Cross-regional, system-level stories that span multiple theaters.
Some stories don't sit cleanly inside one region. Sanctions architectures, weapons proliferation, shadow-fleet logistics, and proxy-network financing thread through three or more theaters at once - and reasoning about any single front in isolation misses the system.
Fronts uses the Global lane for system-level analysis: the connective tissue between Russia, Iran, China, and their counterparties; the international institutions whose decisions cascade everywhere; and the financial, technological, and logistical infrastructure that lets distant conflicts reinforce each other. The goal is the structural picture other coverage misses.
How does a terror group afford hundreds of fighters, trucks, and guns? Same way any government does — taxes. We break down the actual business model of terrorism.
Simon Whistler · August 5, 2026 · 17:41
Moscow is brokering a thaw between Algiers and Bamako after a year of downed drones and recalled ambassadors — and positioning itself as the Sahel's indispensable power broker. Plus the week's other stories.
Simon Whistler · August 1, 2026 · 13:11
Thailand hedges between Washington and Beijing while political turmoil saps its clout at home. This piece examines whether Bangkok's balancing act is strategy or drift.
Simon Whistler · July 28, 2026 · 16:23
Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo have dropped even the pretense of a vote, cementing a family dictatorship with their opponents jailed, exiled, or silenced — and the region looking away.
Simon Whistler · July 26, 2026 · 17:44
After months of quiet following the Gaza ceasefire, the group has resumed attacks on Red Sea shipping — with a larger arsenal, better targeting, and ambitions that now reach beyond Yemen's coast.
Simon Whistler · July 22, 2026 · 13:25
An assassination attempt on the French president in Damascus exposes the fragility of Syria's transition and raises hard questions about who stands to gain from driving foreign powers out.
Simon Whistler · July 20, 2026
Iran just torpedoed its own Hormuz deal, the US is quietly admitting it's out of missiles, and Saudi Arabia is somehow getting squeezed from three directions at once. Big week.
Fronts Staff · August 6, 2026 · 1:05:41
The deadliest war of the century just flared back up. Emergency pod with Mike DeAngelo on what we know, what we don't, and why it matters far beyond Ethiopia.
Fronts Staff · August 4, 2026 · 59:53
Fronts Staff · August 4, 2026 · 1:06:42
The veteran AU mediator traces how South Sudan's secession broke both states, why peace diplomacy has turned kleptocratic, and why Sudan's partition may already exist in its people's minds.
Fronts Staff · July 28, 2026 · 1:13:39
With Hormuz shut, Houthi strikes closing in on the Bab el-Mandeb, and oil past $100 a barrel, the panel weighs Washington's shrinking options — from a renewed blockade to a ground invasion.
Fronts Staff · July 26, 2026 · 1:10:39
Wilfred Waimiri talks to Julia Steers of Lighthouse Reports, whose new documentary traces the UAE's weapons, Colombian mercenaries, and RSF training camps through eastern Libya.
Fronts Staff · July 21, 2026 · 1:05:04
Kyle Moran · August 5, 2026 · 16 min read
Alex de Waal traces Sudan's collapse to the broken promises of South Sudan's secession — and warns that profit-seeking patrons and glory-hungry peacemakers have made real diplomacy impossible.
Wilfred Waimiri · August 3, 2026 · 61 min read
From Nepal to Serbia, youth-led uprisings keep toppling governments without securing lasting change — and the West's Arab Spring record shows how easily outside help can make things worse.
Henrik Hannes Herkel · July 30, 2026 · 13 min read
Under pressure from advancing junta troops and a growing Chinese role in the conflict, Myanmar’s many resistance groups have been increasingly at odds with each other, sparking fears the united front against the coup is starting to crumble.
Thomas van Linge · July 27, 2026 · 14 min read
Fuel theft has become the cartels' second-biggest business — draining billions from Mexico's treasury, seeping into US supply chains, and outpacing every crackdown Washington and Mexico City can mount.
Micky Braeger · July 25, 2026 · 12 min read
In the Central African Republic, Wagner repelled a rebel raid within days; in Mali, Africa Corps surrendered the north — proof that nationalizing Prigozhin's empire gutted what made it work.
Casus Belli · July 24, 2026 · 11 min read
Since the end of the Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet Union, many countries have opted to buy cheap Soviet-era legacy surplus hardware from its successor states. But the Ukraine War means those stockpiles are finally drying up.
Jompy · July 20, 2026 · 17 min read
Mass-produced strike drones now let Ukraine hit Crimea's bridges, rail lines, substations and shipping day after day — turning Russia's southern logistics hub into a supply-starved liability.
Phil Cowin · July 18, 2026 · 15 min read
From the FBI director's inbox to Jordan's wheat reserves, Iran's proxy hackers show how states now wage war cheaply, deniably, and with fear as the real payload.
Fronts Staff · July 16, 2026 · 10 min read
Staggering losses will force Moscow into hard tradeoffs — cutting its navy and air force, betting big on drones — but the force that emerges could be more dangerous than the one that invaded in 2022.
Jakub Janovsky · July 13, 2026 · 15 min read
Strikes on refineries impose costs, but Russia will adapt. The case for a "drone blitz": massing drones and ground robots on a narrow front to rupture Russian defences and restore manoeuvre.
Illya Sekirin · July 11, 2026 · 9 min read
Coordinated rebel attacks across Mali are exposing the limits of Russia's security strategy and the fragility of Bamako's northern campaign.
Paweł Wójcik · July 8, 2026 · 12 min read
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