Multipolarity

Last time Albania blew up it was because the entire country had become embroiled in a Ponzi scheme, led by a gypsy soothsayer. That incident was generally classed as a Civil War, with breakaway militias staking out territory across the country, after about a fifth of the nation's supposed wealth evaporated overnight.

The leader of the opposition at the time? Edi Rama. Now, thirty years on, Edi Rama is still a made man in Albanian politics, and has been happily passing the Premiership back and forth with his rightist rivals ever since.

But almost overnight, it looks like this epochal politician may be gone for good. And Europe's most laggard state might be about to fully break with its post-Communist era - with all kinds of geopolitical implications.

Beyond the manifestations in France, this week we're taking a look at the European riots, from the back of the bus. France blowing up is important. Albania and Spain going at the same time? It's all a function of how much steam the global pressure cooker is generating, says Philip Pilkington.

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Multipolarity is a long-running alt-geopolitics brand, starring the economist Philip Pilkington, and the journalist Andrew Collingwood. In January 2023, we began with the slogan ‘Charting the rise of the multipolar world order’.

And we’ve hardly struggled for material since. Each week, our duo take three key stories affecting the global balance of power, and explain what each means for the coming multipolar era.

Increasingly, they’re joined by guests from across the spectrum: technologist Steve Hsu, journalist Malcom Kyeyune, strategic analyst Amerikanets, or academics like Warwick Powell and Glenn Diesen.

You can follow us on X, get into our lively Substack with the weekly Multipolarity Brief – a one-stop shop for deep analysis – and Philip Pilkington’s bimonthly column.

You can also get our premium subscriber-only podcast episodes on either Patreon or Substack.

Please like, subscribe, and be excellent to each other.

We've been tracking the story for weeks, and now the authorities are waking up to it.

The CFTC, the US commodities markets watchdog, is investigating oil futures bets that appeared to be timed perfectly to profit from President Trump's statements related to the Iran War.

There is an obvious domestic political angle to the return of the Democrats to power after the midterms But there are longer term implications, too: breakdowns of price discovery, untrustworthy markets, rampant corruption among the US political elites — it all speaks to a Third World-isation of their political economy.

Meanwhile, after chivalrously riding to the defence of Trump's targeted oil price, the Saudis are now taking a pasting at the hands of the Houthis.

This puts the Saudi economy itself at risk: politically, it is unable to devalue the Riyal. But without sufficient oil exports, its trade account would have to be financed somehow: either by debt or selling Treasuries.

It all signals coming political instability in the Kingdom. Is this most rock-solid of Gulf regimes finally on the slip-slide?

All of which still leaves a question dangling: why did MBS make such a foolish decision to start this war? Was he given bad advice? Or was he, in fact, 'tricked', by a sophisticated intelligence operation?

***

Multipolarity is a long-running alt-geopolitics brand, starring the economist Philip Pilkington, and the journalist Andrew Collingwood. In January 2023, we began with the slogan ‘Charting the rise of the multipolar world order’. And we’ve hardly struggled for material since.

Each week, our duo take three key stories affecting the global balance of power, and explain what each means for the coming multipolar era. Increasingly, they’re joined by guests from across the spectrum: technologist Steve Hsu, journalist Malcom Kyeyune, strategic analyst Amerikanets, or academics like Warwick Powell and Glenn Diesen.

You can follow us on X, get into our lively Substack with the weekly Multipolarity Brief – a one-stop shop for deep analysis – and Philip Pilkington’s bimonthly column. You can also get our premium subscriber-only podcast episodes on either Patreon or Substack.

Please like, subscribe, and be excellent to each other.

A record-breaking week down in Hormuz, where twelve oil tankers have been hit in a matter of days. Back on Wall Street, the cost of oil has pipped $100 a barrel. Last week, a third US aircraft carrier set sail for the region. It could mean that three carriers are in the region as early as the end of October.

The narrative that the Strait is open and back to pre war oil flows is collapsing already. After we predicted much of this fakery in last week’s episode, this week we’re asking: why did the pundit class get it so wrong?

The answer, says Philip Pilkington, is that it seems as though the analysts are mistaking the tool that Iran is using to achieve its strategic goals for the goal itself. Besides: even if we take the US story of the navy finding a way to pry open the Strait at face value, it's unsustainable.

Now, as Andrew Collingwood points out, US Treasury Yields become the new front in this spiralling crisis. After all, the US has multiple points of financial vulnerability: with more tension being pumped into the system, there’s no telling where that chain of consequences could finally explode out.

***

Multipolarity is a long-running alt-geopolitics brand, starring the economist Philip Pilkington, and the journalist Andrew Collingwood. In January 2023, we began with the slogan ‘Charting the rise of the multipolar world order’.

And we’ve hardly struggled for material since. Each week, our duo take three key stories affecting the global balance of power, and explain what each means for the coming multipolar era. Increasingly, they’re joined by guests from across the spectrum: technologist Steve Hsu, journalist Malcom Kyeyune, strategic analyst Amerikanets, or academics like Warwick Powell and Glenn Diesen.

