Should Russia be expelled from the SWIFT banking system?

Foreign policy expert Walid Phares told "The Ingraham Angle" on Thursday that there is a "major financial game" between Russia and other countries that do not want to cut Russia off from the SWIFT banking system.

WALID PHARES: The Russian leadership, in order to conduct this operation in Ukraine, did an analysis and realized through this analysis that this administration is not willing to confront them on the strategic level. Just to mention a very important point, there is a major financial game between Germany, other European countries and Russia, and we are partnering with both. We … this administration, Germany and Russia are part of what — the Iran deal. And the Iran deal is not just about $40 billion, but $150 billion and even more than that. So the calculations in Moscow are since you are sitting at the same table with these partners, including our administration and the Biden administration is so much dead-set on going back to the deal. Therefore, their calculation is that we're not going to confront them. But there's a second reason. They saw what we've done in Afghanistan, that we withdraw from Afghanistan and we cut a deal with the Taliban leadership, and that in the eyes and the mind of Putin or the Russian leadership means that we're not ready. This administration is not ready to confront them and Ukraine as well.

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This all indicates that this administration and its partners, the Western partners and probably India, were not ready for what Russia has done, and they were not ready because they didn't even calculate that Russia could do so. There is a reason behind that, and I go back to my first point. There are financial interests worldwide that were put together through the Iran deal, through the trade between Europe and Russia, through the energy issue. Nobody thought that Putin is going to do it and calculate exactly that we're not going to react the way we should.

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