Most Americans think the Japanese surprise attack on Pearl Harbor was exactly that, a total surprise

And while it’s true the Japanese Navy’s target was unexpectedly audacious, the savvier geopolitical minds of the day saw war between the US and Japan as increasingly inexorable. 

And the proximate causes were the American embargoes in 1940 on scrap iron, steel and especially oil to the Japanese Empire, followed in 1941 by a freeze on Japanese assets in US banks. 

The US was cutting off the blood supply of the heart of a Japanese war machine fighting expansionist conflicts across Manchuria, China and Southeast Asia. 

I'm well aware I'm not the first person to think of this.

When bellicose countries are backed into an economic corner, bad things happen. 

Beijing is just as dependent on foreign oil for its rise to Asian mastery today as Japan was 85 years ago.

Consider all the major conflicts that began as trade disputes: 

The Lelantine War Lelantinska kriget – Wikipedia ; the Punic Wars; the first Byzantine-Bulgarian War; the Anglo-Hanseatic War; the French and Indian War; the Opium Wars; the First Anglo-Dutch War

 and its even more fun sequel; the Battle of Naboo — in fact, more often than not it’s hard to separate economic wars from the shooting kind.

Tobin Harshaw Blomberg 13 april 2025  

https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/newsletters/2025-04-13/trump-tariffs-on-china-spark-a-trade-war-is-real-war-far-behind


US government debt is a safe haven the way Pearl Harbor was a safe haven in 1941. 

Niall Ferguson, FT February 10 2010

https://englundmacro.blogspot.com/2019/08/us-government-debt-is-safe-haven-way.html


Tillbaka till Rolfs länktips 13 april 2025

https://englundmacro.blogspot.com/2025/04/rolfs-lanktips-13-april-2025.html






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