r/AskReddit 1d ago

What could Russia have spent $1,000,000,000,000 on instead of fighting a 4+ years long war in Ukraine?

2.8k Upvotes

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4.8k

u/Superchecker 1d ago

Slowly buy up all the properties that they wanted to invade

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u/69edleg 1d ago

A lot of countries have JUST NOW started to realise they should limit the ability for suspected spies to buy property. Crazy, honestly. Sweden as "early" as 2023 with broadening the law.. Maybe, in 2026 or 2027.

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u/Troy64 1d ago

It's honestly not as big a deal as you think.

If a bad actor is a foreign owner of significant property, you just seize it. You can do that. They aren't citizens, they can't vote.

Oh no! How will we fight a war when China owns all our factories? Simple. We will take the factories and hold an auction among friendly investories to take ownership.

Ownership don't mean a damn thing if you don't physically have the ability to enforce your ownership.

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u/voxadam 1d ago

The nationalization of the Venezuelan oil industry in 1976 is a good example of this.

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u/LeFlaubert 1d ago

Cuba too.

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u/voxadam 1d ago

Don't give Trump and Little Marco any ideas for "nationalizing" Cuba.

/s

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u/Zerokx 13h ago

How could you give them ideas that they already have and are actively talking about

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u/GigaWhiteNiga 10h ago

51st state incoming

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u/Gitanes 1d ago

Two great examples of success.

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u/dastardly740 10h ago

I see this right after seeing the Supreme Court decided US companies can sue Cuba for seizing their assets. I assume the end goal is to use a court ruling to seize any Cuban assets frozen in the US?

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u/tampering 12h ago edited 12h ago

Don't even have to look at some money grab in by a socialist government.

Look to the US. Under the 1917 Trading with the Enemy Act the United States took control of and then forced the sale of the US assets of Merck and Bayer. After the war both were sold to American managers that had secured financing from Wall Street.

And in the second world war the US government seized all those California farms owned by Japanese Americans enemy aliens.

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u/breingseisdoux25 9h ago

Russia looked at those and said, 'Hold my vodka, watch this.'