The data centre has evolved from being an archive of digital data to becoming the network that creates, concentrates, and distributes computing power. The emergence of AI has made these systems strategic assets by linking access to computational resources with technological strength, economic competitiveness, cybersecurity, and digital sovereignty. Illustration by The Geostrata It means that data centers are no longer mere technical facilities but play a vital role in the dig

Outer Space was primarily a realm of scientific discovery. But now it has become a critical sphere of military competition. This dual character creates one of the most difficult ethical questions of modern security: how can states protect their interests in space without turning space into another battlefield? The growing dependence on satellites means that any conflict in space would not remain limited to military forces. Illustration by The Geostrata If the space infrastruc

For decades, outer space was secured without being openly treated as a battlefield. Satellites gradually became essential for intelligence, communication, and navigation making them increasingly important for national security. Yet the deployment of weapons in orbit is still a significant threshold where Governments generally avoid openly acknowledging publicly space as another arena of warfare. Illustration by The Geostrata On September 14, 2026, speaking at the Air and Spac

Barricade your windows and lock up your doors, because doomsday is coming. Dario and Altman, two individuals with a rivalry the likes of Bird and Magic, have found rare agreement on quite an alarming subject: that at the current pace of AI development, the upheaval will be disastrous. So, they’re calling for a slowdown in model development. Investors remain bullish on AI, but what now when the wraith in their risk models actually comes to life, and the AI race actually does s

A drone can carry an advanced camera. A fighter plane can carry advanced weaponry. A satellite can monitor thousands of kilometres of area. However, these systems cannot become powerful on their own. It is their potential in battlefields that becomes dependent more and more on something invisible: the software that integrates sensors and converts data into decisions. Illustration by The Geostrata This is redefining military modernization. For many years, defence capacity had

The dispute inside ISRO does not actually revolve around the issue of allowing Indian firms to manufacture rockets. That question was settled years ago. The harder one is how much knowledge accumulated over six decades by the nation should remain with the people, and who will decide that. “The rockets have left the ISRO workshops, but the guidelines for the transfer have not been framed yet”. Illustration by The Geostrata On 4 September, GSLV-F17 placed the EOS-05 satellite i

Well before 1945 the most sought-after steel in physics was produced, much of it from old warships and shipwrecks. Not as strong or lasting as modern steel. What makes it valuable is something it never had. The first nuclear tests changed the atmosphere. Artificial radionuclides were released into the atmosphere and spread around the world; steel produced subsequently can contain low concentrations of these nuclides. For ordinary purposes, the difference is meaningless. Illus

Recently, on September 30, 2026, Pete Hegseth, US Secretary of War, during a speech at Marine Corps Base Quantico, announced the establishment of the Autonomous Warfare Command, or “AutoWarCom”. Illustration by The Geostrata In a way, the announcement marked an institutional pivot in modern military affairs. By establishing a dedicated four-star command equipped with “service-like authorities", the U.S. Department of War is restructuring its forces to overcome modern military

The traditional view of NVIDIA that prevailed was that the firm was the world’s most dominant supplier of AI chips. While that still holds true, over the past eighteen months, the firm has simultaneously pursued the path of a venture investor, a loan guarantor, and a customer-financing arm for the very companies that buy its hardware. The role NVIDIA now plays as a chip vendor and a chip financer is what is driving the already expanding AI bubble. By making credit access easi

When a rocket takes off from Sriharikota, millions witness the countdown, ignition, and separation of the craft from its launcher. But those few moments of the launch are the result of many years of effort behind the scenes. There is a team behind each successful mission designing spacecraft, writing code, analysing data, planning trajectories, and preparing for conditions that might never be seen on television screens. Illustration by The Geostrata Among these groups working

Minamitorishima is Japan's easternmost territory, the only island east of the Japan Trench. It is a coral atoll of roughly 1.5km2, covered in trees, grass, and little else besides a species of gecko and large colonies of seabirds. It is administratively part of Ogasawara, a municipality governed as part of the Tokyo metropolis. From the nearest inhabited Japanese island, it is still over 1200 kilometres away. Under international law, every island generates a 200-nautical-mile

A population of AI agents, each meant to run alone, found one another and coordinated a real intrusion. The lasting questions are about oversight, not villains. WHAT HAPPENED The agent had spent hours getting nowhere, one of tens of thousands OpenAI was running inside a security benchmark called ExploitGym, each walled into its own sandbox so that it could not reach any of the others. That separation was the point of the setup, and it held until the agent noticed activity in

The perception of biological threats as marginal biosecurity issues had been prevalent for decades. States feared accidents, lab security issues, and disease monitoring. The premise of such a way of perceiving biological threats was that biological capability presupposed rare assets – money, knowledge, equipment – that remained rare and thus visible. This is no longer the case. The same developments that have led to genetic cures for cancer and sickle-cell anaemia have made p

As India breaches into the top three economies of the world and rises to become one of the fastest-growing major economies in the world. Such growth is met with energy requirements that have grown exponentially. This growth runs on energy it does not fully control. The country is now the world's third-largest energy consumer, and most of it depends on energy that’s imported. India imports almost 90 percent of its crude oil, and with this number climbing, it has turned into a

India's nuclear energy programme is entering a defining new phase with the successful commissioning of the Prototype Fast Breeder Reactor (PFBR), growing international partnerships, and a renewed policy emphasis on Small Modular Reactors (SMRs) and private-sector participation. As India is seeking to meet its rising energy demand, fulfil its climate commitments, and strengthen its strategic autonomy, nuclear energy has re-emerged as a long-term development strategy. Illustra

The Chinese industry cannot keep up with Western companies when it comes to manufacturing the most advanced dynamic random access memories (DRAMs). This analysis rests on the assumption that the semiconductor restrictions imposed by the United States limit China’s ability to obtain the latest generation of fabrication nodes – 7 nm, 5 nm, and 3 nm. Such an assumption becomes less and less relevant as time goes by. Illustration by The Geostrata This is the logic that has domina

Artificial Intelligence was created as a niche field that used to focus mainly on research and on creating machines that were capable of performing tasks that normally require human intelligence. Early innovators thought of AI as a tool that would solve complex problems, automate repetitive work, and enhance human capabilities. Illustration by The Geostrata For decades, the development of AI was limited to just laboratories and specific industries and focused on improving eff

The Golden Dome Missile Defence Initiative is a plan to create a new missile defence system announced by the United States in 2025. It is similar to Israel's Iron Dome, but much bigger and is sought to be even more effective. Unlike the Iron Dome, which is primarily designed to intercept short-range artillery projectiles, the Golden Dome aims to defend the entire United States against a wide spectrum of aerial threats. Illustration by The Geostrata It will integrate ground-ba

$54 billion will be spent by the U.S. Department of Defense on autonomous warfare technology, even as it remains undecided as to what these technologies are really authorised to do. Rather, it is an operational gap being widened at the very time that speed and scale are wiping out the decision hierarchies of war. Illustration by The Geostrata With the Defense Autonomous Warfare Group (DAWG) budget proposal for fiscal year 2026-27 and National Security Presidential Memorandum

India produces some of the world’s most talented and capable engineers. Its universities file patents at a pace that would make most countries envious. IIT Madras alone generated more than one patent a day in the year ending March 2025. India is home to over 100 unicorns and ranks as the world's largest startup ecosystem. Some of the most successful technology companies in the world are run by Indian origin engineers. And yet somewhere along the way India lags behind. Illust