4 ms·

How do you even transport 300 tons of gold? Load it onto a military ship, maybe in smaller batches, and hope the crew isn't too corrupt?

SFJulie 10y ago
You can also when you are smart do it by swapping movement in compensation agencies. When one ton of gold is supposed to leave germany for USA, it is accounted as leaving registered in accounting books as a +1 ton in USA fed reserv, but it actually stays on the territory and countend as -0 in germany... as long as the amount is not credited. if flux of swap goes the wrong direction (more sell than buy from USA) then you also have to physically transport some gold.
throwanem 10y ago
Military transports, each with a strong marine detachment aboard, and escorted by at least equal numbers of fast frigates or destroyers. Even in the very unlikely case that someone's dumb enough to try it on and able to successfully suppress the counter-mutiny that'd be sure to arise among the embarked marine force, an unarmed ship that can't outrun an armed pursuer is in a hopeless situation. In the case where exists a credible threat of attack by another power, you'd want to use a much stronger escort, ideally a carrier strike group and some attack submarines. Escorted aerial transport would be another option, requiring more flights and being more vulnerable in transit, but with each flight exposed to attack for a much shorter period, and significantly lowering the cost of a successful attack. In any case, if you're concerned about perfidy among those entrusted with items of value, the classic response is to ensure that no one acting alone has sufficient leeway to steal, and ideally that massive collusion among many actors at all levels of your guard force is necessary to do so.
rdl 10y ago
Lots of smaller shipments, each secured. Potentially air or sea (probably would do 1-10 ton air shipments for JFK-FRA). Plenty of $100mm-1b items get shipped around the world routinely, although gold is pretty uniquely fungible. It is mostly determined by insurance or willingness to self-insure, though. This is a great article about a similar problem: http://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmon/2011/08/23/how-to-get-12-billion-of-gold-to-venezuela/ http://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmon/2011/08/23/how-to-get-...
reitanqild 10y ago
I have yet to hear about any modern western military being very corrupt. When you phrase it like that you help build an understanding that this is common. Unless you have sources for this I'd ask you to avoid spreading that idea.

SFJulie 10y ago

You can also when you are smart do it by swapping movement in compensation agencies. When one ton of gold is supposed to leave germany for USA, it is accounted as leaving registered in accounting books as a +1 ton in USA fed reserv, but it actually stays on the territory and countend as -0 in germany... as long as the amount is not credited. if flux of swap goes the wrong direction (more sell than buy from USA) then you also have to physically transport some gold.

throwanem 10y ago

Military transports, each with a strong marine detachment aboard, and escorted by at least equal numbers of fast frigates or destroyers. Even in the very unlikely case that someone's dumb enough to try it on and able to successfully suppress the counter-mutiny that'd be sure to arise among the embarked marine force, an unarmed ship that can't outrun an armed pursuer is in a hopeless situation. In the case where exists a credible threat of attack by another power, you'd want to use a much stronger escort, ideally a carrier strike group and some attack submarines. Escorted aerial transport would be another option, requiring more flights and being more vulnerable in transit, but with each flight exposed to attack for a much shorter period, and significantly lowering the cost of a successful attack. In any case, if you're concerned about perfidy among those entrusted with items of value, the classic response is to ensure that no one acting alone has sufficient leeway to steal, and ideally that massive collusion among many actors at all levels of your guard force is necessary to do so.

rdl 10y ago

Lots of smaller shipments, each secured. Potentially air or sea (probably would do 1-10 ton air shipments for JFK-FRA). Plenty of $100mm-1b items get shipped around the world routinely, although gold is pretty uniquely fungible. It is mostly determined by insurance or willingness to self-insure, though. This is a great article about a similar problem: http://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmon/2011/08/23/how-to-get-12-billion-of-gold-to-venezuela/ http://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmon/2011/08/23/how-to-get-...

reitanqild 10y ago

I have yet to hear about any modern western military being very corrupt. When you phrase it like that you help build an understanding that this is common. Unless you have sources for this I'd ask you to avoid spreading that idea.