NATO Edge 26 in Izmir merges civilian tech with war-fighting. AI, cloud, cybersecurity now serve the military-industrial complex.

Contact us: info@strategic-culture.su

The summit NATO held in Ankara in July continues to make its impact felt in our country — a summit marked by the lockdown of the city, red carpets rolled out for imperialist leaders, Janissary marches, the narrative of a “great Turkey” constructed around hosting the event, and arrests that continue to keep people behind bars.

As has often been pointed out, the July summit marked the beginning of a “new era” both internationally and for our country.

It looks like we will be discussing this important turning point for a long time to come. Meanwhile, NATO’s “work” in our country is not yet finished. Another critical NATO event is approaching, one that has received little attention in the mainstream media — and when it does, it will once again be framed through the narrative of “Turkey’s importance”: NATO Edge 26…

NATO Edge 26, which will be held in Izmir in November 2026, is being promoted using concepts such as “innovation,” “readiness,” and “the security of the future.” Or, to put it in plain language: the marketing and integration of military technologies, the defense industry, and war-fighting capacity…

The official promotional text of the event, organized by the NATO Communications and Information Agency (NCIA), lays out its purpose quite clearly:

“NATO Edge 26 will focus on strengthening NATO’s readiness and war-fighting capacity through faster, smarter, and more scalable collaboration with industry.

…NCIA is excited to carry this legacy forward in Türkiye in 2026 and take the event a step further with a renewed format focused on delivering effective solutions and prioritizing industry partnerships.

Industry participation will be at the heart of the 2026 edition, providing more opportunities for direct engagement, focused information sessions, a more comprehensive understanding of NATO’s upcoming procurement requirements and priorities, as well as greater opportunities to showcase industry solutions to NATO decision-makers, end users, and potential partners.”

A military ecosystem operating according to market logic, with partnerships and participation at its core. Defense companies, states and military commands are expanding their cooperation in order to strengthen “war readiness”…

What exactly is NATO Edge?

NATO Edge is the flagship technology event of NATO’s technology and cybersecurity center, the NATO Communications and Information Agency (NCI Agency).

“Edge” can be translated into Turkish as “edge,” “frontier,” “advantage,” “superiority,” or, depending on the context, “cutting-edge” or “advanced.”

It was first held in 2022 in Mons, Belgium. The event was created by merging two previously separate events: the NATO Information Assurance Symposium (NIAS) and an industry conference known as NITEC.

According to NATO’s official documents, NIAS focused on cybersecurity, while NITEC carried the technology-and-industry dimension. In other words, NATO Edge explicitly targets both the technology and industry/commercial spheres.

At the first event, held in Mons, Belgium, on October 25–27, 2022, more than 2,100 registered participants and over 100 companies took part in the exhibition area. The program included topics such as the use of artificial intelligence in military applications, cybersecurity, and digital transformation.

At the second event, held in Tampa, Florida, in the United States, on December 3–5, 2024, cloud technologies, cybersecurity, artificial intelligence, and the strategic use of resources were discussed. According to NCIA’s 2024 annual report, approximately 60 percent of participants came from industry, while 31 percent represented NATO, governments, and armed forces.

This picture is a clear indication that artificial intelligence technology — whose development in the United States has accelerated since the early 2000s and exploded in recent years — is being systematically taken up by the military-industrial complex.

Moreover, this system has been developed directly under NATO’s military leadership, in cooperation with civilian industry, using resources so vast that civilian initiatives seeking to use technology — particularly artificial intelligence — “for the benefit of humanity” cannot compete with them.

In the United States, for example, many companies unable to find investment have begun receiving funding from military institutions such as the CIA and NATO and developing technologies under their direction. The fact that the CIA has been the “first investor” in numerous technology startups is a striking example of this system.

In short, the path of technological development has largely been left at the mercy of military leadership and the American technology giants.

A similar picture will emerge at NATO Edge 26. Many small startups participating in the event will seek agreements with major players and attempt to secure financing from them. Naturally, this will come at the price of working for NATO’s military interests.

For the “domestic, national, and highly nationalist” technology companies whose numbers have grown tremendously in our country in recent years, the “justification” is equally clear: Turkey is now a country on the verge of a major breakthrough, hosting major international events, supposedly becoming not their subordinate but their master, and possessing qualities that make it indispensable to everyone… So why not devote all our strength and labor to the strategy drawn up by NATO? We will make money, and we will take yet another step forward in a world order in which we are already supposedly such an important player…

This is more or less the logic behind the seemingly contradictory and irrational rhetoric of the Turkish defense industry about “challenging the world” and its actions that ultimately amount to working for imperialist powers.

Put simply, NATO Edge is precisely the embodiment of this logic through events, sessions, and corporate exhibition stands.

Why is it being held in Izmir?

NCIA has not given a specific reason for choosing Izmir as the venue for NATO Edge 26. However, it is possible to understand why Izmir was chosen by looking at the institution’s own documents.

First, a NATO Industry Forum was held during the Ankara Summit on July 7–8, where new procurement decisions worth tens of billions of dollars were announced. The decisions taken by NATO in July are intended to translate the political and financial commitments made in Ankara into operational capacity, while in Izmir, NATO and industry are to work together to accelerate that capacity.

Second, the Ankara Summit adopted a new Strategy for Industry-NATO Cooperation (SYNC). This document moves the NATO-industry relationship to an earlier stage. Through this mechanism, companies will not merely submit bids for tenders that have already been announced; they will be brought into the process from the point at which future capacity requirements are identified.

Third, the Turkish Ministry of National Defense presented NATO Edge 26 as an event aimed at “the international promotion and increased visibility of the Turkish defense industry’s ‘high-tech’ capabilities.” NCIA also signed, during the Turkish Industry Day it organized in Türkiye, one of the first contracts of its history concerning the modernization of very-low-frequency air-surveillance equipment for Allied Maritime Command with ASELSAN.

In other words, Izmir should be viewed not merely as an “event venue,” but as a point of contact for tying Turkey more tightly into imperialism’s defense-technology supply chain.

This is also where NATO Edge 26 differs most significantly from previous meetings. NCIA is openly telling companies: “You can learn about NATO’s requirements before they become official tender specifications,” while offering more than €1 billion in upcoming “NATO procurement opportunities.”

NATO Edge 26 is creating an early-stage matching mechanism between NATO’s military requirements and the private sector’s product-development and investment decisions.

Who is taking part?

The official NATO Edge participant list is still being updated, and in its publicly visible format, not all of the more than 270 companies known to be participating appear simultaneously. Nevertheless, a number of notable companies can be confirmed either through the official list or through the companies’ own NATO Edge announcements. Names appearing on the official list include Airbus, AWS, Anduril, ASELSAN, ASFAT, BAE Systems Digital Intelligence, BlackBerry, Booz Allen Hamilton, Cisco, Cloudflare, Broadcom, Armis Federal/ServiceNow, Atos, and Barikat Cyber Security.

Among the industry speakers on the program are Helsing co-founder and CEO Gundbert Scherf, Planet Labs CEO Will Marshall, UiPath founder Daniel Dines, AWS Global Defense executive Christian Hoff, Leonardo technology executive Alessandro Massa, Thales cortAIx Factory executive Mickael Brossard, and BlackBerry Chief Security Advisor Christine Gadsby.

The danger of ‘dual-use’

One of the concepts that stands out particularly in NATO’s 2026 event materials is “dual-use” technology.

NATO Deputy Secretary General Jean-Charles Ellermann-Kingombe said that NATO Edge 26 would be particularly attractive to “companies that have a credible military application alongside their primary commercial business.” In other words, NATO is no longer targeting only traditional defense companies; it is also targeting technologies that can be transferred from the commercial market into the military sphere.

What this means is that a technology company no longer needs to be a “weapons company” from the outset. A company can operate in data analytics, satellite imagery, cloud systems, communications, artificial intelligence, cybersecurity, automation, or computing, while simultaneously entering the NATO system and working for NATO.

This significantly broadens the scope of what has long been described as the “militarization of technology.”

The NATO Edge 26 participant profile makes this clear. On one side are defense giants such as Airbus, Anduril, ASELSAN, Leonardo, and Thales; on the other are civilian technology companies such as AWS, Cisco, Cloudflare, Broadcom, BlackBerry, UiPath, and Planet Labs.

In other words, military technology no longer means merely “producing military products for armies”; it increasingly means placing the products you create at the service of military interests.

How are the market and militarization being merged?

In this new system, in which the private sector is also being drawn into the defense industry, the formula is clear:

Public funding, NATO demand, corporate investment, technology development, military integration, public procurement, larger-scale production, new investment…

At this point, we need to make a brief detour. Combining private enterprise with military requirements, when military needs are given priority, means the emergence of new economic crises in capitalist societies. Because this entire chain of needs will ultimately be paid for at the expense of workers and their social needs, which are placed at the bottom of the priority list.

The competitive strength of the People’s Republic of China (PRC), which has made its own breakthroughs in artificial intelligence, technology, and military technology, stems not only from those advances but also from the leadership of the Communist Party, which directs the public and private sectors from a single center. What provides China’s “speed,” as well as the threat it represents to the Atlantic alliance, is the Party’s control over and direction of the private sector.

This “threat” posed by China is pushing capitalism to take faster and harsher steps in new areas of civilian-military cooperation similar to Edge.

The ‘domestic and national industry’ is being tied to the NATO market

The enthusiasm of the “domestic and national industry” mentioned above is also being directly tied, under this new system, to the NATO market and its military requirements.

It is repeatedly argued that Turkey is expanding its own defense industry. But what kind of expansion is this?

The defense industry is being internationalized through NATO standards, NATO procurement mechanisms, NATO operational requirements, and access to the NATO market.

For this reason, “domestic production” and “NATO integration” do not necessarily have to be opposites. On the contrary, under today’s model, the two can take place simultaneously. The “domestic” character being referred to is, for a country whose entire military strategy has already been built for years in accordance with NATO interests, a very particular kind of domesticity.

Interestingly, a June 2026 announcement by the Aegean Region Chamber of Industry reveals that the quota initially allocated for 100 booths for Turkish defense-industry organizations at the event was reduced to 40 after fewer applications than expected were received from domestic companies.

This data is important in two respects.

First, the assumption that the Turkish defense industry is automatically and intensively turning toward the NATO market does not apply equally to every company. It is possible to guess which types of companies can afford to apply.

Second, it shows that presenting NATO Edge 26 simply as a “giant exhibition opening all of Turkey’s defense companies to the world” does not reflect reality.

What does the Ukraine connection show?

