The international system entering 2026 bears little resemblance to the optimistic vision of liberal order that dominated Western thinking just fifteen years ago. What we face instead is a return to classical power politics—a world where spheres of influence matter more than international law, where military capability trumps normative appeals, and where the strong increasingly do what they will while the weak suffer what they must. The second Trump administration's embrace of transactional deal-making has not created this reality, but it has stripped away the pretense that masked it.
From Caracas to Taipei, from Khartoum to Kyiv, conflicts that will define this year share common characteristics: they reflect the reassertion of regional hegemonic ambitions, the collapse of multilateral restraint mechanisms, and the subordination of humanitarian concerns to strategic calculus. The United States oscillates between disengagement and overwhelming force. Russia and China probe for advantage in every theater. Middle powers pursue their interests with unprecedented boldness. And in the resulting vacuum, millions of civilians pay the price.
The ten conflicts examined here are not merely humanitarian tragedies—they are strategic battlegrounds where the post-Cold War settlement is being violently renegotiated. Some involve direct great power confrontation; others serve as proxy contests. All reflect the harsh truth that international politics remains what it has always been: a struggle for power among states pursuing their perceived interests, constrained only by the countervailing force of rivals.
The question is not whether these conflicts will be resolved through appeals to universal values or international institutions—they will not. The question is whether the emerging distribution of power will stabilize into a new, sustainable equilibrium, or whether we are witnessing the prelude to far more catastrophic confrontations. The evidence from the opening months of 2026 suggests grounds for deep pessimism.
Venezuela: America's hemisphere gambit and the return of military intervention
The Trump administration's consideration of military action against Venezuela represents the starkest expression yet of a revived Monroe Doctrine stripped of diplomatic niceties. The strategic logic is straightforward: a collapsing petrostate ninety miles from U.S. borders, governed by a regime Washington considers illegitimate, hosting Russian and Chinese military advisors, and generating refugee flows that destabilize neighboring allies. From a realist perspective, the surprise is not that intervention is being contemplated, but that it was delayed this long.
The Maduro regime's survival through multiple coup attempts, sanctions regimes, and international isolation demonstrates the durability of authoritarian power when backed by loyal security services and external patrons. Neither the humanitarian catastrophe—millions displaced, an economy in freefall—nor democratic legitimacy concerns have proven sufficient to dislodge him. What has changed is Washington's calculus that Venezuela's dysfunction poses direct strategic costs: migration pressure on Colombia and Brazil, a potential platform for extra-hemispheric powers, and a symbolic affront to U.S. regional dominance.
The regional implications of U.S. military action would be profound and unpredictable. Colombia and Brazil face different pressures: Bogotá might welcome regime change that stems refugee flows, while Brasília would view unilateral U.S. intervention as a dangerous precedent in what it considers its own sphere of influence. The Organization of American States, already fractured, would likely splinter further. Any military operation would require not just decapitation of the regime but sustained occupation and state-building—precisely the mission profile that has consistently exceeded U.S. strategic patience in recent decades.
Members are reading: Analysis of why Venezuela tempts intervention despite Iraq's lessons, and the China-Russia factor.
Ukraine: The grinding calculus of a war without end
Thirty-five months into Russia's full-scale invasion, the war in Ukraine has settled into the attritional struggle that many realists predicted from the outset. The romantic early narratives—plucky defenders versus evil empire, democracy versus autocracy—have given way to the grim arithmetic of casualties, ammunition stocks, and economic endurance. Ukraine has not collapsed, confounding Putin's initial assumptions. But neither has it expelled Russian forces, despite tens of billions in Western military aid. The front lines have ossified into a bloody stalemate that favors the side with greater mobilizable resources: Russia.
The Trump administration's approach, epitomized by pre-meeting calls with Putin before engaging Zelenskyy, signals an American reassessment of interests. The transactional logic is evident: Ukraine is not a NATO member, its strategic value to Washington is limited, and the opportunity cost of supporting Kyiv indefinitely—in both material resources and bandwidth for confronting China—appears increasingly unsustainable. The proposed diplomatic framework amounts to recognition of facts on the ground: Russian control of occupied territories, Ukrainian neutrality, and security guarantees of uncertain value.
For Europe, this represents an existential test of strategic autonomy rhetoric. If Washington brokers a deal that sacrifices Ukrainian sovereignty for great power accommodation with Moscow, European capitals must choose between endorsing a settlement that violates their stated principles or attempting to sustain Ukraine without decisive American support. The latter option confronts brutal realities: European military-industrial capacity cannot replace U.S. contributions at scale, and European publics show limited appetite for indefinite sacrifice on behalf of a non-member state.
