The US is constantly and historically the ones propping up dictators all over the world. AND we have done it while people of those nations have either legitimately voted for the opposite, and/or were fighting for their freedom from colonial powers/dictators. We actively fund and create false narratives inside nations that we don't like to start color revolutions. We force other nations into backing brutal sanctions if they don't want us to go after them and to be allowed to trade with us. Our military is literally installed all over the globe, but we claim nations like China are somehow being "aggressive" for even patrolling their own areas. We create and groom evil and gaslight the world that we are somehow just allowed to police the globe. Fuck yourself.
It doesn't though. Raising costs by forcing a country to dodge sanctions is very effective. A supply will never entirely dry up, but it will shrink and become more expensive, and that's enough.
Though of course, sanctioning less developed countries like Cuba, Venezuela, DPRK, and Afganistan does successfully greatly harm their working-class population, and it has.
It's just speeding up dedollarisation at this point. Trade is increasingly done in other currencies because the US dollar is just a minefield of sanctions and regulations. The US had this power back when they produced everything people needed, but nowadays everything's coming from China, so why involve a third party in your trade that can freeze your accounts for no reason?
This is hilarious because Iran is already sanctioned to hell and back. G7 really has one tool and that's it. So glad my country joined BRICS and made peace with Iran.
I like the idea of economic incentives and I think they're extremely effective, although the ones on the other end of them usually take years before they start to feel the full effects.
What people seem to not be noticing is that effectively the Global North is sanctioning itself. Meanwhile the Global South is making its own plans without them.