This Week’s Hidden Fault Lines: From Kurdistan to the Taiwan Strait

Digital Child Soldiers

Leaked Plans, Laser Wars, and Proxy Power Plays

How We Got Here: Iran and the West (Part 2)

Assassinations, Drones, and Cartels

Bad Magic: When The World Looks Away

How We Got Here: Iran and the West (Part 1)

Cracking Pandora's Box

Enter the Neo-State (Part II)

✌Atomic Handshakes, Strategic Splits

What Comes After Nation-States? (Part I)

Russia's Pearl Harbor?

Ice Breakers 2: Arctic Boogaloo

I'm Not At War, You're At War

Got babies? The Fight for Demography

Last Ditch Diplomacy

Enter the Neo-State (Part II)

As the traditional nation-state model unravels, a new era of governance is emerging—defined by decentralized law, privatized security, and digital identity. This deep dive explores how Gen Z, blockchain, and billionaire technocrats are reshaping power beyond borders. Learn why statehood-as-a-service, jurisdictional arbitrage, and “meta-citizenship” could redefine what it means to belong in the 21st century.

Eric Czuleger

✌Atomic Handshakes, Strategic Splits

Chokepoints, currencies, and kilotons: this week the world’s “little players” keep tugging at great-power threads. Panama walks away from China’s mega-infrastructure club, Nigeria spins up an on-chain naira, Manila rolls out supersonic ship-killers, Red Sea escorts scramble for hulls, and Turkey does a nuclear high-five with Russia.

Eric Czuleger

What Comes After Nation-States? (Part I)

Countries are made up. They're an ideological technology that helped us stop killing one another during feudalism. But they're starting to wear a bit thin, or at least that's what some people think. Here's part one of my exploration of neo-statecraft.

Eric Czuleger

Ice Breakers 2: Arctic Boogaloo

Climate change is melting polar ice. That means it's time to fight over the Arctic. Russia dominates the ice breaking game. NATO sends soldiers to Norway's frosty north. China declares itself a near-arctic country (it's not). And the US debates between recognizing climate change and being ready to win in the frozen north.

Eric Czuleger

The Under Report: Landmines in Finland, Chinese Charm, and Moving Gaza to Africa

NATO is bracing for Russian aggression. China plays hot and cold with its neighbors as US tariffs bite. The US and Israel look for a relocation deal in Africa. Finland prepares to protect its border with Russia.

Somaliland's Gambit: Reshaping the Horn of Africa

Rumblings about new borders being drawn in Africa are always important, however its really big deal when it's on the Horn of Africa. The US has made some overtures towards recognizing the separatist nation north of Somalia, but what does that mean for the region?

All Cloak, No Dagger: This Week in the Gray Zone

France exposes Russian hackers. Sudan's civil war makes it to the Red Sea while New Zealand and Manila have a bloc party. Everyone fights over Lithium in South America and Pakistan tries to take India to court over hydropower plants.

Devil’s Tricks: Politics as a Zero-Sum Game

It's the battle of all against all in the American political landscape. Find out how the the news dissolved a partisan slugfest and how psychological operations pit us against one another.