NATO Edge 26 also contains important signals regarding the war in Ukraine. Although our country has repeatedly sought to position itself as a mediator at every major turning point in the Russia-Ukraine war, it is quite clear that no one — NATO above all — has taken this intention seriously.

Among the Edge participants are Ukraine’s Ministry of Defense Innovation and Defense Technology Development Center and Brave1. Established in 2023, Brave1 is an official platform through which the Ukrainian government brings together defense-technology developers, the military, investors, and technology companies. Their participation also means that NATO will directly transfer the technological experience of the war in Ukraine into its own innovation ecosystem.

This, too, is no coincidence. Under the UNITE–Brave NATO program, NATO and Ukraine have already established a joint contract pool worth a total of €10 million, with plans to expand the program to as much as €50 million in subsequent stages.

Whose interests is technology serving?

Treating NATO Edge 26 in Izmir simply as an event where next-generation weapons, artificial intelligence applications, or digital defense systems are put on display would be a serious oversimplification. The “bigger picture” shows civilian and military capacities being merged into the same pool, with companies, states, military institutions, and technology developers jointly participating in the construction of a new war-fighting capacity under the name of “partnership.”

Thus, the scope of war ceases to be limited to weapons systems used on the battlefield; data, artificial intelligence, cloud systems, communications, satellite technologies, software, and logistics are all becoming components of war preparation and military planning.

From the perspective of our country, it is possible to say that Ankara’s “domestic and national” rhetoric points toward NATO’s requirements, standards, procurement mechanisms, and international defense-industry networks. The limits of the narrative that Turkey is an independent power capable of challenging the world through its own defense industry are ultimately being determined by the decisions taken at NATO events.

At the same time, events of this kind once again expose another reality that Marxists have repeatedly pointed out — and repeatedly demonstrated in practice: how conditional capitalism’s rhetoric of the “free market” really is.

When the issue is war and military requirements, the traditional claim that the market should be left to its own devices can suddenly be pushed into the background. Production capacity can be directed according to strategic priorities, and private capital can be encouraged to work for “security” needs.

In short, the “real question” posed by NATO Edge 26 is not which new technology is being developed, but according to whose needs, according to which political and economic priorities, and ultimately in whose service this technological capacity is being developed.

People involved in organized struggle used to be told: “Forget all this, get yourself a job first.” Now the phrase has changed: “Forget politics, we are living in the age of artificial intelligence — learn technology.”

And yet, although technological development and changing times transform the tools and needs at our disposal, they do not change the fact that the ruling classes use every instrument of “progress” to preserve their power.

From this perspective, the political purpose underlying the monopolization of artificial intelligence by military and economic giants is the same as the purpose underlying the control of machinery by the owners of capital in the early stages of the Industrial Revolution.

In our country, where changing times, tools, and needs are pregnant with major crises, these “devilish deals” to be made in Izmir will open the door to yet another new era.

Ultimately, NATO Edge 26 is a contemporary example not only of technological development itself, but of the organization of technology for “pre-war” purposes and the socialization of its costs — that is, the shifting of those costs onto the backs of working people.

Our political predecessors, who once observed what the giant machines in factories were actually being used for alongside production, also passed down to us what needed to be done in response.

What needs to be built today is the stick that will be thrust into the digital gears of our age.

If the door that Moscow says is open is actually closed, it’s closed on this side – and it wasn’t Rome that closed it of its own accord.

Contact us: info@strategic-culture.su

A Valdai summit off-site

What I’m going to share in this article is less technical and more personal than usual. It concerns the information gathered over several days of dialogue, discussion, and, apparently, a “scandalous” question that became a media sensation in Europe – because I asked the President of the Russian Federation, Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin, what will become of Europe.

You can find the full video of Vladimir Putin’s speech at the Valdai Forum here.

You can find my remarks and Putin’s responses here.

This year, the Valdai Forum did not meet in Sochi. Invitations sent out in the summer still listed the Black Sea city as the venue, but then, in late August, the organizers announced the move to the Moscow region. According to FT, the Federal Protective Service demanded the relocation, concerned about the threat of Ukrainian drones following a summer of attacks on coastal refineries. This logistical detail carries its own weight. The war – which at Valdai is always discussed in the language of the international system – is now also influencing the practical organization of the forum.

The 23rd Annual Meeting took place from September 28 to October 1 under a title that to a European sounds almost like a personal question: “Responsibility for the Future: The Limits of the Possible or Limitless Possibilities?” The opening featured the Club’s annual report, Keep Calm. The State and Responsibility for the Future, which the authors present – with a nod to Kubrick – as a manual for stopping worrying and learning to love chaos. This was followed by nine thematic sessions, a special session, and, on the final day, the plenary session with the President.

I arrived as an Italian and a European, knowing that in those halls, the two identities carry different weight. Over the course of the week, I spoke, in particular, with four high-level interlocutors: Sergey Karaganov, Maksim Oreshkin, Sergey Lavrov, and, during the plenary session, Vladimir Putin. The first three conversations took place on the sidelines of the sessions, and I’m recounting them from my notes – in essence, not word for word. The fourth exchange is public and documented by a transcript, from which I’m quoting directly.

Taken one by one, the four dialogues convey things that anyone following the Russian debate is already familiar with. When viewed in sequence, however, they paint a clearer picture: a shared assessment of Europe and four different ways of drawing conclusions from it. And, above all, a future that is by no means bright.

Karaganov: Europe as the source of evil

Sergei Karaganov is one of the founders of the Valdai Club, honorary chairman of the Council on Foreign and Defense Policy, and for years has been the most radical voice of Russian realism. With him, the conversation began immediately with the most contentious point. Europe, he said, is the root of all evil. If it were destroyed, no one would mourn it. A tactical nuclear conflict on its territory would not involve other actors. Europeans have had plenty of time to find a solution to their own problems; now that they have chosen to prepare for war against Russia, it is too late to offer them another chance.

I must be honest: I’ve never been a fan of Karaganov; I’ve often found his views too radical and old-fashioned. But starting with an after-lunch coffee together – and continuing over the course of a week of discussions – I discovered that we think very similarly and that his views are by no means trivial. Anyone who has read his recent statements will recognize this line of thinking. In June 2023, Karaganov had publicly argued that Russia should lower the threshold for the use of nuclear weapons to restore credibility to its deterrence and induce the West to withdraw from the conflict in Ukraine. Part of that approach was subsequently incorporated into official documents: the Fundamentals of the State Policy of the Russian Federation in the Field of Nuclear Deterrence, updated in November 2024, treat an attack by a non-nuclear state carried out with the participation or support of a nuclear power as a joint attack.

His words, however, contain three distinct assertions, and it is worth keeping them separate. The first is a historical and civilizational judgment: Europe as the source of modernity’s great catastrophes, from the world wars to colonialism. This is a thesis that Karaganov has long argued and which can be contested, but it belongs to the realm of interpretation. The second – that no one would mourn Europe – is a prediction about others’ reactions; from what I observed during those days, it resonates with a significant portion of the Asian, African, and Latin American participants. The third is a strategic hypothesis that underpins everything else: a nuclear escalation in Europe would remain confined to Europe.

On this point, the literature on deterrence has been debating for seventy years, and – fortunately – empirical evidence is lacking. The factor that complicates this hypothesis lies within Europe itself. France and the United Kingdom possess national arsenals, and in March 2025, Paris formally opened the debate on the European dimension of its own deterrence. A “solely European” nuclear conflict presupposes that two European nuclear powers would stand idly by. This is the weakest assumption in the entire argument, regardless of how one assesses the other two.

It should also be noted that Karaganov does not speak on behalf of the government. At the Valdai Forum, he represents the wing of the Russian debate that pushes the Kremlin toward more definitive positions, and one of his roles is precisely to push the boundaries of what can be said. Viewed in this light, his “too late” is an indication of a trend rather than a doctrine.

Oreshkin: The market that no longer exists

With Maksim Oreshkin, the tone has shifted entirely. Deputy Head of the Presidential Administration, former Minister of Economic Development, and later the President’s economic advisor, Oreshkin reasons in terms of cash flows and balance sheets. His assessment was blunt: Europe is finished. There is no longer any viable competition in the energy market, because China and India now occupy the top spots among Russia’s customers. And there is no reason to invest in a European bailout, since the Europeans, to date, have shown no interest in finding a peaceful and reasonable solution. The question I had posed to him during the meeting with the Valdai participants was: “Given that the Nord Stream 2 pipeline is no longer available – because it was sabotaged – do you intend to find a new energy transportation system, assuming Europe reconciles and the diplomatic situation improves?” His blunt – and perhaps brutal – response is like a dagger of truth plunged into the conscience of every European.

“Over” should be understood in a technical sense. Oreshkin was not speaking directly about European civilization but about Europe as a trading partner: a market that has ceased to be central to Russia and therefore does not warrant political concessions to win it back. After 2022, Russian crude oil found its main buyers in China and India, while Brussels, through the agreement between the Council and the European Parliament in December 2025, committed to phasing out imports of Russian gas – including pipeline gas and LNG – by 2027. The energy interdependence that had kept Europe and Russia connected for half a century – even during the worst moments of the Cold War – has been dismantled by both sides. Oreshkin’s reasoning captures the simplest consequence of this: whoever is no longer the main customer no longer has leverage. These are the laws of the market, and neither in London, nor in Berlin, nor in Brussels are there any politicians or power groups left who can tell Russia “what to do”.

The flip side is well known in Moscow, too. A market dominated by two major buyers allows them to demand discounts, and replacing Europe with Asia comes at a cost in terms of price and access to technology. But according to the logic presented to me, the question is no longer whether Europe is in Russia’s interest. It is how much it would cost to make it beneficial again, and the implicit answer is that Europeans must bear that cost.

Lavrov: the door closed on “this” order

With Sergey Lavrov, the discussion shifted from the economy to diplomacy, without changing the conclusion. Europe, he said, had many opportunities to reestablish a dialogue with Russia and chose instead to fuel direct confrontation. Now it is too late to turn back: all limits have been crossed, and with the current European order, there is no way to return to previous relations.

I’d like us to pause for a moment to consider the weight of these words. Those who know Lavrov know that he is a politician capable of weighing every word with great intelligence, even in more relaxed settings such as the Valdai Summit. “The limits have been crossed.” It would be pointless to list these limits, because they are so obvious to the whole world that it would simply be a waste of time. But the look in Lavrov’s eyes as he spoke about Europe – I will never forget that. I have met him many other times, but on this occasion, there was something different.

