GEOINT
Geopolitical intelligence covering global alliances, international relations, foreign policy, and emerging threats.
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After disputes culminated in fighting last week, the country’s political system is in doubt.
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Dusting a Dirt Road: How The United States Can Break the Cycle of Failing Military Infrastructure
Winter Storm Uri ripped through Texas in January 2021. The frigid temperatures froze pipes, which then burst and caused flooding in aging barracks at Fort Hood, many of which were overdue for renovations and had vulnerable mechanical and utility systems. The burst pipes, damaged sprinkler systems, and frozen heating, ventilation, and air conditioning coils affected over 30 barracks, forcing soldiers to relocate and causing nearly $50 million in damage.According to the Department of Defense’s reporting, the United States owns and operates more than 700,000 facilities across nearly 5,000 sites at home and abroad. Much of this infrastructure is aging. Nearly
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Armenians Vote Under Russia’s Shadow
Trump and Putin are backing different players in a contested country. -
The Pentagon’s AI Edge Is Being Distilled Away
Adversaries do not need to breach the Pentagon’s systems: They only need to harvest the logic of the publicly released frontier AI models that underpin them. This is a defining risk as the Department of Defense pivots to an “AI-first” warfighting machine. In this new context, military predominance is a derivative of AI model supremacy. From Project Maven’s intelligence fusion to the high-velocity sensor-to-shooter loops of Anduril’s Lattice, the Defense Department’s most advanced systems are tethered to the frontier models forged by tech heavyweights like Anthropic, Google, and OpenAI. As long as these firms hold the high ground in the
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Trump’s New ‘Forced Labor’ Tariffs Are a Fig Leaf
The new import duties are “a solution in search of a problem.” -
Is Time on China’s Side? Beijing’s Taiwan Calculus and the Balance of Power
When is the risk of war the highest? And what should the United States be doing about it? One of the most important but underappreciated questions in international politics is how states think about the future balance of power. Countries that believe their position is improving often choose patience. Those who fear their position is deteriorating may feel pressure to act before their advantages disappear. In this episode, Ryan is joined by Dean Cheng, Mira Rapp-Hooper, and Amanda Hsiao to explore how Chinese leaders may be thinking about time, power, and Taiwan. This episode is sponsored by Kibu, which ensures you always know
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Building a Better Ukraine Requires Accessibility Reforms
Welcome to The Ukraine Compass, a weekly digest of Ukrainian commentary and analysis from across the political spectrum only for War on the Rocks members. Each Monday, we bring you a curated selection of articles from Ukrainian media offering insight into how Ukrainians themselves debate the issues shaping their country.American coverage often narrows the view to the battlefield — these pieces widen it, revealing the texture of daily life, politics, and public argument in a nation at war. The perspectives gathered here are varied, candid, and often surprising, together forming a more complete picture of Ukraine as it really is.Frontline and StrategyГазета— Gazeta
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Pakistan’s Diplomatic Pivot Makes It a Trump-Era Power Player
Islamabad is happy to give the U.S. president the image he craves. -
How America Lost Its Most Important Defense Tech Habit
On April 15, technology podcaster Dwarkesh Patel published a two-hour interview with Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang. For roughly forty minutes, Patel asked one question six different ways. The question was this: If American-made compute trains AI models with the serious cyber-offensive capabilities Anthropic’s Mythos Preview demonstrated — and that compute is sold to a strategic adversary — what responsibility does the seller bear?Huang’s answers hovered a safe distance away from the question. AI is a “five-layer cake,” he told Patel, and ceding any layer to China would be industrial suicide. The Chinese, he argued, already have enough compute to do
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U.N. Blacklists Israel, Russia for Sexual Violence in Conflict
Both countries have refuted the allegations and accused the agency of bias.