Russia's calculation is straightforward: endure sanctions, accept casualties, and wait for Western resolve to fracture. Moscow has successfully reoriented its economy toward China and the Global South, mitigating isolation. Its mobilized war economy, while extractive and inefficient, can sustain current operational tempo longer than Ukraine's Western-dependent supply lines. Putin need not win decisively; he must simply not lose until geopolitical attention shifts elsewhere and Kyiv's supporters tire.
Members are reading: Why Ukraine's settlement will determine Europe's future and signal resolve to Beijing on Taiwan.
Gaza and the unfinished regional war
The humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza—over forty thousand dead, infrastructure devastated, civilian population displaced—represents the most visible dimension of a conflict whose strategic significance extends far beyond the Strip. The underlying dynamic is Iran's challenge to the regional order underwritten by U.S.-Israeli military dominance and Gulf Arab accommodation. Gaza is not the cause but the catalyst, and its "resolution" will not resolve the fundamental confrontation between Tehran's revisionist ambitions and the status quo coalition's determination to contain them.
Israel's military operations have achieved tactical objectives—degrading Hamas capabilities, eliminating key leadership—but strategic success remains elusive. Hamas cannot be eradicated without governing Gaza, and Israel lacks both international support and domestic consensus for reoccupation. The resulting vacuum will be filled by some combination of reconstituted Hamas elements, other militant factions, and international administrators with uncertain authority. This outcome perpetuates the cycle of buildup and breakdown that has characterized Gaza for decades.
The direct U.S.-Iranian military confrontation that has accompanied Gaza operations marks a dangerous escalation in a long-simmering conflict. Strikes against Iranian proxies in Syria, Iraq, and Yemen; naval confrontations in the Red Sea; cyber operations and sabotage campaigns—these represent a qualitative shift from shadow war to overt, if still limited, military engagement. Both sides have calibrated responses to avoid full-scale war, but the escalation ladder has proven easier to climb than descend.
The Gulf realignment and Saudi Arabia's strategic hedging
The normalization between Israel and Gulf states that seemed inevitable in 2020 has been complicated but not destroyed by Gaza. Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates face a delicate calculation: deepening ties with Israel and the U.S. offers security against Iran and access to technology and investment, but domestic and regional political costs have risen dramatically. The result is strategic hedging—maintaining security cooperation while postponing formal normalization, diversifying relationships with China and Russia while preserving the U.S. defense umbrella.
This hedging reflects a broader trend in Middle Eastern geopolitics: the erosion of American primacy without the emergence of a clear alternative hegemon. U.S. security commitments remain valuable, but they are no longer unconditional or exclusive. Regional powers pursue arms deals with Moscow, economic partnerships with Beijing, and diplomatic autonomy that would have been unthinkable during the Cold War or the unipolar moment. The resulting system is multipolar and transactional, characterized by tactical alliances that shift according to immediate interests rather than ideological alignment.
Members are reading: Iran's nuclear program advances despite proxy losses, and why the window for prevention has likely closed.
Sudan: The forgotten war and Africa's new power brokers
While international attention fixates on Ukraine and Gaza, Sudan's civil war has produced what may be 2026's worst humanitarian catastrophe—hundreds of thousands dead, millions displaced, famine conditions spreading, and state collapse nearly complete. The conflict between the Sudanese Armed Forces and the Rapid Support Forces is nominally about control of the state apparatus, but the reality is more fragmented: a multi-sided contest involving regional militias, ethnic dimensions, and external powers pursuing competing interests through local proxies.
The international response has been characterized by neglect punctuated by ineffective diplomatic gestures. The United Nations lacks leverage; the African Union is divided; Western powers treat Sudan as a humanitarian problem rather than a strategic priority. This neglect reflects brutal geopolitical logic: Sudan possesses no critical resources that global powers cannot access elsewhere, threatens no vital shipping lanes or allies, and offers no clear pathway to stable governance that would justify serious intervention costs.
Yet Sudan's strategic position—bordering the Red Sea, linking North and Sahel Africa, and sitting astride critical migration routes—ensures that regional powers cannot afford indifference. Egypt fears instability spilling across its southern border and threatening Nile water security. The UAE and Saudi Arabia pursue port access and agricultural investments. Russia seeks naval facilities and gold mining concessions. Each backs different factions, perpetuating conflict through arms flows and financial support that far exceed anemic international peace efforts.
