Episode Overview

Podcast: New Books Network
Host: Alfred Marcus
Guest: Edward Fishman, author of Chokepoints: American Power in the Age of Economic Warfare (Portfolio, 2025)
Date: September 23, 2025

In this episode, Alfred Marcus interviews Edward Fishman, a leading expert on economic statecraft and former State Department sanctions advisor, about his new book, Chokepoints. Their conversation explores how the U.S. uses sanctions, export controls, and its dominance in global finance and technology as tools of influence and coercion—redefining geopolitics in what Fishman terms the “age of economic warfare.” The discussion spans recent history, the effectiveness of economic measures against adversaries like Russia, China, and Iran, the global implications of American chokepoints, the emergence of “weaponized interdependence,” and the future of deglobalization.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

Fishman’s Background and the Book’s Origins

• Fishman’s Experience: Work in the State Department during Russia’s first invasion of Ukraine (2014) revealed a policy dichotomy: military assistance vs. sanctions.
  • "When we talked about military assistance ... we had very intense debates ... But when we would talk about the second topic, which was sanctions ... the discussion would kind of just go silent ... I came out of that experience honestly concerned that the U.S. was relying increasingly on tools of economic statecraft like sanctions and export controls to advance its most important foreign policy priorities."
    (Fishman, 03:26)
• Motivation for Writing: Lack of public understanding around sanctions; desire to “demystify economic warfare” for non-experts.
  • "My number one goal for the book is really to demystify economic warfare for as broad of an audience as possible ... it is a book that I'm hopeful any informed citizen can pick up and read through ..."
    (Fishman, 05:21)

Sanctions as “Statecraft”: Efficacy and Limits

• Sanctions vs. Military Force: Sanctions can present an alternative to direct military engagement ("statecraft is really winning without fighting"—Sun Tzu).
  • "The way I view economic warfare, when done correctly, is that it can be an alternative to military force ... you can advance really important national interests without putting American soldiers in harm's way."
    (Fishman, 06:53)
• Iran as a Success: The 2015 Iran nuclear deal is cited as a case where sanctions facilitated nonmilitary resolution.
  • "Both sides agreed that sanctions had worked, that sanctions had actually created a peaceful pathway out of the Iran nuclear crisis."
    (Fishman, 07:56)
• Russia Example: Sanctions haven’t compelled Russia to leave Ukraine, but have meaningfully degraded Russia’s economy and capabilities.
  • “Even when you don't achieve your maximalist objectives, sanctions ... can at the very least hinder the abilities, the capabilities of adversaries like Russia.”
    (Fishman, 09:22)

Measuring Effectiveness: What Makes Sanctions Work?

• Two Categories: 1) Are sanctions advancing a real policy goal? 2) Are they causing economic pain?
  • Examples:
    • Iran: Sanctions aimed to force nuclear negotiations.
    • Russia: Weaken adversary’s economy, even if objectives aren’t fully met.
    • China: Export controls to maintain Western tech dominance (Nvidia chips, semiconductors).
  • "A core thesis of my book Choke Points is that because of the nature of the integrated global economy ... the U.S. does have control over very important parts of the global economy and can use that to incredible benefit."
    (Fishman, 10:37)
• Blind Spots: The most effective sanctions on Russia (oil exports) have not been fully implemented due to U.S. and allied concerns about oil prices and inflation (Biden), and other geo-economic considerations (Trump).
  • "You know, today the circumstances are completely different ... I think right now the Trump administration has actually quite a bit of flexibility to target Russian oil sales."
    (Fishman, 13:15)

The Global Choke Points: U.S. Leverage and Limits

The Dollar as the Ultimate Choke Point

• Financial System: Most cross-border transactions rely on USD; U.S. can seize or block transfers via correspondent banking in New York.
  • "The dollar ... is the most important choke point in the global economy, and that's why the US has been the principal and most powerful user of economic sanctions in the last several decades."
    (Fishman, 19:56)
  • "Even when two non U.S. companies are dealing with each other ... those cross border flows are going to go through the dollar."
    (Fishman, 21:07)
• Enforcement Mechanisms: Blocking banks from using U.S. correspondent accounts effectively excludes targets from global finance.
  • "If the U.S. then says well guess what, you can't do a business with them, then there's no way for you to get through the dollar."
    (Fishman, 22:57)

