Have economic sanctions ever succeeded in altering the behavior of authoritarians? It pretty much always just ends up impoverishing the normal people of a country, which authoritarians do not care about.
China and Russia are already working on a SWIFT replacement. All they need to do is not try and use their banks as weapons -- which they don't need to for obvious reasons -- and they're immediately in-line to replace US-centric banking.
"Debanking" in any form is a short-term play with long-term consequences. Were I running a government, I'd be wondering when the US is going to decide that we need a more "democratic" regime, and taking steps to enhance my country's fiscal autonomy as much as possible.
Belt-and-road is going strong in both Africa and South America. Nobody really trusts China as a partner at this time, but the Party[1] in the US has done a great job of convincing the world that Washington is less reliable than Beijing.
[1] The GOP and the Democrats function as a single-party state. Obama beat the war drums just as hard as Bush.
And let's not get started on BRI projects. People always forget they should look at the reasons why Africa is still poor today. They should check for IRS policy and its impact on politics. US and West have no interest in development in Africa. But, when China goes to Africa makes good roads, the US starts to have a problem. If the US is so altruistic, why don't they go to Africa and develop their continent? I think the US just wants them to be poor so, it can enjoy its hegemony forever.
I mean, yeah, that's like saying that water is wet. Every "humanitarian reasons" organization is a smoke screen for some kind of power play.
> I think the US just wants them to be poor so, it can enjoy its hegemony forever.
Nah, I think this is more stupidity than malice. The regime and its staff, in spite of all the travel and internships and all the rest, really are absolutely clueless about the way that the rest of the planet lives.
It can, however convince that your child's empty belly is caused by evil westerners, and the country needs to stand behind Dear Leader to fight against them.
It's not propaganda that the sanctions have deprived them of food. It's the real actuality.
Russia's economy is on the verge of complete cripplement though. It is basically an oil state and an oil state without customers will soon be in massive trouble.