The pattern is depressingly familiar: state collapse in a strategically marginal but regionally significant country, external powers pursuing narrow interests through proxies, international institutions proving unable or unwilling to enforce peace, and civilian populations trapped in violence that serves everyone's interests except theirs. Sudan demonstrates that the "international community" remains a polite fiction; what exists is a collection of states pursuing interests, and where those interests do not align with conflict resolution, wars continue regardless of humanitarian cost.
Taiwan and the South China Sea: Asia's powder keg
The most dangerous potential flashpoint in 2026 is not an active war but the possibility of one: China's designs on Taiwan and its expanding control over the South China Sea. The strategic stakes here dwarf other conflicts examined in this analysis. A war over Taiwan would involve the world's two largest economies, disrupt global supply chains catastrophically, and carry genuine risk of nuclear escalation. The question is not whether such a conflict would be catastrophic—it certainly would—but whether the distribution of power and interests makes it increasingly likely.
China's military modernization has proceeded with singular focus on the Taiwan scenario: anti-access/area denial capabilities to complicate U.S. intervention, amphibious assault capacity, cyber and space warfare systems, and nuclear force expansion to ensure survivability. The People's Liberation Army has not fought a major war since 1979, but it has studied American operations intensively and designed its force structure specifically to exploit perceived U.S. vulnerabilities: long logistics chains, dependence on forward bases vulnerable to missile strikes, and political sensitivity to casualties.
The United States maintains formal strategic ambiguity—neither confirming nor denying that it would defend Taiwan militarily—but this posture has eroded through incremental commitments and statements. The Biden and Trump administrations, despite profound differences, share an assessment that Taiwan's autonomous status serves U.S. interests and that Chinese control would unacceptably shift the regional balance. Yet the credibility of American defense guarantees is precisely what Beijing probes through gray-zone operations: air defense zone violations, naval exercises, economic coercion, and cyber intrusions that test resolve without triggering armed response.
Taiwan's domestic politics add volatility. Beijing's preferred outcome—peaceful reunification under generous autonomy terms—has become less likely as Taiwanese identity has strengthened and Hong Kong's experience under "one country, two systems" has discredited that model. The CCP leadership faces a dilemma: accept indefinite separation of what it considers core territory, or employ force with catastrophic risks. Xi Jinping's pronouncements increasingly emphasize that reunification cannot be delayed indefinitely, suggesting a closing window for peaceful resolution.
Members are reading: Why 2026-2028 may represent China's window of maximum opportunity for Taiwan invasion.
The Sahel's descending spiral
The collapse of French influence across the Sahel—Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger all expelling French forces and pivoting toward Russia—represents one of the most dramatic geopolitical reversals of recent years. The new military juntas that seized power justified their coups partly by claiming that France and local civilian governments had failed to provide security against jihadist insurgencies. The grim irony is that their Russian-backed strategies have proven even less effective, while accelerating humanitarian catastrophe and state fragility.
Russia's approach through the Wagner Group (now restructured under direct state control following Prigozhin's death) emphasizes support for regime security over population protection. Russian advisors excel at keeping unpopular governments in power through intelligence support, targeted violence against opposition, and information operations. What they do not provide is effective counterinsurgency against dispersed militant networks embedded in local populations. Jihadist groups affiliated with al-Qaeda and Islamic State have expanded their operational zones as professional French forces withdrew and less capable, more predatory Russian-backed militias replaced them.
The strategic logic for Moscow is straightforward: the Sahel offers opportunities to demonstrate great power status, access natural resources (particularly gold), and complicate Western interests at minimal cost. Russian forces are not fighting and dying in significant numbers; local militaries and private contractors absorb the risks while Moscow gains diplomatic alignment and economic access. For the Sahelian juntas, Russia provides what they most need—regime protection without the governance and human rights conditionalities that Western partners demanded.
The humanitarian consequences are catastrophic. Attacks on civilians have increased as both jihadist groups and government-aligned forces employ collective punishment strategies. Development progress accumulated over decades has reversed. Migration pressures toward Europe intensify. And the underlying drivers of instability—state weakness, economic marginalization, ethnic tensions, and governance failures—remain unaddressed while violence metastasizes. The Sahel demonstrates that geopolitical competition does not require direct great power confrontation to devastate civilian populations; proxy contests suffice.
Myanmar: State collapse and regional indifference
Myanmar's descent into comprehensive civil war following the 2021 military coup represents state failure on a massive scale. The Tatmadaw (military) controls the capital and some major cities, but vast swathes of territory are governed by ethnic armed organizations, pro-democracy resistance groups, or exist in violent anarchy. The junta's proposed 2025 elections were a transparent farce aimed at securing international legitimacy without conceding meaningful power—an approach that satisfied neither domestic opposition nor critical international observers.