The minister has a track record of events that Russian diplomacy regularly references: the Minsk agreements, the draft treaties on security guarantees submitted to the United States and NATO on December 17, 2021, and the Istanbul negotiations in the spring of 2022. The Russian interpretation of each of these developments is controversial, and it is contested in Europe. What interests me here is another element – a qualification that, upon re-reading after the plenary session, proved to be the key to the entire week. A return is impossible under this European framework. Not with Europe, in its current form – that is, the EU and NATO. The rejection concerns a ruling class and an institutional architecture, not the countries that are part of it.

I wonder just how much Russian patience has been abused to reach the point of saying such things? Classic Russian literature offers us admirable examples of how Russian politicians are capable of stalling, ignoring, and being patient. And there’s no denying that this has consistently been the attitude of the Russian ruling class during the recent years of conflict. To go so far as to say that the limit has been crossed – something Putin would later echo in the summit’s plenary session – means there are no more resources to waste on patient waiting; it means the Bear has been awakened from its hibernation at the wrong moment; it means the consequences of these actions will be of epochal significance.

Lavrov added one more thing: “We are ready to strike Europe in an exemplary manner, not as we did in Ukraine.” Take note of these words, dear European friends. Reread them and reflect on their weight. Nothing more needs to be said.

An Italian professor asks Putin a question

We come now to one of the most dangerous moments of my career. The plenary session took place, as is traditional, with the Russian president in attendance and Fyodor Lukyanov moderating. I took the floor and asked a two-part question:

“I come from Italy, a country that currently does not have good relations with Russia. As a European, I would like to ask you: What conditions will Russia set for developing a new security system for European countries? And, if we imagine a post-European Union Europe, will you consider it part of a great Eurasian partnership, or, in your view, will the United States and Russia always be competing for these territories?”

Putin began with the second part, and the order is no coincidence:

“Italy is, in fact, located in Europe, and I am speaking of a Eurasian partnership: it goes without saying, therefore, that we will consider – and already do consider – Italy a Eurasian partner as well.”

Immediately afterward, he clarified that the fate of the European Union, and Italy’s continued membership in it, “is none of our business.” Moscow does not even intend to discuss it, because any comment on the matter would be interpreted as an attempt to break up the EU, “while we do not want to break up anything at all. We only want to build and cooperate.”

On the conditions for a new security system, the response was clear: “We have no preconditions.” The obstacle, in his view, lies on the other side. Some European politicians consider it unacceptable for a single country to open a dialogue with Russia, and Putin has called this demand a diktat even harsher than that of the Soviet era. The comparison was carefully crafted: the USSR was a unitary and highly centralized state, whose republics were part of a single state structure; the European Union, in theory, is not, but in practice behaves as if it were. “No one is forbidding us; we’re ready.”

At that point, Lukyanov interjected with a provocative remark typical of an experienced moderator: since Brussels forbids it, wouldn’t it be better to contribute a little to the disintegration of the EU, so as to make it easier to deal with individual countries? The answer came without hesitation: “But there’s no need – they’ll fall apart on their own.”

Then Putin addressed me directly. “Our Italian colleague knows this better than we do,” he said, and began running the numbers: Italian public debt at 140%, the deficit around 3%, and in other European countries close to 5%. The figures were rounded but not far from the truth. According to Istat and Eurostat, at the end of 2024, Italy’s public debt stood at 135.3% of GDP and its net borrowing at 3.4%. The point of the passage, however, wasn’t about the decimal points. All problems start with the economy: living standards fall, unemployment rises, and citizens of the major European economies feel it firsthand – and this, he said, “also undermines the very foundations of the European Union. But that’s not our business; we don’t interfere.”

He concluded by reiterating the offer in a balanced manner: dialogue with the Union as a whole, if the Union so desires, or with individual countries, without preconditions. “But there must be no preconditions on the European side either.”

Trying to grasp the magnitude of these words, the political balance they reveal, and the strength of a statesman who cares not only about the good of his own country but also that of an entire other continent is a true lesson in what politics is all about.

Listen to Putin’s entire speech, and you will understand how, in less than five minutes, it is possible to capture the decline of all of Europe, in all its facets, while at the same time wistfully reiterating that Russia has done everything in its power to offer its assistance. But the choices of Europeans are their own, whatever flag they may fly. Russia respects and will always respect the fundamental principles of its foreign policy and its political tradition. No miraculous messianism, no improvised savior.

Europe – or rather, the Europeans of this Europe – what do they intend to do?

Rereading my travel notes

Rereading my notes upon my return, the first thing that stands out is the convergence of views. The strategist, the economist, the foreign minister, and the President have each expressed, in their own words, the same assessment: today’s Europe has exhausted its credit with Moscow. The second thing that stands out is that each draws a different conclusion from that diagnosis.

For Karaganov, the conclusion is coercive and takes on an almost eschatological tone: Europe has had its chance, and what follows is no longer a matter for diplomacy. For Oreshkin, it is a matter of cold, hard accounting: Europe is not worth the investment needed to win it back. For Lavrov, it is a limited diplomatic withdrawal, focused on the political structure rather than the people. Finally, for Putin, the door remains open – but toward individual states, not toward Brussels – accompanied by the expectation that economic erosion will do the rest.

The apparent contradiction between the “too late” stance of the first three and the “no preconditions” stance of the fourth is resolved precisely in Lavrov’s characterization. The result is a coherent line, which I would call “bilateralization”: Moscow will not deal with the Union as a political entity as long as its current leadership remains in place; it offers individual member states channels without preconditions and lets Europe’s internal difficulties make those channels attractive. The reference to Italy as a Eurasian partner “already today” must be understood within this framework: it is not a courtesy; it is an indication of which interlocutor Moscow prefers.

I certainly cannot claim that the four exceptional interlocutors had reached an agreement – that goes without saying – but I found this convergence truly “prophetic.” Valdai has always been the venue where the breadth of Russian debate is showcased to a foreign audience. I can say that these perspectives are compatible and mutually reinforcing: Karaganov’s tough stance makes Putin’s offer appear moderate; Oreshkin’s figures lend credibility to the idea that Moscow does not need to make concessions; and Lavrov’s formula balances firmness with openness.

The 2010–2012 sovereign debt crisis gave rise to the European Stability Mechanism and the banking union; the pandemic led to Next Generation EU and the first large-scale common debt. Within the Union, crises have generated at least as much centralization as fragmentation. “They will fall apart on their own” is therefore a gamble, not an observation – even if the gamble costs little to those making it: if the EU holds together, Moscow has at least offered dialogue; if it collapses, it already has bilateral channels in place.

The indicators to watch over the next twelve to eighteen months are fairly clear. The first concerns bilateral visits to Moscow by EU heads of government, in addition to the previous visits by Viktor Orbán in July 2024 and Robert Fico in May 2025. The second is whether unanimity holds during the semi-annual renewals of sanctions, where a single veto is enough to open a crack. The third concerns national exemptions from the timeline for phasing out Russian gas. The fourth – and most significant for us – is the possible opening of a structured channel by a major capital, including Rome.

What do I take away from this? As an Italian, the phrase I’m taking with me isn’t the one about disintegration; it’s the other one: “We already consider Italy a Eurasian partner as well.” It contains both an offer and an observation directed at us. If the door that Moscow says is open is actually closed, it’s closed on this side – and it wasn’t Rome that closed it of its own accord.

How long can a country with a debt exceeding 135% of GDP afford to leave it up to others to decide who can speak with whom? No one in Moscow asked me that. It’s a question I brought home with me on my own. And every Italian of good conscience, every European who still has a heart, knows the answer.

Contact us: info@strategic-culture.su

History does seem to like to repeat itself, although often in a different guise. Mistakes are usually the things History uses to make these repetitions work.

Mankind is somehow incapable of stopping itself from making the same or similar mistakes over and over again. What does work in a near-fantastic manner is to give the things new names and new justifications.

One other method used is the designation of terms. Not terms as in negotiations, but in the sense of words. Take, for instance, the term “Genocide”.

Genocide has been reserved for the actions taken by the Nazis in Germany under the government of Hitler and his NSDAP party – the mass killing of minorities and opponents on an industrial scale. With a thoroughness often seen as typically German, everything was bureaucratically calculated and accounted for. The net gain generated by the killing and plundering of the victims was offset against the cost of the act of killing itself. Every part and item of that said person was monetised, and a profit was looked for. This, of course, also included the amount of labour extractable before killing and disposing of the remains.

The term “Genocide” has been dedicated to this issue. It has thus become difficult to use in other contexts. Strange, too, is the fact that only one of the groups of victims of the said genocide use it to justify their own actions today.

The next word designated is the term “defence”.

Up to the second Trump presidency, there were only Ministries of Defence. And in most countries, backward thinking no doubt, these Ministries are still so named. Not so in the modern U.S. Here the Ministry has received its rightful name: Ministry of War. Being honest at last. Calling NATO a defence organisation is something that should get the Trump honesty brush-up too. The same with the “defence industry”.

The personal use of such terms is one thing; to claim exclusivity is another.

The definition of Genocide by the United Nations, for example:

Genocide is defined by the 1948 UN Genocide Convention as certain acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group “as such,” including killing group members. It also covers acts like causing serious bodily or mental harm, deliberately inflicting destructive living conditions, imposing measures intended to prevent births, and forcibly transferring children.

So now everyone can reach their own conclusion on that term and its usage. Defence and War as ministry names is self-explanatory.

Repeating mistakes is another thing worth looking into a bit.

Trying to get at other people’s goods over and over again is a popular mistake made on a regular basis. Trying to set up one-sided trade agreements is one method. The EU has no good track record when it comes to things like this. Trade with African nations, for example, was carried out with such aims in mind. One anecdote springs to mind. When the EU was caught in the throes of BSE (mad cow disease), the EU wanted to import ostrich meat from South Africa. The EU wanted to dictate to the South African ostrich farmers how their meat should meet EU standards. If not met, no business possible. The ostrich farmer rightly pointed out who had a BSE problem. Did he and his ostriches, or the EU with their standards?

End of discussion.

When confronted with larger nations, able to look after themselves, other methods are needed. Back in the Middle Ages, land and resources were a point of contention, wars being fought for such reasons. In modern times, it is not necessarily land that matters, but foremost controlling other people’s resources.

The Second World War was fought for this reason. Hitler and his Nazi movement were supported, financially and morally, by some of the elites in the U.S. and Great Britain, apart from other countries in Europe. The aim of the U.S. was to have a go at the Russian Communists and take economic control over the British Empire. The second part of the plan worked: Britain lost its empire to the U.S.