Technology Control

• The U.S. also wields power via “frontier technologies”—AI chips, semiconductors, cloud computing (AWS, Azure, Google Cloud).
• China has established its own chokepoints, notably in rare earth mineral processing ("winning card" in the 2025 trade spat).
  • "I think what we're seeing now ... is that as the US has popularized economic warfare ... other countries really have started emulating the United States."
    (Fishman, 24:15)

Evasion, Adaptation, and Blowback

Russian Oil Sales & “Sanctions Busting”

• Russia sells oil to India and China because U.S. hasn't imposed secondary sanctions cutting off their banks/refineries from the dollar.
  • "There are no sanctions on Russian oil sales to India or China. To ... impede those types of sales, you would need what's called secondary sanctions ..."
    (Fishman, 14:49)
• These sales occur at a discount due to limited global demand for Russian oil, benefiting Indian and Chinese refiners.
  • “…they are literally just taking advantage of an arbitrage opportunity that exists in the market."
    (Fishman, 16:57)

Limits on Effectiveness

• Overuse of sanctions meets diminishing returns and accelerates the search for alternatives (resilience and countermeasures by adversaries).
  • "The general threat of all these sanctions, is that the Chinese will just become more independent of the United States, and then the sanctions will have very limited use."
    (Marcus, 27:52)
• Fishman’s “geoeconomic impossible trinity”: Only two of three—geopolitical competition, economic interdependence, economic security—can coexist.
  • "We are living in an age of economic warfare that really started early in the 21st century and has only accelerated since. This is all because of hyper globalization."
    (Fishman, 28:07)

Historical Context and Modern Uniqueness

• Precedents exist (WWII, Japanese push for resource independence, 1930s autarky), but today’s scale of economic integration—especially with China—makes decoupling politically and economically painful.
  • "It seems to me, though, that in the current global economy there's so much interdependence, especially with China, that it's really fundamentally different than the Cold War."
    (Marcus, 33:49)
• Fishman warns that economic interdependence doesn’t always prevent conflict; sometimes it exacerbates tensions.
  • "Economic interdependence does not necessarily prevent conflict. Right. And in some ways it can actually increase the possibilities of conflict if there's more and more friction among ... trading partners."
    (Fishman, 34:38)

China, Tech, and New Frontlines

Tech Giants as Vulnerabilities

• Huawei: Direct security threat via telecom infrastructure (“could manipulate that infrastructure, could spy on communications”; 44:01).
• TikTok: National security risk due to CCP algorithmic influence over U.S. users and data profiling.
  • "Huawei's telecom gear is a national security threat ... TikTok ... the threat about TikTok is ... this is an algorithm that's controlled by the ccp ... building these incredibly detailed psychological profiles of our youth here in the United States."
    (Fishman, 44:05-45:30)

Human Costs, Ethics, and Policy Choices

• Collateral Damage: Sanctions rarely target elites only; ordinary people usually bear the brunt, fueling anti-Americanism and potentially backfiring.
  • "The concept that sanctions are going to hurt elites and hurt leaders more than average people is totally a myth ... sanctions always are going to affect regular people, middle class, poor people, more than the elites."
    (Fishman, 46:27)
• Rouhani & Iran Nuclear Deal: Shows the need to offer real relief when deals are struck or risk undermining reformers ("if they cut a nuclear deal with the U.S. but then they didn't get economic relief, it would discredit the peace party"; 47:44).
• Limits of Precision: Symbolic “targeted” sanctions achieve little; only measures that hurt the “commanding heights” really alter adversary calculus.
  • "Can you just do purely symbolic sanctions ...? Yeah, you can ... it'll make you feel good ... but ... it's going to have absolutely zero impact on their lives."
    (Fishman, 49:10)

