More: Analysis
Below the Threshold: Why the Black Sea Is NATO’s Hardest Flank to Defend
In little more than a week, three merchant ships have gone to the bottom of the Black Sea inside the exclusive economic zones of...
The Bypass Is the Target: What This Week’s Gulf Escalation Reveals About Energy Security
On Tuesday, a Houthi missile strike set fire to part of Saudi Aramco's executive headquarters in Dhahran, the administrative heart of the kingdom's oil...
Sanctions as a Price Lever: What the Diesel Deal Reveals About the Transatlantic Split Over Ukraine
When Donald Trump announced on 9 October that Vladimir Putin would release Russian diesel onto world markets, it read at first like another episode...
The Black Sea Has Quietly Closed
Twenty-One Ships
In August, Ukraine's Black Sea ports recorded 21 ship calls, about 90% fewer than a year earlier. A month later, on 16 September,...
The Waiver Is the Policy: What 19 October Will Reveal About Who Washington Really Sanctions
A Licence Signed Before the Ink Was Dry
On 9 October, three weeks after Donald Trump signed the most sweeping Russia sanctions statute of his...
Trump-Putin Diesel Deal Explained: What We Know and What It Means for Global Oil Markets
US President Donald Trump is taking steps to reduce diesel prices by lifting sanctions on Russian diesel exports and declaring a ceasefire on energy...
Diesel Diplomacy: A Weekend Peace Discount Meets a Gulf War Premium — and the Bond Market Prices the Fed Instead
Today's Numbers
~$103 (Brent on Monday morning, off a weekend spike above $105) · 5.24% (US 10-year Treasury yield at Friday's close) · 74.5% (Polymarket...
Ukraine’s Refinery Strikes Have Become a US Election Issue
"Don't Hit Refineries"
On 10 October, standing outside the White House, Donald Trump gave Ukraine a targeting instruction. "Don't hit refineries. There's plenty of targets,"...
Greece’s $4bn Bet: How Washington Is Rebuilding Its Eastern Mediterranean Around Athens
The Visit That Skipped Ankara
On 7 October, Marco Rubio and Greek Foreign Minister Giorgos Gerapetritis closed the sixth US–Greece Strategic Dialogue in Athens with...
Europe Is Rearming. It Is Not Integrating
For the better part of a decade, the European defence debate ran on a single complaint: Europe would not spend. That complaint is now...