5 ms·
Trade in War
- eru 1y agoInteresting topic. Though keep in mind that it might be states being at war with each other, it's usually (but not always) individuals or companies that are trading. The interests almost never align.
- kubb 1y agoThe interests of individuals can be manufactured though!
- eru 1y agoSure, people react to incentives. Btw, the interest of states aren't monolithic either, they are made of people after all. (That's why corruption can happen in the first place.)
- Frieren 1y agoMost times that a country attacks another is a tragedy of the commons situation. A few people at the top will profit from the war even if most citizens from both countries lose because of it. The country as its citizens does not profit from war. The country as its leaders sometimes it does, or at least it may do so in the short term.
- kubb 1y agoThey don’t materially profit, but they have a perception of gain (eg. killing hated enemies).
- eszed 1y agoThat's a prime example of the GGP's point about the interests of individuals being manufactured. [Edit] Ha! Didn't see you were the GGP. I got your point, even if I am an unobservant idiot.
- anon191928 1y agoaka war on Iraq and Afganistan made $trillions for war p. and army dealers. this is a fact. Could be more than $10T
- energy123 1y agoWhich is why the recent wars between Israel and Hezbollah, Iran and Houthis are so paradigm shifting. It's the first time in all of human history that the leaders are the ones to die first. If this is the new status quo due to modern intelligence capabilities and stealth fighters, then you're dealing with a whole different set of incentives.
- eru 1y agoThe first time in recent history, yes. Not sure about the first time in all of human history: human history is long, and often leaders used to lead from the front.
- hiAndrewQuinn 1y agoTwo states are at war, and their constituent citizens are helping each other despite the war, and you imply that's the manufactured part? Heaven help us, we should all be so lucky if whoever's manufacturing that happens to improve their assembly lines a bit. Maybe they'll manufacture all of us being interested in no wars again, ever.
- mattashii 1y agoI think what they refer to is that while the interests of the individual and the country almost never align, the government can work to align these interests; e.g. through tariffs on trading with that other country. By doing so, a country can reduce/remove the incentive to trade with that other country's individuals, thus aligning the interests.
- awesome_dude 1y agoI'm with you - I always thought that when countries go to war they made it illegal for their citizens/companies to "trade with the enemy" With the government of the day making exceptions as they feel fit
- ignoramous 1y ago> interests almost never align When they do: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporatocracy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporatocracy
- usrusr 1y agoWas about to write roughly the same. But it's much more than that I think: when the stuff you sell to the other side can easily be substituted, from another supplier, domestically or by changing to ways that get by without, where's the benefit of stopping trade? Those 0.5% the other supplier has been more expensive (if it even is, might very well have just been inertia keeping them buying from you) won't meaningfully harm their war effort.
- MangoToupe 1y agoMeanwhile others sanction (or tariff) countries they're at peace with for no discernible benefit to anyone.
- dlahoda 1y agoso you say only nothing or harm to all?
- OKRainbowKid 1y agoWar and peace live on a spectrum
- victorbjorklund 1y agoTariffs are a tax on your own population (no matter what Trump says). Which countries sanction friendly ally nations?
- hdgvhicv 1y agoIt amazes me how the right wing in America is so pro Russia
- stevenwoo 1y agoThe reveal of much of the right wing influencer network being funded by Russian state actors makes this more understandable. https://apnews.com/article/russian-interference-presidential-election-influencers-trump-999435273dd39edf7468c6aa34fad5dd?utm_source=copy&utm_medium=share https://apnews.com/article/russian-interference-presidential... It goes from bottom to top with Tulsi Gabbard parroting Russian talking points on Russian state TV then from the White House and now those right wing influencers repeating Russian talking points at White House press conferences. It's probably the most successful adversarial state sponsored social engineering effort ever.
- MangoToupe 1y agoI actually had Iran in mind. Russia at least ostensibly behaved in a way that's worth sanctioning by destabilizing the world. Iran just held some hostages 50 years ago, as best I can tell, and it's hard to be angry at that. Israel has harmed many times more Americans than Iran has, but Israel also seems to be the reason we continue to sanction Iran. It makes no sense on the face of it.
- pintxo 1y agoBecause they are not atomic bodies?
- dude250711 1y agoIt is very simple, people trading/deciding are not the same ones as fighting.
- actionfromafar 1y agoI think you could fairly easily find examples when even the people fighting engaged in trading. The world is complicated and tradeoffs are made all the time.
- lifestyleguru 1y agoSomeone else fights, someone else trades, the elites from both groups from both sides cooperate. The groups of the opposite fighters less, the groups of the opposite traders more. The arrangement is mutually beneficial and cleansing. For anyone unimportant enough to read this comment - nationalism is the worst poison.
- rho4 1y agoI for example do not understand how it can be possible that Ukraine transports Russian gas on its pipeline network. Not sure if that's still the case though.
- lifestyleguru 1y agoEveryone involved and decisive are neighbours living in Dubai.
- jiggawatts 1y agoYou're thinking of HAMAS and co in Qatar.
- lifestyleguru 1y agoApplies to both conflicts apparently.
