Strategic spillover across regions

This week in a brief

Several conflicts began to affect theaters far removed from where they originated. The war in Iran prompted the United States to redeploy an aircraft carrier from the Indo-Pacific to the Middle East, deepened tensions with China over trade with Tehran, and led European countries to consider protecting maritime traffic through the Strait of Hormuz outside the NATO framework. Meanwhile, the defense pact between Saudi Arabia, Türkiye, and Pakistan is already attracting prospective members, Russia continues to recruit personnel in Africa, and the United States and Canada have moved from negotiations to reciprocal tariffs. At the same time, competition over long-term infrastructure continued across the space, energy, and critical-minerals sectors.

Geopolitical Dynamics

The Makkah Pact begins attracting additional countries: Bangladesh announced that it was favorably considering joining the defense pact signed earlier this month by Saudi Arabia, Türkiye, and Pakistan, following an invitation from Riyadh. Such a move would mark a departure from Bangladesh’s traditional policy of non-alignment and would bring into the alliance another South Asian country located east of India, alongside Pakistan to India’s west. Türkiye also identified Egypt as a potential future member.

The war in Iran strains U.S.–China relations: The United States threatened economic measures against countries that continue trading with Iran, while China declared that it would not yield to American pressure. Beijing remains the principal buyer of Iranian oil, receiving approximately 90% of the crude Iran manages to export. Washington must now decide how far it is prepared to target Chinese entities in order to weaken Iran, even as its relationship with Beijing remains delicately balanced following last year’s trade war.

European countries consider protecting Hormuz shipping outside NATO: NATO’s Supreme Allied Commander Europe convened representatives from allied countries to assess what capabilities they could contribute to protecting freedom of navigation through the Strait of Hormuz. Officials emphasized, however, that no NATO mission is currently under consideration. In parallel, Britain and France are working to establish a coalition of approximately twelve countries that could help protect maritime traffic once conditions permit.

Security and Threats

The war in Iran leaves the Indo-Pacific without a U.S. aircraft carrier: The U.S. aircraft carrier permanently based in Japan was redeployed to the Middle East to replace another carrier that had operated in the region for more than eight months. As a result, the United States has no aircraft carrier in the Indo-Pacific for a limited period. Although Washington continues to maintain substantial air, naval, and ground forces in the region, the redeployment illustrates how a prolonged Middle Eastern campaign consumes assets also intended to deter China.

Taiwan puts wartime preparedness on a long-term budgetary footing: The government proposed increasing the 2027 defense budget by 18%, to approximately $35 billion and more than 3% of GDP. It is also advancing a separate six-year program to acquire roughly 210,000 military drones, alongside missiles, submarines, and other capabilities. Chinese pressure is no longer producing only military exercises and ad hoc procurement. It is now driving a multiyear budgetary framework designed to build asymmetric warfighting capabilities on a large scale.

Russia continues recruiting personnel in Africa for the war in Ukraine: Botswana announced that it had intercepted eight of its citizens en route to Russia and that 22 citizens had already fallen prey to recruitment networks, sometimes presented as employment or training opportunities. Botswana joins a growing list of African countries reporting that their citizens were recruited into the Russian military, in some cases without understanding that they would be sent to the front. Russia’s use of foreign manpower is therefore evolving from an isolated feature of the war into a broader phenomenon requiring African governments to act against recruitment networks operating within their territory.

Economy, Technology and Trade

Denmark puts data centers at the back of the line for electricity: A proposed law would replace the first-come, first-served system for grid connections and allow the government to prioritize infrastructure according to its importance to the economy. Data centers not classified as essential would be placed in the lowest-priority category. Demand for new connections already amounts to several times Denmark’s peak electricity consumption, with data centers accounting for a substantial share. The growth of artificial intelligence is therefore confronting not only semiconductor constraints, but also a more fundamental question: who will receive access to the physical electricity infrastructure?

Brazil becomes a focal point in the search for alternatives to Chinese-controlled mineral supply chains: More than 86% of Brazil’s rare-earth exploration applications were submitted during the past three years, many of them linked to companies from the United States, Australia, and Canada. Brazil holds the world’s second-largest rare-earth reserves, while China controls most global processing capacity. The Brazilian government wants foreign investment to include domestic processing and technology transfer, ensuring that the country does not become merely a supplier of raw materials.

Black Sea disruptions are feeding into global food prices: Intensified attacks on Russian and Ukrainian ports, grain terminals, and commercial vessels have delayed shipments and driven Chicago wheat futures, a global benchmark, up by more than 17% since the beginning of July. Together, Russia and Ukraine account for a significant share of internationally traded wheat. The disruption comes as fertilizer prices are also rising because of instability in the Strait of Hormuz, while adverse weather is damaging crops in other producing regions.

The United States and Canada move from negotiations to reciprocal tariffs: After talks collapsed at the last moment, the United States imposed a 50% tariff on Canadian products valued at approximately $20 billion annually. Canada suspended negotiations and responded with matching tariffs on roughly $20 billion in U.S. goods. The dispute has therefore moved beyond negotiation and into direct disruption of deeply integrated supply chains built over several decades.

Crises and Domestic Politics

Syria dismantles its last major independent military force: The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) announced their dissolution as an independent force following the completion of an agreement to integrate their fighters into the Syrian military. The organization, which controlled large parts of northern and eastern Syria for years and served as a principal U.S. partner in the campaign against ISIS, will now operate under the central chain of command. Combined with the dissolution of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) in Türkiye, the move expands Damascus’s control over organized armed forces within Syrian territory after more than a decade of fragmentation.

Zambia’s electoral crisis becomes an institutional one: The incumbent president was declared the winner with approximately 60% of the vote, but observers raised questions about the counting process and the opposition sought to challenge the result. On the final day for filing electoral petitions, the country’s courts were closed on security grounds following arrests and clashes involving opposition activists. Zambia has long been regarded as one of Southern Africa’s more stable democracies. The manner in which the appeal is handled therefore matters beyond the identity of the election’s winner.

“Surely goodness and mercy shall follow” (Psalm 23).

The Geopolitics Lab Team