The first idea, solving the Communist problem, turned out to be more difficult. They just did not stop and stand and be beaten by the German army, even with all its sophisticated weaponry. The idea the Allies had – turning the German Army into an allied one and going at the Russians – did not come to pass. This was seen by some as being a mistake at the time. The idea was not scrapped but only postponed, as can be seen today.

There we have it again: the mistake being repeated, but with a different justification. Which is where NATO comes to the front once more.

It was always an anti-Russian thing. That and controlling the European Continent. Keep America in, the Russians out, and the Germans down. Fun fact: Stalin wanted to join NATO one year before it was founded, but the NATO fathers said no thank you very much. Putin made the same suggestion to Clinton, but he said no thank you too.

Now NATO has done it again and repeated the mistake Napoleon and Hitler and the Finns made – wanting to get hold of the resources Russia calls its own, preferably by force. That saves lengthy negotiations and has always been looked upon as the quickest and easiest method. To do this, NATO came up with a brilliant plan: get Ukraine to do it.

Now let everything go regarding this conflict; enough has been said by more qualified people than me, and I cannot add anything sensible on that subject. Europe is beating the drums of war again, regardless of history or common sense. What will happen in the coming months is anybody’s guess.

One point, however, has, I feel, not been mentioned to the extent it deserves. In fact, Ukraine has been given all kinds of weapons from NATO – the same weapons NATO would have used itself had it come to a direct confrontation between NATO and Russia, not using a proxy.

Even the Ukrainians complained that the weapons sent were not up to scratch and outdated, as in “over the shelf time”. Now the thing is, these weapons have proven below par for all the world to see. Not only that, but this conflict has shown that NATO countries, for all their chest-thumping and war talk, cannot produce the quantity necessary to sustain any kind of prolonged military campaign. And that’s ignoring the quality altogether. The big brother in arms, the U.S., has even shown itself to be unreliable when it comes to equipping its allies. To say nothing of the miserable performance of its so-called “best weapons the world has ever seen”.

Now let us for a moment imagine: what if NATO had gone and attacked Russia directly? It would obviously have used these same said weapons and found them lacking, just like the Ukrainians did and do. NATO, meaning Europe, would have been whipped, like back in 1945. Only more thoroughly this time.

How short can memory be to start and make the same mistake again, for absolutely no reason whatsoever, just 80 years ago? Can any European politician in his or her right mind want the European countries to look like they did then, back in 1945? Destroy and lose all the things that have positively come to be since then?

Either they suffer from amnesia, or mental issues that need serious medical attention by qualified staff, or there is another reason.

If the regime in Ukraine is defending our so-called Western values while being Nazi-inclined, blatantly corrupt and definitely non-democratic, led by a cocaine-sniffing dictator, then the answer could be found in the old English saying:

“Birds of a feather flock together.” Who knows?

Brazil’s alignment with Europe amid current geopolitical tensions poses a serious threat to Brazil’s traditional policy of neutrality.

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On September 30, all major Brazilian newspapers published a report stating that the Brazilian Intelligence Agency (Abin) had allegedly warned European authorities about supposed simultaneous interference by the United States and Russia in Brazilian elections. The case raises questions that go far beyond the 2026 electoral dispute. The central issue is the accusation against Moscow, as well as the political and institutional circumstances in which it was presented.

Within Brazil’s intelligence system, Abin is institutionally linked to the Presidency of the Republic, while the Federal Police, another intelligence-related institution in the country, has stronger links to the Judiciary. Its function is to produce strategic information to assist the Brazilian government. Therefore, when representatives of Brazilian intelligence inform foreign authorities that Russia is interfering in the electoral process, it is inevitable to ask to what extent this assessment reflects the political position of the government that controls the agency.

The issue becomes even more significant because, according to the information released, the European delegation received an accusation concerning Russian interference without substantial details about its nature being made public. No agents, operations, funding mechanisms, propaganda structures, or specific campaigns attributed to Moscow have been identified, at least in the material made public so far. There is therefore an accusation, but its foundations remain largely unknown.

This creates a particularly convenient situation for certain political actors. Europe – which is hostile toward both Russia and Trump – receives information suggesting that Washington and Moscow are attempting to influence the Brazilian elections. This would allow Brussels – and especially France and Germany, currently Lula’s key “friends” – to potentially “support” Brazil in “counter-intelligence” efforts aimed at combating alleged US and Russian influence. In other words, the accusation of interference, even in the absence of evidence, could serve as a pretext to justify actual interference (by Europe).

There is also a broader political issue. A significant portion of the Brazilian left has consolidated in recent years an unfounded interpretation according to which Vladimir Putin belongs to a kind of “far-right international movement,” alongside Donald Trump and other Western conservative leaders. This interpretation places Russia, Trump, and the Brazilian right within the same international political camp, despite profound differences between their respective positions and interests.

Within this framework, associating Russia with a potential Flávio Bolsonaro candidacy becomes politically convenient. Flávio is identified with Trump, the Republican Party, and the American right. The existence of an alleged Russian connection would allow the Brazilian electoral dispute to be incorporated into a broader international narrative in which different conservative forces are presented as parts of the same network of influence.

However, it is absolutely obvious that Russia has no interest whatsoever in interfering in the Brazilian elections to favor either side. Furthermore, the majority of pro-Russia activists in Brazil identify with the left or remain neutral regarding both sides of national politics. The accusation appears to be made simply to please the European Union, given that Europeans prefer Lula to Flávio (as the latter is subordinate to Trump). The lack of details substantiating the accusations only reinforces this point.

The truly relevant question is different: why did an intelligence agency subordinate to the Presidency of the Republic present European authorities with an accusation against Russia without its foundations subsequently being clarified? And why is this happening precisely during preparations for the Brazilian elections and at a time of extraordinary deterioration in relations between Russia and Europe?

The answer to these questions matters because Brazil is operating in an increasingly polarized international environment. Russia occupies a central position within the BRICS and maintains strategic relations with Brazil, while Europe is going through a period of growing confrontation with Moscow. In this context, any official Brazilian information associating Russia with an electoral interference operation carries serious diplomatic consequences.

Moreover, tensions between Russia and Europe are increasing, and there is a real risk of conflict due to Europe’s continued provocations. Clearly, in such a context, it is not in Brazil’s interest to become part of either side of the crisis. But nothing could be more damaging to Brazil’s policy of neutrality than reporting a formal accusation against Russia to the European Union.

In theory, it is possible that the report was delivered to European authorities without prior communication to the Brazilian president – although this seems highly unlikely. If Lula wants to preserve Brazil’s neutrality, the appropriate course of action would be to publicly disavow Abin and apologize for the incident. The question, however, is whether he would actually be willing to do so, considering that the European Union is currently the Lula government’s main international “ally”.

Classical nuclear deterrence is dead. New START expired, tripolarity returns, verification gone. Iran proves nonproliferation is a trap.

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A contingency mistaken for law

We have often discussed nuclear deterrence and how the doctrine has changed, especially in the context of hybrid wars and the new weapons now available. Precisely on this point, at the 23rd annual meeting of the Valdai Discussion Club, my friend Nelson Wong put forward a thesis that deserves attention precisely because it is presented without fanfare.

The classic theory of nuclear deterrence, developed during the Cold War around the concept of mutually assured destruction, was based on historical conditions that have largely ceased to exist today. The framework isn’t entirely wrong: mutual vulnerability remains, and the threat of unacceptable retaliation is perhaps still the only thing preventing a direct war between major powers. But too many features of the landscape have changed for that map to serve as a guide. My argument is that the individual factors eroding deterrence share a common root: the transition from unipolarity to a tripolar system, managed by elites trained in an era when competition among equals had been declared over.

Classical deterrence arose from specific circumstances: two main actors, fairly predictable escalation ladders, and functioning channels of communication. That shared grammar was not a given, but the product of costly learning. Thomas Schelling described the diplomacy of violence as a tacit bargaining process in which a threat is valued for what it communicates; the code of bipolarism was written through crises in which the two sides teetered on the brink and drew institutional consequences from them, from the 1963 hotline to the 1972 ABM Treaty. Atlantic simulations confirm this. Carte Blanche (1955) and Proud Prophet (1983) showed that stopping a Warsaw Pact offensive with tactical weapons would have killed about 1.7 million Germans and that keeping the war at the “tactical” level was an illusion, because the leap to the strategic level seemed almost automatic. Deterrence worked in part because those who planned it knew that once the threshold was crossed, it would no longer work. It was a culture of limits rather than a theory of calculation.

The guardrail has shattered

In February 2026, New START expired, and for the first time in over half a century, Russia and the United States are not bound by any binding bilateral nuclear treaty; verification, notifications, and data exchanges have ceased. That same year, the NPT Review Conference ended without results. Verification was not merely a technical mechanism: it was the arena where two military bureaucracies learned to understand one another. With that channel closed, each side has reverted to assessing the other based on worst-case scenarios – the very raw material of the security dilemma.

Added to this is the end of bipolarity. In the realist interpretation that John Mearsheimer has revived with Glenn Diesen, the current disorder stems from the transition toward multipolarity and the persistence of problems inherited from the unipolar era. The liberal order was the global projection of the Western order of the Cold War, possible only as long as the sole remaining great power was a liberal state. Today there are three powers, each with a different conception of order. A tripolar system is not simply a bipolar system with an extra player: with two actors, it is sufficient for one dyad to be stable; with three, all must be stable, and each measures its own arsenal against the potential combined strength of the other two. This is why the growth of China’s arsenal weighs on U.S. planning, regardless of Beijing’s intentions.

Thus, the security dilemma returns to the forefront: China’s intercontinental missiles are defensive for Beijing and offensive for Washington; Taiwan’s weapons are defensive for the United States and offensive for China. There is also a more troubling element. The stated goal of inflicting a “strategic defeat” on Russia is not containment, but rollback. During the Cold War, deterrence preserved the status quo; today, the West invokes it while it is itself the revisionist pole, pushing the line forward through NATO expansion and increasingly advanced weapons. This amounts to asking the adversary not to react while one climbs the ladder of escalation. Deterrence that masks a shift in the strategic balance ceases to convey stability and begins to convey an intention.

The Iranian test case

No theater puts these theories to the test quite like Iran. On June 13, 2025, Israel struck the Islamic Republic with Operation Rising Lion; Tehran responded with “True Promise 3.” The paradox was already evident: Iran had signed the NPT, and the Supreme Leader had issued a fatwa against nuclear weapons, while Israel possesses an undeclared arsenal estimated at between 75 and 200 warheads and keeps Dimona off-limits to inspections. I wrote at the time that the attack would not destroy Iran’s program but would push Tehran to view the weapon as a deterrent. The nonproliferation regime promises security to those who renounce nuclear weapons; the Iranian case teaches us that those without them are targeted, while those who possess them are not.

