When China deploys warships to the Taiwan Strait or when it funds a port in Hambantota or finances a railway through the Sahel, the world notices. But when Beijing rewires how populations think, what they fear, and who they trust, the world largely looks away. This is Cognitive Warfare, the world's most consequential battlefield of the 21st century, the one that's least understood. Illustration by The Geostrata China calls it ‘public opinion warfare,’ which is one of the thre

Throughout history, geography has influenced the fate of empires. For many centuries, lands that lack coasts have been described as landlocked or held captive to the land due to the need to pay tolls to pass through the territory of their neighbour country to access an ocean to use for shipping goods out of their country. The depiction of landlocked territories as prisoners or land-bound will soon change in the near future; when the new Silk Road is completed in April 2026, t

On April 23, 2026, the People’s Republic of China (PRC) commemorated the 77th founding anniversary of the People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN), celebrating nearly eight decades of technological innovation and strategic reach that have defined its naval history since 1949. In the late 1970s, Deng Xiaoping’s reforms transformed China’s coast into an export- driven economic engine, making maritime security vital for national survival. Illustration by The Geostrata Following the

US President Donald Trump is set to visit China from May 13 to 15 for the Trump-Xi Summit, amid recent tensions on tariffs, the US’s sanctions on five Chinese refineries for purchasing Iranian oil and the new Chinese anti-sanctions law asserting that these sanctions “shall not be recognised, enforced or complied with”. Illustration by The Geostrata Although President Trump sought to ease these tensions with his new Board of Trade proposal to resolve trade-related issues and p