The regional response has been characterized by performative diplomacy devoid of pressure mechanisms. ASEAN's special envoy process produces statements but no accountability. China and India compete for influence with the junta while maintaining ties with ethnic armed organizations along their borders—hedging strategies that prioritize stability over democratic governance. Thailand and Bangladesh manage refugee flows but avoid actions that might destabilize their neighbor further. The result is a frozen international posture that effectively accepts military rule as preferable to uncertainty.
Myanmar's tragedy illustrates the limits of international norms when great powers lack interest in enforcement and regional powers prioritize stability. The military's violence against civilians, including artillery bombardment of villages and airstrikes on schools, violates every humanitarian principle. Yet the Responsibility to Protect doctrine, invoked selectively elsewhere, finds no champions here. Myanmar possesses strategic location between China and India, but not such importance that either power will jeopardize its interests by seriously pressuring the junta.
The opposition's fragmentation compounds the problem. The National Unity Government commands international sympathy but limited territory. Ethnic armed organizations pursue local agendas sometimes aligned with, sometimes orthogonal to, the democracy movement. Resistance groups lack unified command and sustainable funding. No credible alternative government exists that could assume power if the junta collapsed, discouraging even sympathetic external actors from actively destabilizing the regime. Myanmar is locked in a grim equilibrium of violence without victory, suffering without resolution.
The Horn of Africa: Overlapping crises and external meddling
The Horn of Africa concentrates multiple conflict dynamics: Ethiopia's internal fragmentation following the Tigray war, Somalia's endless battle against al-Shabaab, Eritrea's destabilizing regional role, and competition among external powers—UAE, Turkey, Egypt, Saudi Arabia—pursuing influence through arms transfers and economic deals. Each conflict feeds others in a regional system characterized by porous borders, ethnic groups spanning multiple states, and governments prioritizing survival over governance.
Ethiopia's trajectory is particularly concerning. The Tigray war formally ended but underlying tensions persist, while new conflicts have emerged in Oromia and Amhara regions. Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed's consolidation of power has alienated former allies and ethnic constituencies, fracturing the coalition that brought him to office. Ethiopia's economic crisis, compounded by war damage and debt burdens, limits the state's capacity to address grievances through development or service provision. The specter of comprehensive state collapse—unthinkable for Africa's second-most populous country just years ago—is now discussed as a plausible scenario.
Somalia represents the inverse problem: a state that has never fully consolidated control attempting to combat an entrenched insurgency while dependent on external military support. African Union and bilateral security assistance has prevented al-Shabaab from seizing Mogadishu, but not from controlling rural areas or conducting high-profile attacks in the capital. The planned withdrawal of international forces confronts Somali security services with challenges they are not prepared to meet, threatening a reversion to the state collapse that has characterized much of Somalia's post-1991 experience.
External actors exploit these fragilities to pursue narrow interests. The UAE's port investments and military facilities secure access to strategic waterways. Turkey's economic and military engagement builds influence in a historically Ottoman sphere. Egypt's involvement in Ethiopia reflects Nile water anxieties exacerbated by the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam dispute. None of these actors possess the sustained commitment or resources to stabilize the region; all contribute to militarization and competitive dynamics that perpetuate instability. The Horn of Africa remains a zone of overlapping spheres of influence where no power is dominant and cooperative governance remains elusive.
Members are reading: How the Nile water dispute creates war risk between Ethiopia and Egypt that climate change intensifies.
The South Caucasus: Frozen conflicts thawing
The 2020 war between Azerbaijan and Armenia over Nagorno-Karabakh, followed by Azerbaijan's 2023 military operation that secured control over the entire region, appeared to settle a decades-old frozen conflict. The reality is more complex: Armenia remains deeply insecure, its military defeat total and alliance with Russia revealed as hollow. Azerbaijan, emboldened by victory and Turkish support, has expanded territorial demands and military pressure. The South Caucasus is less stable now than during the formal cease-fire period.
Russia's traditional role as regional arbiter has collapsed. Moscow's inability or unwillingness to defend Armenia—a CSTO treaty ally—during Azerbaijan's operations demonstrated that Russian security guarantees are subordinate to broader strategic calculations. Turkey's decisive support for Azerbaijan, including drone warfare capabilities that proved devastatingly effective, established Ankara as the ascendant external power. This shift reflects Russia's overextension in Ukraine and Turkey's successful projection of influence in a former Soviet sphere.
Armenia's strategic reorientation toward the West and away from Russian dependence represents rational hedging but offers uncertain security benefits. The United States and European Union provide diplomatic support and economic assistance but no security guarantees comparable to what Moscow theoretically offered. France has increased military sales to Armenia, but Paris lacks the capability or political will to confront Azerbaijan militarily. Armenia's position is profoundly vulnerable: geographically isolated, economically weak, and militarily inferior to its neighbor.