You can follow us on X, get into our lively Substack with the weekly Multipolarity Brief – a one-stop shop for deep analysis – and Philip Pilkington’s bimonthly column. You can also get our premium subscriber-only podcast episodes on either Patreon or Substack.

Please like, subscribe, and be excellent to each other.

What can we know about the oil that gets through Hormuz?

Turns out most of what we know filters through a single data point: a company called Kpler.

Before the war, Kpler's numbers were solid. They combined transponder tracking with loading and unloading records, following each ship payload from port to port.

But then the shadow fleet tankers switched their transponders off. No one reports their cargo any more. Now, Kpler has to fall back on satellite images. And those are redacted by the Pentagon...

Now, says Philip Pilkington, we're all in the woods looking for Yetis - and we can't tell whether we've hit a real Sasquatch, or just a guy in a woollen suit.

Brent was $70 to 80 when everyone agreed the Strait was shut. It's now above $90. In July, 'Oil Glut 1.0"' knocked about $30 off the price. But 'Glut 2.0' has only moved it by about $10 - well within ordinary weekly volatility.

Does the market no longer believing the people pushing these stories?

***

Multipolarity is a long-running alt-geopolitics brand, starring the economist Philip Pilkington, and the journalist Andrew Collingwood. In January 2023, we began with the slogan ‘Charting the rise of the multipolar world order’.

And we’ve hardly struggled for material since. Each week, our duo take three key stories affecting the global balance of power, and explain what each means for the coming multipolar era.

Increasingly, they’re joined by guests from across the spectrum: technologist Steve Hsu, journalist Malcom Kyeyune, strategic analyst Amerikanets, or academics like Warwick Powell and Glenn Diesen.

You can follow us on X, get into our lively Substack with the weekly Multipolarity Brief – a one-stop shop for deep analysis – and Philip Pilkington’s bimonthly column. You can also get our premium subscriber-only podcast episodes on either Patreon or Substack.

Please like, subscribe, and be excellent to each other.

Lately, European leaders seem panicked.

By the beginning of July, the EU had begun acting in an increasingly assertive, confident way.

On China – they announced new anti-dumping, anti-subsidy measures. On Ukraine, they pushed forward with plans to release even more materiel to the front. On the question of democracy and centralisation, they were happy to roll over the Romanians, and put their thumb on the scale in Hungary.

Now it’s call time at the casino. The cards are being turned over – and once they lose their shirts, the continent’s leaders are still going to need the parking deposit to pay their way out of the building.

A trade war with China. America stepping back. An increasingly unstable game of missile ping pong with Russia. An energy shock coming up the pike. Winter in a few weeks. Ursula & co now find themselves sitting amidst a perfect storm of bad bets. How will they ride this out? As the security situation weakens, will Europe revert to ‘securitisation’ to bolster its faltering power?

***

Multipolarity is a long-running alt-geopolitics brand, starring the economist Philip Pilkington, and the journalist Andrew Collingwood. In January 2023, we began with the slogan ‘Charting the rise of the multipolar world order’. And we’ve hardly struggled for material since.

Each week, our duo take three key stories affecting the global balance of power, and explain what each means for the coming multipolar era. Increasingly, they’re joined by guests from across the spectrum: technologist Steve Hsu, journalist Malcom Kyeyune, strategic analyst Amerikanets, or academics like Warwick Powell and Glenn Diesen. You can follow us on X, get into our lively Substack with the weekly Multipolarity Brief – a one-stop shop for deep analysis – and Philip Pilkington’s bimonthly column.

You can also get our premium subscriber-only podcast episodes on either Patreon or Substack.

Please like, subscribe, and be excellent to each other.

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Patreon

Substack

Donald Trump’s year of smashing things continues apace.

Iran, Greenland, Canada… At some point, there is no more china in the shop for the bull to break. But not yet.

With his comments that he wants to see a united Ireland, the President has jabbed the Special Relationship in the eye, kneed it in the balls, and burst its spleen.

Breaking up the territorial integrity of an ally? Bad sport, old chap.

He wanted to teach Britain a lesson, but as eighty years of diplomacy crumples in a heap, Trump may soon come to understand the difference between heavy leverage and making a sworn enemy.

Or he may not.

From the poodle Blair to the sticky end of Anthony Eden, British Prime Ministers have always yielded to the jesses of American power. In return, they have been allowed to ride shotgun in the global order.

So what if that soft solicitousness went away? As Britain is loosed from the unipolar order, we’ll be assessing the full damage - from The Falkands to the Balkans, British interests are about to become extremely interesting.

In a special edition, we’ll be spending the whole hour redrawing the map as it could be, if Greece and Rome go their own ways.

***

Multipolarity is a long-running alt-geopolitics brand, starring the economist Philip Pilkington, and the journalist Andrew Collingwood. In January 2023, we began with the slogan ‘Charting the rise of the multipolar world order’. And we’ve hardly struggled for material since.