In the summer of 2026, there was open discussion of using tactical nuclear weapons against a non-nuclear country, in an air and naval conflict whose stated aim was to reopen the Strait of Hormuz. Against whom? Striking the strait would contaminate the waters of the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, and Saudi Arabia; striking the interior would not guarantee surrender. In either case, the nuclear taboo would be broken, setting a precedent for Moscow, Beijing, and Tel Aviv; it is not surprising that, according to available information, Trump’s advisors oppose this. Nina Tannenwald has shown that the non-use of nuclear weapons since 1945 rests on an established norm, not merely on the calculation of retaliation. Today, that norm holds more because of the prudence of certain advisors than because of its own strength, and a deterrent that depends on the character of individuals is no longer an institution.

The Gulf also shows that the logic of “unacceptable punishment” is shifting toward non-nuclear infrastructure. After the refineries in Tehran, Haifa and the Bapco refineries in Bahrain were struck; and the attack on the desalination plants in Qeshm has effectively legitimized retaliation against Israel’s desalination network – on which over 60 percent of the country’s water supply depends – and against that of the Gulf, where some states derive 80–90 percent of their drinking water. It is an energy-humanitarian “Samson option”: the threshold of unacceptable punishment, which during the Cold War coincided with the nuclear threshold, is now reached by drones launched against a desalination plant. Herman Kahn’s escalation ladder assumed visible and costly steps to climb, but in the Gulf, the steps have been crushed one on top of the other.

The material basis and the fearless machine

Deterrence is also a function of the ability to sustain a war over time. While Washington was burning through interceptors over Iran, Beijing was presenting its 15th Five-Year Plan, featuring “extraordinary measures” for self-sufficiency in critical supply chains. China controls about 90 percent of the world’s rare-earth refining, on which every F-35, every Patriot battery, and every THAAD interceptor depends; starting in 2025, it will subject these materials to export controls, while the Pentagon must eliminate its dependence by January 2027. If the replenishment of conventional deterrence depends on the rival, the threshold beyond which one is tempted to compensate with nuclear weapons is lowered: a deterrent that cannot be replenished tends to become nuclear out of necessity. Whoever controls weapons materials controls the pace of others’ wars.

Then there is artificial intelligence. In 1983, Stanislav Petrov deemed a report of a U.S. launch to be a false alarm; when integrated into command systems, AI can reduce that pause from minutes to seconds, and a system that feels no fear cannot be dissuaded. The immediate danger is not the machine that decides to launch, but the decision-support system that accelerates escalation or excludes de-escalation from the options. I’d like to add a point about the education of decision-makers: if Mearsheimer is correct, the current ruling class came of age after 1991, when the study of the balance of power had all but disappeared from European universities. In 1983, the machine made a mistake, and the human knew it. Today, the risk is that the machine will make a mistake and the human will lack the tools to detect it.

Legitimacy eroded from the center

The NPT established a two-tier system with clear colonial legacies, and the 2017 Prohibition Treaty challenges its legitimacy. But the erosion of the legal framework does not originate at the periphery. It starts at the center. Washington has claimed control over an international strait as national territory and the right to seize Iranian oil tankers; the European Commission has proposed a “reparations loan” of up to 165 billion euros guaranteed by Russian funds frozen at Euroclear. However one judges it, the inviolability of sovereign assets is being called into question by the very states that established it. If sovereign property, freedom of navigation, and nonproliferation are suspended when it suits those who wrote the rules, others draw the most rational conclusion: the only reliable guarantee is one’s own strength.

This does not mean that deterrence is dead. Following the August 26 Storm Shadow attack on Donetsk, Maria Zakharova warned that Moscow could strike British installations “in Ukraine and beyond its borders”: the most explicit threat to date directed at a NATO member, one to be taken seriously without overreacting, as it remains merely verbal. Ratcliffe’s mission to Moscow on August 25 shows that the channels of communication are not closed. The warning system still works; what is missing is the predictability of the response. Deterrence is being practiced, but blindly.

For the 2026–2028 period, based on evidence of moderate quality, the most likely scenario (approximately 55 percent) is unregulated deterrence: no successor to New START, recurring crises managed through unilateral signals and ambiguous thresholds. A minimal restoration (about 30 percent) would establish crisis communication channels, launch notifications, and commitments to human control over nuclear decisions, following the statements made by the United States and China in Lima in November 2024; the indicators would be the resumption of Russian-American consultations and a negotiated formula for the Strait of Hormuz. Breaking the taboo (about 15 percent) – limited use against a non-nuclear state – would be preceded by deployments of low-yield warheads, rhetoric normalizing tactical use, or the depletion of interceptor stockpiles. Everything hinges on one assumption: that no power considers the stakes in peripheral theaters to be existential. A crisis over Taiwan superimposed on the Gulf crisis would bring this assumption crashing down.

Rebuilding crisis communication channels, limiting the integration of AI and nuclear weapons, and giving a voice to the Global South: these are necessary measures, but they are insufficient. Bipolar deterrence was stable because it protected an order that the superpowers – while ideologically opposing it – recognized in practice. Multipolar deterrence requires something analogous: namely, the mutual recognition of security spaces among poles that do not share the same conception of order.

This is not a moral concession but a technical necessity: without a recognized framework, deterrence does not know what to protect. A new map is drawn starting from the territory, and today’s territory consists of three poles: mining supply chains, desalination plants, algorithms, and rules applied intermittently. Understanding this is the minimum requirement – and I emphasize minimum! – for clear-headed thinking to prevail over reassuring formulas.

From the Shanghai Spirit to the Bishkek Declaration, the security-first organization prioritizes pragmatism over ideology.

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Security first

The recent summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), held in Bishkek, marked the 25th anniversary of the founding of what, in the landscape of international institutions, represents a particularly interesting case study. Born from the ashes of Soviet-Chinese confidence-building measures and transformed into a full-fledged organization in 2001, the SCO has spent a quarter-century consolidating an institutional framework that now functions effectively: annual meetings of the Council of Heads of State, regular interministerial meetings, and day-to-day cooperation that is developing along increasingly complex lines.

However, this anniversary offers an opportunity for reflection that goes beyond mere celebration. The question that emerges most forcefully is: what role do values play within the SCO? And how does this value-based dimension relate to the seemingly more pragmatic dimension of security and functional cooperation? An analysis of the founding documents and subsequent declarations reveals a complex trajectory that deserves in-depth examination.

From its very inception, the SCO has made security cooperation one of its top priorities. This choice is no accident: the organization’s prehistory is rooted in Soviet-Chinese confidence-building measures, both regarding border issues and broader aspects of mutual security. The “Shanghai Five,” an informal group that preceded the SCO’s official establishment, found its primary unifying force precisely in the management of security issues and the building of trust among its members.

This original specialization has had lasting consequences. Even as the SCO has expanded its scope over the years to encompass increasingly diverse sectors, security has remained the linchpin around which the entire organizational architecture has developed. In a sense, as the analysis astutely notes, the SCO can still be defined as a specialized international organization focused on a single primary priority, despite its evolution toward more comprehensive forms of cooperation.

The comparison with the BRICS – a genuinely all-encompassing cooperative framework operating across a wide range of fields – is particularly illuminating. While the BRICS have developed an increasingly sophisticated values-based platform over time, with declarations that devote considerable space to issues of common and shared values, the SCO has maintained a more markedly operational approach that is less rhetorical on the values front.

The SCO Charter: Principles without values

A particularly significant finding emerges from an analysis of the SCO’s founding document. The Charter, signed on June 7, 2002, and which entered into force on September 19, 2003, makes no mention whatsoever of the term “values.” Instead, we find a dedicated article – Article 2 – significantly titled “Principles.” It is on these principles that the SCO bases its activities.

These principles include: mutual respect for sovereignty, independence, territorial integrity, and the inviolability of state borders; non-aggression; non-interference in internal affairs; non-use of force in international relations; equality of all member states; peaceful resolution of disputes among member states; and the SCO’s non-targeting of other states. A particularly revealing principle is that of the phased implementation of joint actions in areas of common interest.

This last principle – that of “phased implementation” – goes a long way toward explaining how the SCO operates and the expectations, sometimes excessive, that surround its activities. The disappointment that sometimes accompanies assessments of the organization – the notion that “nothing happens beyond the summits,” which circulates in certain circles – finds its explanation precisely in this principle. This is not a flaw, but a deliberate and foundational choice: to proceed step by step, consolidate the results achieved, and avoid missteps.

The absence of the term “values” from the SCO Charter is perfectly understandable and in no way diminishes the level of mutual trust among member states. It is worth noting that, even in the case of the BRICS, the term “values” was not an immediate feature of the final declarations, becoming firmly established only starting in the mid-2010s. Before then, the term used to characterize the internal cohesion of the BRICS was, among others, precisely “principles,” just as it is for the SCO.

The Historical context and evolution of the vocabulary of values

In 2002, the term “values” was not yet as politically fashionable as it is today, and was used rather rarely in the documents of the major non-Western countries. At that time, in these countries – including Russia – the word “values” was more often invoked in political discourse in a negative sense, as “values imposed by the West,” and thus as something that required resistance.

The realization that this is a game that can be played by two sides, and that to effectively strengthen solidarity among non-Western countries it was necessary to formulate their own platform of shared values, came much later. And the work to ensure that non-Western values are perceived as understandable, attractive, and at the same time not trivial – not simply in the style of “we are for all good things and against all bad things” – continues to this day, with mixed results.

This delay in developing an explicit value framework does not, however, mean that the SCO lacks an axiological dimension. On the contrary, it exists, but it is expressed through categories different from those of the Western value lexicon: “principles” and, above all, “spirit.”

A chronologically significant finding emerges from a comparative analysis of SCO and BRICS documents: with regard to one particular term – and its substantive relevance – the SCO was significantly ahead of the BRICS. This term is “spirit.”

In the declarations of the annual BRICS summits, the term “BRICS spirit” and its constituent elements first appeared during the Chinese presidency in 2017. The “spirit” then disappeared from BRICS documents for several years. The term returned in 2022, once again during the Chinese presidency. But subsequently, in all the BRICS summit declarations from 2023–25 – whose initial drafts were prepared by other countries – the term “BRICS spirit” was consistently present.