Azerbaijan's calculus is driven by nationalism and resource politics. President Aliyev has consolidated authoritarian control and utilized military victory to bolster domestic legitimacy. Oil and gas revenues, while subject to price volatility, provide economic cushion that Armenia lacks. The "Zangezur corridor" project—securing territorial connection to Nakhchivan through Armenian sovereign territory—represents Azerbaijan's maximal territorial ambition, one that Armenia vehemently opposes but may lack the power to prevent. The South Caucasus demonstrates how military victory in territorial conflicts, rather than resolving tensions, often generates demands for further revision once the taboo against force is broken.
The broader pattern: Order collapse and power resurgence
These ten conflicts, diverse in specifics, reflect common dynamics that define international politics in 2026. The post-Cold War hope that international law and institutions would constrain power politics has proven illusory. What we observe instead is reversion to historical patterns: great powers carving spheres of influence, regional hegemons asserting dominance over smaller neighbors, and military force regaining primacy as the ultimate arbiter of disputes.
The United States remains the most powerful state but no longer the unquestioned hegemon. American strategy oscillates between disengagement and overwhelming force, between transactional deal-making and ideological confrontation, reflecting domestic political divisions and strategic uncertainty about priorities. The result is a superpower that is simultaneously everywhere and nowhere—intervening in some theaters while abandoning commitments in others, generating uncertainty among allies and adversaries alike about American reliability.
Russia and China pursue revisionist agendas from different positions. Moscow leverages nuclear weapons and willingness to accept costs that would be politically unsustainable in democracies, compensating for economic and demographic weakness through risk tolerance and strategic patience. Beijing plays a longer game, accumulating economic and military capabilities while avoiding direct confrontations, but signaling through actions in the South China Sea and statements regarding Taiwan that it will not indefinitely accept constraints on its perceived interests.
Middle powers navigate this environment by hedging and exploiting great power competition. Turkey, UAE, Saudi Arabia, India—each pursues policies unthinkable during periods of tighter great power control, simultaneously maintaining relationships with multiple blocs while avoiding exclusive alignment. This creates a more multipolar system but not necessarily a more stable one; multipolar systems historically prove prone to miscalculation and cascading alliance dynamics that generate systemic wars.
Conclusion: The return of tragedy in international politics
The optimism that characterized Western thinking about international order at the Cold War's end has not survived contact with the enduring realities of power politics. The conflicts examined here demonstrate that international law constrains behavior only when backed by force or when states perceive compliance serves their interests. Humanitarian norms prove subordinate to strategic calculation. International institutions function only insofar as major powers permit. And the threat or use of military force remains central to international politics, regardless of normative prohibitions.
This is not a moral judgment but an analytical observation. Realism does not celebrate these dynamics; it describes them. The task for policymakers is not to lament the gap between the world as we wish it were and the world as it is, but to navigate the latter effectively. This requires clear identification of interests, honest assessment of capabilities, and willingness to accept that not every problem admits a solution aligned with our values.
The strategic environment in 2026 is more dangerous than at any point since the Cold War's end because multiple revisionist challenges are unfolding simultaneously while the constraining mechanisms of the post-1945 order erode. The U.S.-led alliance system persists but with questionable American commitment. Nuclear deterrence remains stable at the strategic level but risks erosion through tactical use or miscalculation in regional conflicts. Economic interdependence, once thought to prevent major power war, now appears compatible with sustained confrontation as states accept costs for strategic objectives.
The ten conflicts profiled here will not be resolved through appeals to international law or humanitarian principles. They will evolve according to the balance of power among the actors, the strategic value each places on the contested issues, and the willingness to pay costs to secure interests. Some may reach stable, if unjust, settlements. Others will grind on indefinitely, consuming resources and lives without resolution. A few carry potential for catastrophic escalation that would dwarf their current humanitarian costs.
The question facing the international system is not whether we can return to a rule-based order that never existed in the form imagined. It is whether the emerging distribution of power can stabilize without major power war, whether regional conflicts can be contained rather than allowed to metastasize, and whether states can develop mechanisms to manage competition without catastrophic escalation. The historical record offers limited grounds for optimism, but the imperative to avoid great power war in the nuclear age makes the effort essential. What is certain is that the world of 2026, and the conflicts that define it, will not be shaped by the values we profess but by the power we can project and the resolve we demonstrate. That has always been the tragic essence of international politics; we simply forgot it for a brief, anomalous period.
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