What would the effects be of the World as a whole sanctioning the US for their actions in regards to their invasion of another country.
I am thinking of a Helms-Burton type law imposed by all nations that currently now do not support the US position.
This is assuming for this example that such sanctions actually happened. I am not interested debating the plausibility of such an action, merely what the consequences could be for all parties involved.
Just a WAG, the other countries would suffer far more. Our food exports alone helps to feed the world.
according to the CIA world factbook, we import 1.148 trillion in goods a year
http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/us.html
Most in the form of food, oil, machinery & autos.
I have no idea what would happen. I guess our auto choices would dry up (no korean or japanese imports), our consumer electronics wouldn’t be as good w/o imports, we wouldn’t have enough oil, and alot of our raw food goods would be cut off too (alot of foodstuffs come from south america).
Not to mention that current loans, aid and grants from the US are dependent upon mutual trade agreements. No Trade, no US money.
I’m not sure it could be done by stopping the sale of cars or oil to the U.S. Don’t the exporters really need to sell as much as we need to buy? They’d hurt themselves just as much.
There could be a grassroots boycott of American goods. I don’t know what body could sanction the US other than individual countries- whatever that would mean. We have a UNSC veto so the Security Council couldn’t get one approved.
A world wide trade embargo on the USA would result in a very messy world war 3, imho.
If the world enacted sanctions on the US, we’d have problems for a few years, but we’d quickly recover. There’s a lot of land in the US which is no longer being farmed for economic reasons, that’d change quickly as the government started programs to encourage people to take up farming once more. Also, while we don’t make as many things in this country as we once did, we’ve got lots of manufacturing plants running at below capacity or closed. Those could be converted or reopened fairly quickly. Oil would be a problem, but alternative energy sources would rapidly become attractive (I bet people would be happy to see a nuclear reactor built in their neighborhood if they thought it’d cut their gas prices.). Sanctions haven’t toppled Castro, and they wouldn’t topple the US.
Well, there could be, but it would be fairly difficult, considering the rise of multi-national companies that are “owned” in several nations, the US ownership of foreign companies, the foreign ownership of US companies, etc. etc.
Just as a small but culturally significant example, the Tim Horton’s donut chain is now owned by Wendy’s. So, no more “Dutchie and a double-double” if you’re Canadian and want to boycott the US. So, you go to the corner donut shoppe for your fix. But, how do you know the shop owners aren’t buying American…especially as American imports make up 30% of the “Canadian consumer price basket”?pdf file–August 2001
It’s darn tough to pursue a boycott against a country, not without legal backing, as in the boycotts pursued by many nations against South Africa during the apartheid era. Companies are another matter, however.
Also remember that we do have a multi nation coalition and really only 3 outspoken (semi-relevant) opponents, Germany, France and Russia (all of which do have Big Oil interests in avoiding a war). So this is very much a hypothetical argument and not a reality.
The biggest threat would be a total cut off of oil, which I’m sure they’re is some contingency plans lying around the White House as to which oil fields could be taken over before the S.P.R. is exhausted.
How much would the PR of some international boycott of American goods affect US public opinion?
If there were UK nationals and Indians and South Africans appearring on the telly talking about how they won’t buy American anymore what would that do to our image of ourselves as a nation?
They would probably become fiercely patriotic. It would be seen as bullying and trying to interfere with the US, and Americans hate nothing more than anyone trying to tell them what to do.
If you look just at the “Western Democracies” and Japan, our econonmies are so intertwined that it would take years to impose any kind of embargo. Not just on the US, but any of these countries. Of course, it would be hardest to work if it were against the US. This is a very good thing. It keeps us united even when we have significant political disagreements.
Hopefully, 5 - 10 years from now this will all seem like ancient history and we’ll be talking about something else. Hell, France might even be our strongest ally then (not likely, but possible).
Well, every week the Federal Reserve Bank sells a lot of US government securities some of which are used to refinance previous US Government obligations that have come due. Lots of these securities are bought by foreign financial institutions I believe. If they refused to buy them we probably would have a difficulty servicing the federal debt. But I don’t think this will happen for a long time to come. As someone else pointed out, the world economy is so entangled that for foreigners to do this in the case of the US might bring the financial house down on their heads too.
The U.S. and Japan between them produce more goods and services than the rest of the world combined.
In addition, U.S. military and economic aid to the world is massive.
If the ‘world’ tried to impose a boycott on the U.S., the result would be a worldwide depression. Withdrawal of U.S. troops and aid to the world would be devastating. Without the implicit protection of the United States, wars and skirmishes would break out throughout the world.
And no other countries are as self-sufficient as the United States in terms of resources, technology, and agriculture. The U.S. would suffer a serious economic contraction and would have to re-structure its society, but the rest of the world would be devastated.
Let’s see…us vs. them Us being Gr. Britain, Australia, the US, who else wants to be on our side? I’d say probably Israel, Japan and Mexico and probably Canada if it came to that level.
OR did you think it was even remotely possible for EVERYONE, every nation to be against the US and just “ignore the US”
That’d be absolutely fan-damn-tastic…you mean we wouldn’t have to listen to the bunch of fucking whiny ass nations looking for a damned handout or some policing of their neighbors. The next time your ass was on fire you’d have to put it out yourself.
Shit, it wouldn’t take a month. Y’all have it so fucked up you’d be in the damned dark-ages again. and speaking either German, Arabic, or Chinese.
and as an added bonus we get to keep all the foreign investments in the US…
(sorry, I just had to get that off my chest)
Well the grassroots thing’s started. It’s only symbolic I figure.
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I wonder if the boycott will take root.
I don’t know. Can a junkie effectively sanction heroin?
I don’t think so. Only around 37%, I believe…
I’m sure the Russians, Germans and French would continue to sell us goods under the table.