“Our intent is not to crash the Russian economy,” the official told reporters Friday. “Our intent is to make it impossible for the Kremlin to continue to make the choice of propping up the economy and also paying for their war.”
“The thing that we’re focused on is cutting off the revenue,” the official said. “We’re also going after their military industrialized complex and supply chain so they can’t use the money they have to buy the weapons they need. Our approach to this is really to go after the things that are crucial to the Kremlin’s war effort and their ability to prop up their economy.”
Officials shrugged off reports that, despite numerous sanctions, Russia’s economy is still expected to rebound and may even outpace Germany and Great Britain. The senior Treasury official said economically, the country “doesn’t function any longer like a normal economy.”
“They’ve shut it down largely, meaning that if you have money of Russia, they’ll let you keep putting money in Russia, but you can’t take money out. They no longer allow foreign capital coming into Russia,” the official said. “They’re needing to spend more money to prop up their economy because they become a closed…
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