In the case of the SCO, however, the term “spirit” appeared in the very first declaration following the Shanghai summit on June 15, 2001, when the “Shanghai Five” – which had previously existed as an informal grouping – was transformed into a full-fledged international organization. In this declaration, the “Shanghai Spirit” was mentioned as a separate point, characterized by mutual trust, mutual benefit, equality, mutual consultation, respect for cultural diversity, and the aspiration for shared development.

It is clear that the term “spirit” has its roots, first and foremost, in contemporary Chinese political tradition, since it first appeared in documents from years when the summits were held in China. This is, in a sense, a distinctly Chinese feature. That said, the term “spirit,” though not immediately, eventually became firmly established in BRICS declarations; and in the case of the SCO, a year later, in 2002, when the summit was held not in China but in St. Petersburg, the term “spirit” was included in the preamble to the SCO Charter.

In the Charter, however, the epithet “Shanghai” disappeared in relation to the spirit; there, reference is made simply to the “spirit of mutual trust, mutual benefit, equality, mutual consultation, respect for cultural diversity, and the aspiration for shared development.”

The civilizational approach and its evolution

Of particular relevance to today’s political ideology is the civilizational approach reflected in the 2001 Shanghai Declaration. It specifically noted “mutual respect and mutual trust among states belonging to different civilizations and bearing different cultural traditions.” A year later, however, the mention of civilizations disappeared from the preamble to the SCO Charter.

This shift – the appearance and disappearance of civilizational terminology – is significant. On the one hand, it reflects China’s sensitivity to issues of cultural identity and diversity; on the other, it demonstrates the caution of other members in adopting language that might be perceived as too overtly ideological or potentially divisive.

If we examine the preamble to the current Bishkek Declaration of the SCO Council of Heads of State dated September 1, 2026, we find that it emphasizes the “firm commitment to the objectives and principles enshrined in the SCO Charter, as well as to the further strengthening of good-neighborliness, friendship, and effective multilateral cooperation.” Furthermore, this declaration once again uses the very term “Shanghai Spirit,” which is embodied in the principles set forth in the preamble to the SCO Charter.

It is clear that, since the constituent elements of this SCO spirit are enshrined in the legal text of the Charter, their wording remains unshakable even twenty-five years later. Herein lies the difference between the spirit of the SCO and the spirit of the BRICS, where, year after year, various elements of this spirit are added or removed by the countries holding the presidency, depending on their national particularities. And the definition of the spirit of the BRICS turns out to be, every year, at least slightly different.

In the case of the SCO, however, it is significant that the epithet “Shanghai” has returned – an epithet that, unlike the spirit itself, is not legally enshrined. This return signals a political will to reclaim the organization’s original legacy, at a time when competition among powers over the definition of global values is becoming increasingly intense.

How significant is this anniversary?

If we re-examine the SCO summit declarations step by step, we find significant variations in how the values dimension is addressed. The particular emphasis placed in the Bishkek Declaration on the SCO’s commitment to the Shanghai Spirit and the SCO’s principles is not typical of other summit declarations in recent years.

For example, in the declarations following “non-anniversary” summits, the preamble is practically absent, and the description of the international situation and security challenges begins right from the start. In the declarations issued in Astana in 2024, in Delhi in 2023, and in Moscow in 2020, neither the “Shanghai Spirit” nor simply the “spirit” is mentioned (although the Moscow declaration does contain the term “SCO space”). In the declarations issued in Tianjin in 2025 (naturally), in Samarkand in 2022, and in Bishkek in 2019, there is a mention of the “Shanghai Spirit,” but it is placed not at the beginning of the text but deep within the first section.

It is clear that the specific character of the current declaration stems from its anniversary nature; the declaration issued in Dushanbe for the previous anniversary – the 20th, in 2021 – was structured in exactly the same way, with a lengthy preamble mentioning the Shanghai Spirit and the commitment to the principles. This is highly significant: anniversaries provide an opportunity for a more explicit affirmation of the organization’s value-based identity, whereas at regular summits a more pragmatic approach focused on current issues prevails.

India’s contribution and the “4 M” perspective

In this context, India’s perspective on the SCO is of particular interest. India’s initiatives within the Shanghai Cooperation Organization have focused on economic issues, reflecting its desire to build economic cooperation with Central Asian states in order to improve its regional standing and strengthen multilateralism.

According to Anil Trigunayat, the SCO can undoubtedly contribute to regional collaboration by adhering to the “4 M” principle: members must embrace Mutual Respect, Mutual Interest, Mutual Sensitivity, and Mutual Benefit so that the group can emerge stronger and more relevant.

This formulation is significant because it shows how, from India’s perspective, the SCO’s value dimension lies not so much in an explicit ideological platform as in a set of operational principles that guide day-to-day cooperation. India, with its tradition of nonalignment and its sensitivity to national sovereignty, naturally feels at home in an organization that prioritizes principles over values and avoids imposing a common ideological vision.

Toward a prosperous future

An analysis of the SCO’s value dimension twenty-five years after its founding reveals a complex and nuanced picture. On the one hand, the organization has never developed an explicit value platform comparable to that of the BRICS or other cooperative structures. On the other hand, it possesses a solid foundation of principles, enshrined in the Charter, and a “spirit” that, while not defined in terms of values, serves as a powerful unifying force for identity.

This configuration is no accident but reflects the organization’s history and nature. Founded as a tool for building trust in security matters, the SCO has prioritized the practicality of operational principles over the abstract nature of value-based declarations. Its functional specialization, its institutionalized character, and the principle of gradual implementation have helped keep the organization grounded in a pragmatic approach, avoiding the ideological drifts that sometimes characterize other international forums.

However, the return of the “Shanghai Spirit” in the Bishkek Declaration, issued on the occasion of the 25th anniversary, signals a growing awareness of the importance of identity and values. In an era of increasingly intense global competition, in which the definition of the values and principles that should guide the international order is itself a matter of contention, the SCO finds itself having to balance its traditional caution with the need to assert its identity more clearly.

A terminological analysis of the texts – and of the value frameworks they reflect – is but one piece of the much broader picture of practical cooperation among SCO member states achieved over the past twenty-five years. But it is a significant piece, because it reveals how an organization founded for security purposes has gradually become a laboratory for developing a common language, shared principles, and a collective spirit. And in a world where the battle to define global values is bound to intensify, this laboratory could prove to be more important than it appears at first glance.

The challenge for the SCO over the next twenty-five years will be to preserve its distinctive character – the practicality of its principles, the gradual nature of its actions, and the centrality of security – without neglecting to develop a worldview that, while not ideological, is capable of attracting and uniting. This is no easy task, but one that the organization has demonstrated, over these first twenty-five years, it can successfully tackle.

Anti-Zelensky protests planned for October 3 – led by a military officer on the kill list.

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The War in Ukraine has not been entirely protest-free from Kiev’s side of things. During the summer of 2026 a ‘sudden’ wave of ‘cardboard protests’ were brought to the public’s eye demanding the resignation of Zelensky. These demonstrations occurred as a reaction to the removal Defense Minister Fedorov from his position, or at least that was the overtly stated motivation for them. Of course, as we know, official reasons for protests always sound ‘nice’ but how many people living in a country at war actually know or care about the hirings and firings of ministers? Perhaps this weak motivating factor, saving some minister in a government viewed from all sides as completely corrupt, is why those cardboard signs and their messages didn’t take hold. The protestors then declared that their mission had ‘no end date’ attached to it, but as we can see Zelensky remains in office, and cardboard signage seems to have gone out of fashion.

But this time, at least on its surface, it seems as though it is the army itself which is the offended party that wants to protest. Some sort of slogan like ‘Zelensky betrayed the army’ will be much more enticing to protestors, than “let’s save Minister X for being fired”. Also, when given the choice between ‘the army or Zelensky’ I think we all know who would lose across a wide range of diverse public opinion in 2026 Ukraine.

Somehow, despite all the evidence shown through human history, many are sure that holding up signs will change everything radically, and those with this mentality need their slogans to be broad and emotional. According to Gazeta.Ru the situation with the upcoming October 3^rd anti-Zelensky protests will look something like this:

“Ukrainian military officer Alexander Todorov on the MayiakUA YouTube channel announced a series of rallies demanding the resignation of Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky and his team.”

According to him, the public actions are scheduled for October 3^rd, 2026. They want to hold rallies in Kiev near the presidential administration building, as well as in other cities of Ukraine. Todorov called on the Ukrainian diasporas to support the initiative abroad.

The military man criticized the current leadership. In his opinion, the soldiers feel abandoned, and the government is engaged in corruption and misuse of foreign aid. Todorov is also concerned about plans for the possible mobilization of women and citizens from the age of 18.

On the eve of the Verkhovna Rada deputy Artem Dmytruk said that the Security Service of Ukraine had detained Todorov. The politician did not provide details. There have been no official comments on the incident yet.”

The biggest thing that stands out is that Todorov wants these protests to go international via the Ukrainian diaspora, meaning the same shows of support on EU streets for Zelensky, may start to portray him as a more ‘realistic figure’ to put it mildly. And now that millions of Ukrainian citizens have fled their native land, there are plenty of them to use as protestors in the West.

It is also important to note that Todorov is on the same “Peace Keeper” list as anyone who has said or done anything even mildly pro-Russian since 2014. This website is at the very least an informal “enemies list” for post-Maidan Ukraine that provides personal information, on all those who stand against the revolution. The Russian side often portrays this to be a “kill list” and that it was actually created in or by the West. According to Izvestia the site works as such:

Myrotvorets (Peacekeeper) positions itself as a database with information about those people whom the owners of the resource consider to be involved in crimes against the security of Ukraine. The website is officially registered in Canada, and in Ukraine it has the status of an independent non-governmental media outlet.

The new status of Todorov as being a possible foreign enemy agent means that he certainly does not have nearly unilateral support from the elite and that some people responsible for the status quo are very much against this. Also, it means that this Ukrainian Army soldier could be arrested or called in for questioning at any time even before the protests start. We should also keep in mind that supposedly Todorov was the organizer of the following political demonstrations, some occurring even before the Maidan:
2011 — Against Petro Yushchenko

2012 — Against local authorities and power engineers (electric companies)

2014 — Against radicals and Kolomoisky

2017— Against Poroshenko

2024 — Against the military leadership and the TCC (press gangs)

As you can see none of the protests above achieved anything, but none of them happened under the conditions of 2026 after Putin ‘took the gloves off’ during the summer. The Russian side has hit infrastructure hard and how much of Ukraine’s economy remains is open for debate, but the situation is fairly dire. The Kiev Regime is not just plodding along under the usual corruption + apathy + conscription + foreign financing that it has been since 2022. Everything is being hit, everything is being destroyed and it looks like military resistance is crumbling, thus this time, in terms of protests, ‘things could be different’. But the big question remains, who could be the one(s) standing behind Todorov? Who would benefit from yet another revolution in Ukraine?

