenko, said there are more Russian troops surrounding Bakhmut than there is ammunition to kill them all. Either Zelensky has been wasting ammunition due to inefficiency, sold them in the black market due to corruption, or simply outsmarted. Described as the “meat grinder”, a U.S. Marine said a soldier’s life expectancy on the front lines in Bakhmut was only 4 hours.

 

But the loss of Bakhmut will see Biden administration escalates the war. The U.S. and its allies have been providing incremental military aid to Ukraine over the last 12 months of the conflict. First, there was a denial to provide lethal weaponry, only to supply M777 howitzer artillery system, followed by HIMARS long-range rocket launchers and then Patriot missile system.

Now, the U.S., the UK and Germany are sending tanks – something unimaginable at the beginning of the war – including 31 American Abrams tanks, 14 British Challenger-2 tanks and 14 German Leopards-2 tanks. Biden has proudly announced that the Abrams are the most capable tanks in the world, never mind it will take several months to procure, build and deliver.

 

Yes, not only the sophisticated and expensive Abrams tanks have to be built from scratch using refurbished old tank hulls and turrets in the depot, but the machines will be stripped of the secret uranium armour due to fear that it will fall into the enemies’ hands. Still, it didn’t stop news media from spreading lies – “US Abrams M1 Tank Is Already In Ukraine! Russians Are Fleeing In Panic!”

 

After tanks, the fall of Bakhmut will put pressure on senile Biden to send U.S.-made F-16 Fighting Falcon jets, which Ukraine has been asking for months. Zelensky has actually asked for 200 of the fighter jets in an attempt to drag NATO into the war with Russia. Heck, the Ukrainian president has even demanded that the U.S. sends their sons and daughters to fight in the Ukraine War.

Assuming both Russia and the United States will not start launching nuclear missiles at each other, more sanctions will send the global economy into a tailspin. With more than 14,000 sanctions imposed, Russia is already the world’s most-sanctioned country, ahead of Iran’s 4,000. The geopolitics tension will see history repeats itself – shortage and skyrocketing price of fertilizer.

 

Russia exports two-thirds of the world’s ammonium nitrate, which is used in fertilizers to improve yields for crops like wheat, corn and cotton. Farmers who could not afford the increase in costs of fertilizers will see lower crop production, which in turn will hit global food security. We would see another round of price hike in grocery stores, leading to new waves of inflation and subsequently recession.

 

The inflation didn’t start because of Russia. For years, the Fed lied that the high inflation was not serious in order to justify an interest rate near zero because the White House wanted to make Americans feel rich by allowing them to borrow and spend. Even before the Covid-19 pandemic, the Fed was responsible for flushing the financial markets with cheap money – about US$120 billion a month – since 2018.

At least US$6 trillion was printed to boost people’s savings during the pandemic. It was this money supply that led to inflation. The Fed only rushed to raise interest rate after three consecutive months of hitting highest inflation in 40 years last year (Jan’s 7.5%, Feb’s 7.9% and Mar’s 8.5%). The Congress had approved a whopping US$113 billion in aid to Ukraine in 2022 alone.

 

Those money increase deficit spending, adding more debt to America’s existing massive US$31 trillion national debt. Meaning the U.S. has to borrow more money. But China isn’t buying the I.O.U. papers., not after the U.S. and Europe expressed their desire to seize Russia’s US$300 billion frozen reserves under the pretext of covering the cost of Ukraine War.

 

On the contrary, China has been “silently” dumping its U.S. Treasury bonds to the lowest amount since June 2010. Even then, it still holds about US$870 billion in Nov 2022. Instead, the Chinese are stockpiling gold like crazy, learning from Russia how to use the precious metal to stabilize and strengthen its currency after the West’s sanctions – suggesting that Beijing is preparing for a war.

The diversification of its reserves away from the greenback also means the de-dollarization has begun. Other countries, including BRICS – comprises Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa – are trimming their assets in dollar. Russia has started trading in Yuan with China. And Saudi Arabia has started talking about accepting Yuan as payment for crude oil – giving a bloody nose to petrodollar.

 

As Washington recklessly provokes Beijing – threatening sanctions – the value of the U.S. dollar could drop drastically – leading to inflation, recession and wild volatility in stock and financial markets. China had rescued the U.S. during the 2008 global financial crisis by purchasing huge amounts of U.S. Treasury bills. Who will rescue the American economy if Biden starts World War 3 with China and Russia?

 

Other Articles That May Interest You …

• A Photo-Op Drama – How President Biden Made A Surprise Trip To Ukraine “After” Getting Permission From Russia
• Proof British Navy Blew Up Nord Stream – PM Truss Sent Text Message “It’s Done” To Secretary Of State Blinken After Attacks
• Europe’s Fake Solidarity Cracking – Panic & Social Unrest Began As Putin Says “No Gas” Until Sanctions Lifted
• De-Dollarization Begins – China Stockpiling Gold & Offers Discount To India Businesses If Settles In Yuan
• Moscow & Beijing Laughing All The Way To The Bank – How China Makes Easy Money Reselling Russian Gas To Europe
• The Worst Is Not Over Yet – Why Inflation & Recession Are Still Alive And The Global Economy Is Still In Bad Shape
• A Shift In Propaganda To Damage Control In Washington – Why President Biden & Western Media Making U-Turn Now
• Economic & Financial Meltdown Is Here – All Signs Lead To Recession, Stagflation, Jobless And A Repeat Of Dot-Com Bust
• Russia Cuts Off Gas To Poland & Bulgaria – European Gas Jumps 24% As Putin Starts Punishing “Unfriendly Countries”
• U.S. Sanctions Fail – How Russian Currency Emerges Stronger Than Pre-War With A New Gold Standard
• From Wheat To Oil & Gas – How Russia Invasion Of Ukraine Affects Europe’s Food Supply, And Even Your Loaf Of Bread

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March 5th, 2023 by financetwitter

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