Reply #33: Everyone has an opinion.

[bemildred]

I remember well reading articles about the difficulties of the dying empire
with being a "service economy" and loss of manufacturing base and the
associated good jobs and so on, and the corresponding erosion of the pound.
There was a good deal of blather about loss of moral fiber and such too.

It seems to be a common way for imperial/colonial economies to crater out,
and one can see why. A colonial arrangement inevitable distorts an economy
and reduces it's autonomy and robustness under stress, fills it with "leaders" used
to cheap easy solutions based on screwing the natives, so when things change
big adjustments are required, living standards fall, rebellions happen and so on.

Another fellow I talked to some time back pointed out Spain after we kicked their
ass in the Spanish-American was as a possible example of what could happen here.

Edit: WRT the other thing, currencies, Russia is not a big player in keeping the dollar
anywhere, and it's unlikely to do anything without coordinating with it's other EurAsian
peers, even the oil switch will be done in a measured and coordinated way.