Who is behind these upcoming protests?

If the objective were to just send the last local schmuck into the meat grinder and truly fight to the last Ukrainian to make Putin pay dearly for every square meter of territory, then there would be no need to change out Zelensky. Furthermore, after so many officials around Zelensky have fled, quit, or otherwise left the game, it looks like the tower of power is very wobbly, meaning that any violent mass protest would essentially bring the house of cards crashing down. Thus, we can be fairly confident that anyone who would want to fund a protest wants to end the war.

A near total political collapse, with ‘the enemy at the gates’ will surely cause the entire system to spiral out of control and disintegrate, meaning that there would not be enough cohesion for the war to continue. Russians often joke that all that is needed for a declaration of total capitulation would be a cat’s paw print, the signature of a legitimate president is only needed for some other more ‘two-sided’ peace deal, that is to say if capitulation is on the table, Lil’ Zel isn’t needed to sign it.

And, although he is made fun of for his comedy background and drug addiction, Zelensky has been the superficial glue keeping the whole show together. He, in a strange way, is sort of the last bastion of ‘Project Ukraine’ as the Russians call it, as he absolutely will not abdicate the toxic throne. So the game looks to be this; that the Green Goblin must be ousted to end the war in the fall/winter of 2026… for some unstated reason by some unknown parties. But who could they be?

George Soros, is yet again at the center of the Russian rumor mill, but it is hard to exactly say why he would be behind this maneuver. Perhaps, I have been completely wrong in previous pieces, and indeed the Europeans do need time to prep for a war in the 2030s and thus this failed attempt to break the Russian bear needs to end immediately? Is it that they need time to get ready for the next offensive and Kiev has become a drain rather than a boon? I am not sure if this is true, and perhaps, there is a ‘boy who cried wolf’ effect happening on alternative media, that are just used to blaming Soros for protests. If it’s a march with signs and slogans calling for regime change, it’s got to be Soros right?

Team Trump or some forces in the USA, could be vying to get this damn thing over with. Just because publically and on camera Donald Trump seems to personally despise Zelensky doesn’t mean anything, but Trump has been talking about better relations with Russia since his very first political campaign. Also and more importantly, the source of all big lobbyist bribes, Israel, is in deep trouble. Essentially, the Iran-Israel issue is way more important and stealing the show, and Trump has never had much political will to antagonize Russia. When D.C. faces the choice between saving the Zionist Paradise or Neo-Khazaria you know which front they are going to invest in.

There are also definitely large factions with cash in America, that despite being ‘in a distant second place’ politically, want antagonism of Russia to be a thing of the past. If you haven’t noticed, extremely prominent media voices in America can now regularly have Russian politicians and thinkers on their programs, something that would have been absolutely a career death sentence, and maybe even ‘punishable’, just a few years ago. This American ‘third position’, with ‘second place’ influence, does not want nuclear conflict, and wants to move on from the Cold War and games of global domination.

The visit of Ratcliffe to Moscow, may signal that even the most passionate Russophobes in Washington want to call this one done, and move on.

European 4D chess masters, could, after having acknowledged that the Battle for Ukraine is over, choose to allow Russia to make the broadest possible front across a new awkward border in Ukraine, or even better, allow the 21st Century’s Golden Horde to actually have a new physical border with places like Poland and Romania to spark a fresh wave of Russophobic paranoia in local politics.  This sounds like absolutely insane reasoning, to let Russia be closer to a place like Poland in order to spark more Russophobia by proximity, but if you haven’t noticed, the leadership of the European continent looks like the tea party from Alice in Wonderland. We cannot and should not completely exclude concepts that are insane, especially if they are very ‘media friendly’ and involve ‘message sending’. Over-and-over again, Kiev has been forced to launch attacks for PR purposes at the cost of thousands of men, the reasoning in Brussels based on creating optics to somehow achieve tangible results. Like it or not this is how they do things. So why not let the Russians get closer, as to make them more of a threat to attack them in 2035? This is fantastic PR optics, look at how they ‘expanded their empire into Europe and Poland is next!’.

Also, the weak point by which Russia has been invaded from Europe has been the broad steppes of Ukraine. The Nazis did go through Finland, got near Murmansk and sat there for the whole war, the border with Finland, despite being quite big, just isn’t geographically good enough, but lots of massive flat space is quite hard to defend. Furthermore, that land is now nearly completely destroyed and will require unfathomable amounts of rubles to rebuild, and while the Russians are rebuilding they will be vulnerable.

What if the protests succeed?

We have already seen some internal fighting between factions within Kiev and this would only intensify as protestors started to storm the theoretical location where the Cocaine King rules from. Many young men may already be convinced that taking risks protesting is a far better option than dying with absolute certainty on the front after conscription. Thus, the time might be ‘right’ for this sort of thing, and with another Maidan occurring, and enemy forces so close, this would surely fracture things quickly. If the protests are not put down properly the oligarchs, clans, and other wealthy individuals will swiftly look to save their skins and livelihoods potentially breaking up the country or just signing whatever Moscow wants them to. Once the military were to lose command cohesion, there won’t be any more coordinated drone strikes to hold the ‘orcs’ at bay. Ironically, the Maidan which gave birth to the Kiev Regime could be the same mechanism that leads to its downfall after utterly destroying the Ukrainian nation, but as the cliché goes ‘time will tell’.

Can an arithmetic majority become a political force?

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On the front lines during crises, at the back of the line when decisions are made

On September 22, 2026, on the sidelines of the 81st session of the General Assembly, Subrahmanyam Jaishankar brought together in New York the ministers of what Indian diplomacy calls the group of “like-minded and friendly” Global South countries. The chosen theme had the tone of a manifesto: “Navigating Together Toward a Brighter Future – the Compelling Case for an Empowered Global South.” In his opening remarks, the minister set the tone that would define this session. The Global South sits in the front row when it comes to the world’s crises and in the back rows when it comes to deciding how to address them, because the institutions built for another era continue to reflect the power dynamics of that era.

Ten days earlier, in New Delhi, Narendra Modi had opened the 18th BRICS summit with a harsher tone. Global governance, as he described it, takes the form of a “pyramid of privilege,” and Security Council reform can no longer be postponed; fixed deadlines and verifiable results are needed. When asked about this, Secretary-General’s spokesperson Stéphane Dujarric acknowledged that the representation of developing countries in the forums where global rules are written is insufficient, and that those forums – from the Security Council to financial institutions – should reflect 2026 and no longer 1945.

Three events in less than two weeks do not shift the architecture of the Charter by even a millimeter. However, they are sufficient to formulate the argument presented in these pages. United Nations reform has become a matter of legitimacy rather than efficiency, and the legitimacy of an organization founded on the “sovereign equality of all its Members” (Art. 2, para. 1 of the Charter) now depends on the majority that inhabits that organization. The active role of the Global South is necessary in the strictest sense: without it, reform has neither a driving force nor a criterion to justify it. With it, as we shall see, it still lacks an instrument to enforce it.

The arithmetic of 1945

In 1945, there were 51 founding members; today there are 193. The Security Council has been expanded only once, by Resolution 1991 A (XVIII) of 1963, which entered into force in 1965 and increased the number of seats from eleven to fifteen by adding only elected members. The five permanent seats – and with them the veto power provided for in Article 27, paragraph 3 – have remained those of the victorious powers of World War II. The result speaks for itself. Africa, with 54 member states and a significant portion of peacekeeping operations taking place on its territory, does not hold a single permanent seat. Neither do Latin America and the Caribbean. Asia, home to more than half of humanity, is represented there by China alone.

The revision mechanism is designed to preserve this status quo. Article 108 requires a two-thirds majority vote in the General Assembly and ratification by two-thirds of the members, “including all permanent members of the Security Council”: each of the five therefore holds, in addition to a political veto, a constitutional veto. Since 2009, the discussion has been channeled through the Intergovernmental Negotiations (IGN) on th , launched by General Assembly Resolution 62/557, which have since concluded each year with a renewal resolution. Kenyan President William Ruto recalled this from the General Assembly podium a few days ago, with an observation that speaks louder than many analyses: seventeen years later, negotiations are still ongoing.

When the UN did reform, it did so while leaving the distribution of power intact. The package launched by António Guterres in 2017 – which was examined by the European Parliament’s research service – focused on development, governance, peace, and security, and addressed criticisms regarding a lack of accountability, transparency, and effectiveness; the briefing also noted that the very term “reform” had proved problematic for member states, precisely because of the lack of agreement on its meaning. Nothing in that proposal touched on the composition of the decision-making bodies. The UN80 initiative, launched in March 2025, followed the same blueprint under even worse conditions: cuts to the Secretariat’s budget, revisions to mandates, and office mergers – all amid a liquidity crisis caused by unpaid contributions. Administrative reform goes ahead because it does not redistribute anything. Political reform remains stalled for the opposite reason.

Genealogy of a demand

The Global South is not just now discovering the United Nations as a battleground. Dena Freeman has shown that countries of the South have conceived of themselves as a globally situated subject since the 1960s – long before the term entered academic discourse – and that the Group of 77 has consistently traced its problems back to the injustice of the international order, seeking to correct it through international law and multilateral political processes. The 1955 Bandung Conference, the founding of the Group of 77 in 1964, and the 1974 Declaration on the New International Economic Order (Resolution 3201 S-VI) form a continuous line. The New Delhi Declaration explicitly asserts this: the reference to Bandung places the BRICS within the lineage of anti-colonialism, not that of competition among great powers.

What, then, has changed since the days of the NIEO? Two things, and neither is mere rhetoric. The first is material clout. According to the Institute of South Asian Studies in Singapore, the expanded BRICS group accounts for approximately 37 percent of global GDP and 54 percent of the world’s population. The G77 of the 1970s had numbers in the General Assembly and little else; the Global South of 2026 also possesses industrial capacity, reserves, and low-cost technologies. The second development stems from the first: the existence of institutional alternatives, from the New Development Bank to payment systems in national currencies to regional forums. The NIEO called on the North to change the rules. Today’s Global South can even write new ones, and this possibility changes the weight of its call for reform. Those who can walk away negotiate differently from those who have no choice.

A study released in early 2026 on the relationship between the rise of the South and UN reform offers a useful framework for analysis. Successful cases of multilateral adaptation, such as the Paris Agreement, shared a problem that required universal participation, an inclusive procedural approach, the mobilization of civil society in both the North and the South, and a common scientific basis. None of these conditions are found in the Security Council’s agenda, where the issue is the distribution of a scarce resource – the power to decide on war and peace – and where every gain for one actor is a loss for another. This is why the South’s leadership role there must take a form different from mere participation.