- Cthulhu_ 1y agoThey stopped on January 1st 2025 when the contract with Gazprom signed in 2019 expired, costing Gazprom / Russia an estimated $5bn / year: https://edition.cnn.com/2025/01/01/business/ukraine-russia-gas-eu-halted-hnk-intl/index.html https://edition.cnn.com/2025/01/01/business/ukraine-russia-g... It's a complicated one, but legally it's a civil contract; if the Ukrainian government decided to stop the gas flowing, both Gazprom and all the companies "downstream" would be in their rights to sue for breach of contract and/or causing gas shortages, costing the Ukrainian government billions. And you could wonder why they signed the contract anyway given Russia invaded/annexed Crimea 5 years prior, but, it's a lot of money, and at the time it was still considered a civil contract I presume.
- blackhaz 1y agoI am completely naive,l as I don't understand much in contracts, but wouldn't war effectively nullify those contracts? I mean, if a large proportion of your adversary's economy hangs by a simple piece of paper, I'd expect one to suggest them to go and wipe themselves with it.
- KaiserPro 1y agoI need to search for it in the FT archives, but I do remember them trying to quantify the amount of oil traded between the various rebels in syria and the syrian state. At one point islamic state (or one of the similar groups) had either ownership of a few oil fields, or transit between them, and were actively trading petro chemicals with each other for a good while.
- trash_cat 1y agoI think it would be better to ask why do states allow trading with the country your state is at war with.
- talkinghead 1y agoI'll have to ask my friend Thomas Pynchon
- jcattle 1y agoI also find the last point which is teased in the article interesting: "States very infrequently get forecasts about the length of war right". I can see why that happens, but are there any good counterexamples? Are there any conflicts that actually were as short as the initiating party expected?
- jongjong 1y agoThis sounds very optimistic. A more realistic interpretation is that the companies which control governments don't have moral principles and don't pick sides. In the case of weapons manufacturers, they may sometimes back both sides. It may also be profitable for banks to back both sides of a war if they don't currently have much collateral in the affected countries. Providing loans to rebuild countries is a great way to profit from war and establish a presence there. Big companies like to lobby governments into creating problems for which they have solutions to sell. I mean just look at what happened with companies like Mercedes Benz and Hugo Boss which were selling tanks and uniforms to the Nazi government... Still very successful today, didn't even change their names. They didn't have any problems finding customers or investors. Clearly it means that nobody who matters economically cared about the war. Quite remarkable when you realize that we're talking about WW2. In the business world, it's as if WW2 didn't happen.
- xnx 1y agoI was surprised to learn the US is still buying fertilizer from Russia: https://www.npr.org/2025/08/27/nx-s1-5496336/despite-sanctions-many-countries-are-still-importing-russian-products https://www.npr.org/2025/08/27/nx-s1-5496336/despite-sanctio...
- _trampeltier 1y agoThe US still buys a lot more from russia. Also it seems like Exxon returning to russia was an important point inthe Trump / Putin meeting.
- somenameforme 1y agoIt's simple self interest. If you perceive trade as benefiting your interests (which, by definition, would imply not giving your opponent a meaningful edge in the conflict) then you trade. It's the same thing that decides when wars end. Either side is free to surrender or withdraw at any point in a war. They continue fighting when they think that the result they can obtain (win or lose) in the future will be better than the result they can obtain in the present. They stop fighting when that no longer becomes the case, at least assuming non-insane leadership. War isn't the end of relations. It's not infrequent that enemies today are allies tomorrow, or vice versa. Nobody ever knows what tomorrow holds, and history seems to love a nice plot twist.
- calvinmorrison 1y agoAmericans mental assessment of war is that it is an all out slog, you gear up the entire country and fight to the death. Of course, that image is changing as the US continues to engage in protracted conflicts in ponzi states like Afghanistan, Korea and so forth. However - for older nations, especially european ones, war is another tool in the chest of diplomacy, and may not be viewed as 'all encompassing'. To understand that war is just another lever of power can help Americans make better sense of conflicts.
- nradov 1y agoYou're ignoring the principal-agent problem. Even when national leaders aren't technically insane, they will often choose to continue fighting well past the point where it could possibly benefit their country because that suits their own personal interests. So they keep sending their citizens to die because there are no personal consequences.
- seangrogg 1y agoThe GP did not say anything about war continuing due to logical outcomes or nationally-motivated ones. Most wars simply are personal pursuits wrapped in convenient excuses.
- sevensor 1y ago> has its roots in research Grinberg started as a doctoral student at the University of Chicago A reminder that not long ago this was a functioning institution of higher learning.
- f137 1y agoThe article is a bit ambiguous. It mentions "trade via neutrals" in passing, and it is not clear if all or most of examples are trading through neutral states (whether knowingly or not).
- lucas_membrane 1y agoAnyone here know anything about where and how the cotton for bandages for the Union wounded was obtained during the US civil war? India and the Middle East being so distant, I'm guessing that some kind of smuggling or trading happened, but I've never read of it. But I have read of some traveling merchants who were allowed by the Union to exit the areas the Union controlled. Even more postmodern is the likelihood that printers in the Union states propped up the Confederacy by flooding the states in revolt with counterfeit confederate paper money. There being a dearth of competent printers, genuine Confederate cash was so shabby looking that no one would have trusted it, and the Southern economy would have collapsed even sooner than it did because no one would take money like that seriously. But the bogus money from the North was typically so respectable in appearance that it had a street value above the coin of the local realm, giving said revolting realm a stronger medium of exchange. During WWII, one of Hitler's higher ranking underlings let the Allies know that they could spare the lives of a large number of Hungarian persons bound for the death camps in exchange for trucks shipped through Spain, approximately 1 truck for each 10 lives saved, but that offer drew no genuine response.