Corporate and Economic Perspectives

• Businesses and Deglobalization: U.S. companies need to reduce dependencies on adversaries, but Trump’s unpredictability makes “safe” zones hard to identify.
  • "The companies that succeed today are going to be the ones that figure out how to reduce their dependence on geopolitical adversaries like China and Russia."
    (Fishman, 52:19)
• Economists vs Realpolitik: Economic efficiency isn't always the guiding principle; economic security and national security can “trump” optimization.
  • “It’s not so much that economists are wrong, it's that there are variables that go beyond dollars and cents that sometimes frankly trump our economic incentives.”
    (Fishman, 54:07)

The Future: De-dollarization and New Risks

• Digital Currencies & Erosion of Dollar Power: The rise of gold, Bitcoin, central bank digital currencies, and stablecoins may gradually chip away at the dollar’s dominance and American leverage.
  • "I think the greater threat is that on each of these different metrics, you have alternatives that kind of gradually chip away at the dollar's sort of dominance."
    (Fishman, 57:04)
• Maintaining Primacy: The U.S. can avoid declining influence if it innovates and adapts, as it did after leaving the gold standard in 1971.
  • "It's not so much that the dollar is being replaced, it's that it risks erosion ... now is the time really for the US to try to seize the mantle for the next international financial system, or else we might lose it."
    (Fishman, 57:47)

Notable Quotes & Timestamps

• On policymaking culture:
  "When we would talk about ... sanctions ... frequently the discussion would kind of just go silent ... even at the center of power, we had enough understanding of how these tools work." —Edward Fishman (03:26)

• On the limits of sanctions:
  "Even when you don't achieve your maximalist objectives, sanctions ... can at the very least hinder the capabilities of adversaries like Russia." —Edward Fishman (09:22)

• On the dollar's centrality:
  "The dollar is the most important choke point in the global economy ... the U.S. has been the principal and most powerful user of economic sanctions." —Edward Fishman (19:56)

• On China’s response:
  "What we're seeing now ... is that as the U.S. has popularized economic warfare ... other countries really have started emulating the United States. We have an economic arms race." —Edward Fishman (24:15)

• On ethical tradeoffs:
  "Sanctions always affect regular people ... more than the elites ... we should be using these tools only when there's a vital U.S. national security interest." —Edward Fishman (46:27)

• On the risk of autarky and war:
  "Autarkic mentality over time could lead to more warfare." —Edward Fishman (33:13)

• On business adaptation:
  "The companies that succeed today are going to be the ones that figure out how to reduce their dependence on geopolitical adversaries." —Edward Fishman (52:19)

• On dollar dominance and digital currency threats:
  "It's not so much that the dollar is being replaced, it's that it risks erosion, and ... now is the time for the U.S. to seize the next international financial system, or else we might lose it." —Edward Fishman (57:47)

Timestamps for Important Segments

• Fishman’s background and origins of Chokepoints — 03:16–06:25
• Sanctions as alternative to war — 06:24–09:40
• Effectiveness of sanctions: Iran vs Russia — 09:40–12:36
• Dollar dominance and mechanics of enforcement — 19:33–23:04
• Other chokepoints: technology, rare earths, economic arms race — 23:16–25:27
• Global adaptation and business risk in age of sanctions — 26:03–28:07
• Historical context: autarky, interwar period — 29:22–34:38
• China technology/Espionage: Huawei and TikTok — 42:37–45:47
• Ethics and unintended consequences of sanctions — 46:27–51:08
• Business and economist perspective; necessity of deglobalization — 52:19–55:28
• Future threats: de-dollarization, digital currencies — 56:42–59:09

Closing

Edward Fishman’s Chokepoints offers a timely, insider’s account of how economic tools became America’s primary instrument of global influence—and the risks ahead as rivals adapt and global commerce fragments. This dense yet accessible conversation underscores why understanding the mechanics and ethics of sanctions, export controls, and financial dominance is now essential citizenship.

Recommended For: Business leaders, policymakers, global affairs analysts, students of international relations, and anyone seeking to grasp the real-world dynamics of 21st-century economic warfare.