Who sponsors Russian war machine?
ukraine
russia-economy
Russia’s pivot to China and India after sanctions boosted export revenue short-term, but left the war economy dangerously concentrated on two buyers.
Western sanctions pushed Russia’s trade eastward, and the immediate effect was higher energy export revenue — but at the cost of extreme customer concentration in just two markets, China and India. India in particular emerges as an unexpected financier of the Russian war effort, increasing imports of Russian goods by $53 billion between 2021 and 2023. That concentration is a vulnerability as much as a lifeline: Russia keeps the revenue flowing but is now exposed to whatever these two buyers decide next.
Originally published on Substack, March 18, 2024.