> economic collapse means that they will inevitably submit to western liberal democracy Not, economic collapse means that Russia will became a serf from China.

> economic collapse means that they will inevitably submit to western liberal democracy Not, economic collapse means that Russia will became a serf from China. Coca cola, blue jeans and jewels are easily replaceable; Russia not having anymore Intel CPUs, or Taiwanese chips for fixing computers, or even neon gas required to make their own chips will not be so funny. And by Computers I mean all that is basically a computer now: cars, trains, machine, TV, phones, appliances... the "stone age" one is a good metaphor. Everything can be smuggled, is just more expensive, but "Smart" products can easily be redesigned to refuse to work inside Russian frontiers, for example. Of course Russia could buy (almost) everything from China instead, paying with raw materials or asking China to buy all things in their name (Many African countries are doing exactly that now), but then China will write the price. Russia will not have much leverage to negotiate in that position.