Michael Hiltzik: How Western sanctions may demolish Putin's 'Fortress Russia'

For years, Vladimir Putin worked assiduously to strengthen what was known as "Fortress Russia," reducing its government debt and building up its reserves of gold and foreign currency as a bulwark against political and economic challenges.

Over the last few days, Fortress Russia has begun to crumble. What looked impregnable up to the moment that Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24 now appears to resemble a Potemkin Village, a reference to the fake settlements purportedly erected to deceive Catherine the Great about the vibrancy of her domain in the 1780s.

In the most significant of international sanctions imposed on the aggressor, the Russian central bank has been blocked from accessing more than $400 billion in foreign reserves held abroad as bank deposits and securities holdings — a massive portion of the .