New Delhi: What the Declaration says – and what it leaves unsaid

Adopted by consensus on September 12, 2026, at the conclusion of the restricted plenary session, the New Delhi Declaration consists of 140 paragraphs. Regarding United Nations reform, it accomplishes three objectives. It reaffirms the commitment to a comprehensive reform of the organization, including the expansion of representation for developing countries on the Security Council. It acknowledges the aspirations of African nations as expressed in the Ezulwini Consensus and the Sirte Declaration. Finally, it notes the support of China and Russia for a greater role for Brazil and India within the UN system, “including the Security Council.” Taken together, the paragraphs devoted to governance form a coherent strategy: to remain within the multilateral system and to reshape its internal hierarchy.

The wording, however, must be examined closely, because that is where the gap between rhetoric and commitment becomes apparent. A “greater role” is not a permanent seat. The phrasing echoes that of previous statements, and the fact that a summit chaired by India did not go further says a lot about the limits of internal consensus: Beijing supports India’s aspiration to carry more weight, not its desire to sit alongside it with equal powers. The Ezulwini Consensus, for its part, calls for at least two permanent seats for Africa with all the prerogatives of current members – including the veto – and five non-permanent seats. Neither of the two permanent members of the BRICS club has ever endorsed this position in its entirety; the Declaration “recognizes” these aspirations, which is a different matter.

What the text does not mention also matters. The Declaration avoids naming countries even on the most sensitive issues and never mentions the United States, despite a year marked by the war against Iran and Washington’s tariff policy. This is a methodological choice dictated by the bloc’s composition, which brings together Iran, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates: the May meeting of foreign ministers ended without a joint declaration precisely because of differences over West Asia. Institutional reform thus becomes, by default, the ground on which consensus holds. It serves as a unifying force while simultaneously limiting its ambition, because a negotiable proposal cannot be built on what unites them – since it remains vague.

Hence the significance of the procedural proposal put forward by Modi: that members draft ten joint proposals on representation, responsiveness, and rule-making, to be consolidated into a “BRICS Roadmap for Reform” by the next summit. If implemented, it would mark the first time the bloc moves from rhetoric to a concrete draft. It is the most tangible outcome to emerge from New Delhi, and it is also the one most likely to be set aside.

New York, September 2026: The Global South as a coalition

The Indian Ministry of External Affairs’ communiqué on the September 22 meeting lists the concerns shared by participants: conflicts affecting food and energy security, volatility in trade and investment flows, the plight of seafarers in war zones, extreme weather events, and delays in achieving the Sustainable Development Goals. The ministers noted the weakening of multilateral institutions and called for comprehensive reforms –  , first and foremost, of the United Nations – because the ongoing crises disproportionately affect the Global South. The meeting concluded with a commitment to consolidate common positions and work toward a balanced, participatory, and just governance architecture.

Three details from the same week speak louder than the press release. Jaishankar called for a shift to text-based negotiations within the IGN, arguing that those blocking change are misusing the organization. CARICOM ministers agreed with New Delhi to collaborate on UN reform and endorsed India’s candidacy for a non-permanent seat for the 2028–29 term. Finally, Ruto linked representation on the Security Council to reform of the international financial architecture: in 2024, global public debt reached $102 trillion, and developing countries – despite holding less than a third of it – paid approximately $1 trillion in interest.

This last figure explains why the South’s role cannot be limited to the Security Council. For most of the more than 130 members of the G77, the issue of the veto is a distant concern, whereas the cost of capital, debt service, and access to climate finance are issues that affect every national budget. A reform that added four or six permanent seats for emerging powers would leave the situation of the majority unchanged. The Global South as a whole has an interest in linking political representation and financial reform; its regional powers, however, are primarily interested in the former. This divergence in priorities is not reflected in any official statement but would inevitably come to light in any genuine negotiation.

Three key issues

The first sticking point is the South’s internal representation. The Global South is a majority, not a unified entity. At least three factions are at odds within the Council. The G4 (Brazil, Germany, India, Japan) is calling for new permanent seats. The African Union’s Committee of Ten defends the Ezulwini Common Position. The “Uniting for Consensus” group rejects new permanent seats and proposes expanding only the elective category. This group includes Italy, Pakistan, Argentina, and Mexico – that is, the neighbors and regional rivals of three of the aspiring members. Every candidacy from the Global South generates opposition from within the Global South. “Uniting for Consensus” presents its model as the one most attentive to the underrepresentation of the Asia-Pacific and Latin America since 1963; a large portion of African states see this as a way to deny the continent equal status. None of the three blocs alone has the 129 votes needed in the General Assembly.

The second sticking point is the veto. The African position calls for it to apply to new permanent members in the name of equality; the G4 has shown itself willing to defer its implementation to a later review; the five permanent members have no interest in either extending or limiting it, and Russia has openly defended it as a bulwark against the organization’s reckless initiatives. Here, the interests of the BRICS members diverge structurally. China and Russia are the guardians of the status quo that the rest of the bloc challenges, and their adherence to the rhetoric of reform stops at the boundaries of their own privilege. Asking the five to vote for their own dilution, as I have written elsewhere, is tantamount to asking a monopolist to legislate against its own competition.

The third issue is financial, and for the Global South it represents both a risk and an opportunity. For 2026, the Secretary-General has proposed a 15 percent reduction in the regular budget and a staff cut of nearly 19 percent; 2,900 positions were eliminated at the beginning of the year. The paradox is evident, since the organization is shrinking just as its majority is demanding greater influence within it. But whoever funds an institution gains the right to reshape it. If Washington’s missed contributions make the UN more dependent on other donors – starting with China, the second-largest contributor to the regular budget – the center of gravity in negotiations shifts. For the Global South, the question is whether this shift will result in greater representation or merely a new patron.

Three paths: within, above, or aside

The first path is through negotiation, within the IGN. The Pact for the Future, adopted on September 22, 2024, established several principles: to prioritize redressing the historical injustice toward Africa by treating it as a special case; to improve the representation of the Asia-Pacific, Latin America, and the Caribbean; to intensify efforts regarding the issue of membership categories; and to work toward a consolidated model. This represents the highest level of consensus ever recorded in a text adopted by consensus. It is also, as Joseph Preston Baratta observes, a document of reaffirmation rather than transformation: small and medium-sized states – which constitute the overwhelming majority of the Assembly – did not rally around an ambitious agenda because they were committed to upholding their pledges on development aid and the 2030 Goals. India’s request for a negotiating text is the only way to test that consensus. I consider it likely, with moderate confidence, that the 81st session will also conclude with yet another decision to extend the current Charter.

The second path bypasses ordinary negotiations. Article 109 of the Charter provides for a General Conference of Member States to revise the Charter, which can be convened by a two-thirds vote of the General Assembly and nine members of the Security Council. Thus, the veto does not apply to the convening of the Conference. Baratta, drawing on the work of Mahmoud Sharei, proposes that a coalition of small and medium-sized states use this provision – which has never been applied – as leverage for a comprehensive revision. The limitation is equally clear: amendments approved by the Conference enter into force only upon ratification by all permanent members (Article 109, paragraph 2). Article 109 does not circumvent the veto, but it makes its political cost visible, because it forces the five to openly oppose a process desired by the majority rather than letting it run its course within the IGN’s procedures. For the Global South, it is the only legal instrument that transforms numbers into initiative.

The third path runs parallel. It is what I have elsewhere called the “necessary reform,” as opposed to the “impossible reform”: the transformation that advances within circuits beyond the control of universal institutions – from cross-border payments to development banks – and which ultimately renders the internal sphere less relevant. This path asks no one for permission. It does, however, come at a cost that the Global South must factor in: a hollowed-out UN does not protect the small nations, which need international law and the universal forum far more than the great powers do. Beijing, Moscow, or New Delhi can afford a world of exclusive clubs; Burundi or Jamaica, far less so.

The three paths are not mutually exclusive. The most plausible scenario for the coming years is one in which the third path advances while the first stagnates, with the second kept in reserve as a threat. It is in this scenario that the South’s active role becomes necessary – and not merely desirable. Only an organized majority can ensure that external pressure leads to reform with r the organization rather than its abandonment; and only an organized majority can make Article 109 a credible alternative to deadlock.

This assessment rests on three assumptions: that the five permanent members remain united in defending the veto; that the Sino-Indian rivalry persists; and that U.S. financial disengagement continues. If the first assumption were to fall – for example, if Washington or Paris were to open up to limiting the veto – scenarios involving partial reform would become more likely. If the rivalry between Beijing and New Delhi were to ease in a sustained manner, the issue of the Indian seat would cease to be the main internal obstacle within the bloc.

Another test is now imminent. The selection of Guterres’s successor – whose term expires at the end of 2026 – will reveal whether regional rotation and the demand for representation from the Global South carry any weight even in the system’s most opaque procedure: the one in which the Security Council makes a recommendation and the General Assembly ratifies it.

A majority that must become a subject

The Charter opens with the words “We, the peoples of the United Nations.” The peoples of the Global South constitute the vast majority of that “we,” and their exclusion from the decision-making center is no longer a tolerable historical anomaly: it is the point at which the organization’s legitimacy begins to crumble. This is why the Global South must take center stage. Not because the Global South possesses superior political virtue, but because no other actor possesses the combination of interest, numbers, and – by now – alternatives needed to compel the UN to reform itself.

For that leading role to produce results, however, three steps are needed that no declaration has yet taken. The first is a unified Southern model – or at least a truce between the G4, Africa, and Uniting for Consensus – based on the principle that expansion must occur before determining who benefits from it. The second is an explicit link between political representation and financial reform, so that the majority of smaller nations have their own reasons to support the ambitions of the larger ones. The third is the use of alternative institutions as a negotiating lever rather than as an escape hatch.

In New Delhi, the BRICS nations stated that reform is overdue. In New York, the Global South declared it is ready to demand it. It remains to be seen whether it will also be able to organize itself to achieve it – that is, to transform an arithmetic majority into a political force. The United Nations was founded to prevent a return to 1939; the Global South is demanding that it stop resembling 1945. There is no contradiction between these two demands. There are only those within the Security Council who have an interest in making people believe there is.

The issue roiled French politics for years before resulting recently in legislation allowing adults with incurable illnesses to receive lethal medication.

The issue roiled French politics for years before resulting recently in legislation allowing adults with incurable illnesses to receive lethal medication.