Japan controls a 1200km chain of islands that sits across the Chinese navy’s main routes to the Pacific. In peacetime, Chinese warships sail through the gaps legally, but in a war, the Ryukyu Islands could become a giant wall. With China historically sensitive to being hemmed in by foreign powers, how has Japan managed to control the Ryukyus, and what impact does this have on geopolitical strategy?
Read MoreNorth India and South India share a country, but they speak unrelated languages and grew up on very different land. Today the south holds a disproportionate share of India’s wealth while the north holds a growing share of its people, and India’s first census in sixteen years could shift the balance of power between them. So how did these two Indias form, and what does the tension between them mean for India’s place in the world?
Read MoreWe all know that wars cost money and damage economies. But you probably don’t know that insurance has a shocking amount of influence on conflicts. Imagine if your car insurance charged you extra every time you drove through a dangerous neighborhood, and could raise that charge overnight or refuse to cover you there at all. That’s roughly how ships are insured in war zones, and it can decide whether a shipping company sails through a conflict or goes around it. But how exactly does this influence geopolitics?
Read MoreWhen the Soviet Union collapsed, Ukraine inherited custody of roughly 1900 strategic nuclear warheads. But they gave these up in exchange for security assurances from Russia, the US, and the UK, including a pledge to respect Ukraine’s borders and never use force against it. So would Ukraine have been invaded if they hadn’t given up those nuclear weapons?
Read MoreFrance protests more often, and more disruptively, than almost any other wealthy democracy, with strike days per worker in its private sector alone running about five times Germany’s rate. But while French cabinets come and go, all those riots and fires have never brought down the Fifth Republic itself. So why does France have so many protests, and why are they seemingly not a threat to the country’s overall stability?
Read MoreThe Hungarian language is more closely related to languages spoken in Western Siberia than to any other language in Europe, including its distant cousins Finnish and Estonian. Hungarians are culturally distinct too. But why is Hungary so different from its neighbors, and what impact does it have on geopolitics?
Read MoreNo Ugandan leader has ever lost power in an election since Uganda gained independence in 1962, and the military that decides who’s in charge has become so useful to Western partners that they rarely challenge what it does at home. So how did Uganda become so volatile and militarized, and what impact does it have on geopolitics?
Read MoreIceland has no army, navy, or air force. But at the same time it’s a founding member of NATO. So why is a country without a proper military such a key part of a military alliance?
Read MoreA typical geostationary satellite orbits the Earth roughly over the equator. But a lot of Russian military and intelligence satellites fly very strange orbits that linger far above the Arctic. So why do Russian satellites operate like this, and what impact does it have on geopolitics?
Read MoreMany people only know New Zealand from Lord of the Rings. But geopolitically, it’s a fascinating case, because after decades of hedging between China and the West, it’s moving firmly to one side while tightening its hold on the islands tied to it, behaving less like a neutral small state and more like a regional power. So why are New Zealand’s geopolitical dynamics changing?
Read MoreParaguay is a landlocked country with no oil, no gas, and no coastline, so it has built its leverage another way, by selling electricity and through diplomatic strategy. But why does Paraguay exist to begin with, and what does it have to offer the rest of the world?
Read MoreYou probably don't know that Estonia keeps a copy of its government data in Luxembourg. In fact, it's one of only two countries known to run a data embassy abroad. But why would Estonia want to back up its most sensitive government information in a foreign country, and what can this tell us about Estonia's geopolitical dynamics?
Read MoreGuatemala claims about half the land in neighboring Belize, plus all of its islands, in one of the few live territorial disputes in Latin America today. The International Court of Justice is scheduled to hear oral arguments on the case in February 2027, the last stage before a ruling that could result in dramatic border changes. But why does Guatemala claim so much of Belize to begin with, and how does it shape the region's geopolitics?
Read MoreAndorra is one of the smallest countries in the world, and it has some very strange geopolitical dynamics. While it is sovereign, its two co-princes are always the French president and a bishop selected by the Pope, meaning that Andorrans elect their own government but have no say over who their heads of state are. But why is Andorra set up like this, and what impact is this having on European affairs?
Read MoreIf we look at a map of modern Thailand, we’ll see that it’s wedged between former French and British colonies. But if nearly all of southeast Asia was dominated by foreign powers, why is Thailand the exception, and how does this influence its geopolitical dynamics?
Read MoreFor 29 straight years, the US kept at least one nuclear command and control aircraft in the sky at all times. Each one carried an Air Force general who could take command of the nation's nuclear bombers and missiles if Washington, DC and Strategic Air Command headquarters were destroyed.
Read MoreThere is no capital of the planet Earth. But if there were, it would be New York City, the very city the diplomats who founded the United Nations originally tried to avoid. So how did New York become the world’s de facto capital, and what does this mean for geopolitics?
Read MoreThe Italian peninsula has some of the oldest geopolitical history on the planet. You might think that modern Italy should have grown powerful as a result, but though Italy is in the G7 and is Europe’s second-largest manufacturer, the country is more defined by its burdens than its abilities. So what’s keeping Italy from being geopolitically powerful?
Read MoreIn the year 1900, Africa had about 9.6 million Christians, but today it has around 750m. In many ways, Christianity’s center of gravity has shifted south of the Sahara, where African church leaders are now decisively winning internal fights within the Anglican, Catholic, and Methodist worlds. But why is this happening, and what impact does it have on geopolitics?
Read MoreIf a nuclear missile launched toward the US, it would take 20-30 minutes from an infrared satellite’s first detection to the retaliatory missiles leaving their silos. The president’s actual decision window is compressed to around six minutes, within which they must decide whether the attack is legitimate and how to respond, effectively choosing whether to end the world. But how do these nuclear launch procedures vary from country to country, and what do they reveal?
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