World Briefing Plus: On the Move, Because the World Is
This week’s World Briefing Plus comes, for the first time - from 30,000 feet, tracking the cracks in the Western alliance
This week’s World Briefing Plus exclusive comes to you from a moving airplane - Thai Airways TG 638 to be exact - my first-ever video recorded mid-flight, en route from Bangkok to Hong Kong.
It’s the perfect setting, because it mirrors the pace of the world right now: you go to bed thinking the headline is Ukraine, Iran, or Greenland… and you wake up to Afghanistan, the South China Sea, or another flashpoint entirely. Everything is shifting at speed - and that’s exactly why World Briefing exists: to connect the dots in real time, so you don’t have to.
In this week’s video I touch on the shifting geopolitical sands, but the deeper story is the widening rupture in the transatlantic alliance - a growing break between the United States and its closest partners, with Canada, my home country, increasingly caught in the crosshairs (as I write this, a breaking news headline flashed across: ‘Donald Trump threatening 100% tariffs on all Canadian goods entering US if Canada "makes a deal with China.)’”
I also break down the trilateral Ukraine-Russia-US talks in Abu Dhabi, where expectations are rightly low given the Russian delegation’s composition, deep mistrust on both sides, and Moscow’s blunt refusal to even entertain the question of territorial swaps.
And I explain why I’m now in Hong Kong - for two major “Year Ahead” panels (one global, one focused on Africa), with details via the links for anyone who wants to attend, tune in virtually or view later on YouTube.
Finally, after several days in Thailand, I share why this region deserves far more attention than it’s getting: Thailand’s looming elections, Myanmar’s contested vote, and the simmering tensions along the Thai-Cambodian border - a conflict Trump claims among the several others to have “solved,” though the real credit lies largely with ASEAN leaders (especially Malaysia’s Anwar Ibrahim) and likely quiet backing from China. This is World Briefing at its best: not on the red carpet, not clinking glasses, not stuck in one place - but moving, watching, listening, and reporting from where tomorrow’s headlines are forming.
If you value this kind of independent, on-the-ground insight, please consider upgrading to a paid subscription to access World Briefing Plus and support the work.
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