Each week, our duo take three key stories affecting the global balance of power, and explain what each means for the coming multipolar era. Increasingly, they’re joined by guests from across the spectrum: technologist Steve Hsu, journalist Malcom Kyeyune, strategic analyst Amerikanets, or academics like Warwick Powell and Glenn Diesen. You can follow us on X, get into our lively Substack with the weekly Multipolarity Brief – a one-stop shop for deep analysis – and Philip Pilkington’s bimonthly column.

You can also get our premium subscriber-only podcast episodes on either Patreon or Substack.

Please like, subscribe, and be excellent to each other.

Twitter

Patreon

Substack

Super-Size Me II.

140 episodes ago, Malcolm Kyeyune launched a piece of verbal artillery into the mess hall of online discourse.

The Burger Theory of History.

It quickly became one of our most quoted episodes.

The Burger Theory is the idea that, since the pandemic of 2020, the rising costs of basic necessities is feeding a malaise that is eating into our society. The sense not that we are in yet another cost of living crisis. But that the system itself is failing.

Much like it did in late-80s Russia, when Soviet citizens were confronted with the Big Mac, and knew that their Leninist world view simply could not stack up. A few years later, the economic Iron Curtain truly tumbled when Mikhail Gorbachev did an advert for Pizza Hut.

Now, as the Hormuz crisis after the Covid crisis after the Ukraine crisis once again strangulates the delicately balanced trading system of the West, he’s ordering a second helping – with fries.

I’ll be explaining what the USS Rustbucket, aka the aircraft carrier Abraham Lincoln, tells us about the quickening tempo of that unravelling.

And I’ll be explaining why he’s right.

The Golden Arches are the new Twin Towers, folks. Strap in, let’s roll…

***

Multipolarity is a long-running alt-geopolitics brand, starring the economist Philip Pilkington, and the journalist Andrew Collingwood. In January 2023, we began with the slogan ‘Charting the rise of the multipolar world order’. And we’ve hardly struggled for material since.

Each week, our duo take three key stories affecting the global balance of power, and explain what each means for the coming multipolar era. Increasingly, they’re joined by guests from across the spectrum: technologist Steve Hsu, journalist Malcom Kyeyune, strategic analyst Amerikanets, or academics like Warwick Powell and Glenn Diesen. You can follow us on X, get into our lively Substack with the weekly Multipolarity Brief – a one-stop shop for deep analysis – and Philip Pilkington's bimonthly column.

You can also get our premium subscriber-only podcast episodes on either Patreon or Substack.

Please like, subscribe, and be excellent to each other.

Twitter

Patreon

Substack

September is here. As the calendar page tugs away, the madness of the dog days of summer blows away. The madness of the autumn is upon us.

With the Pina Colada mix in the recycling bin, the sense of happy impermanence is over, and all the bills we’ve rung up are about to fall due.

Now, with the put-upon air of Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor’s lawyers, we’re counting the cost. Taking the medium-range view. Going through the key agenda items that will see us out of 2026.

Item one: Sort out Iran.

Two - Figure out who’s scamming US Treasury Yields

3. Count the cost of the US midterms

Number 4. Draw a bead on European energy policy as the frost starts to roll south.

5. Get inside the Russia Game.

6. Unpick America’s secondary sanctions on China

Finally, number 7 – throw the Donroe Doctrine in a skip.

Yes it’s a wardrobe’s worth of homework falling on us at once - across a 98 minute show.

And half of all that is here for all of our free subscribers.

The other half is behind the paywall.

That’s right: in a complex and ever-changing world, if you want to stay half-informed, remain a free sub. If you want to see the whole of the moon - sign up for the pods-only on Patreon.

Or pods plus our lively Substack output on, where else, Substack.

Two audio essays, one smouldering fuse.

This week, Philip Pilkington takes on a financial cascade emerging from the Japanese Bond situation. Ever since its one-day bond market heart attack in March, Japan has been trapped: it can't raise rates, it can't let the yen fall, so it has sold the very US Treasuries that hold the US system together. Knowing how perilous things are, in the background, Scott Besent is trying to send in support. But this Wizard of Oz is himself running out of tricks. And when these fail, much like the 2011 sovereign debt crisis, there will be other marks ready to be hit – starting with Britain.

Meanwhile, the Japanese bond crisis began with the spike in oil prices. Now, Andrew Collingwood asks how the Iran War is about to be extruded through the gravitational field of US domestic politics. To him, what looks like a stalemate is actually profoundly unstable, hinging on a unique paradox: the more success America has in keeping the Strait of Hormuz open, the more likely Iran is to escalate.

Of course, this week is pay week – only available to subscribers. So you’ll need to pony up to get it. If you want to support our work, you can tip $8 a month on Patreon. Or get the podcast, plus our paywalled analysis, including Philip Pilkington’s bi-monthly column, and Andrew’s brilliant weekly Multipolarity Brief – for $12, all in.

Simply go to Patreon or Substack, search for us, and do the necessary.

You’ll also have access to our deep archive of over 25 paywalled episodes spanning the three years of the show.

Multipolarity Dialogues is a series of special multipolarity interviews that scan the geopolitical horizon. We talk to some of the sharpest analysts, thinkers, and experts about how they see the world beyond the visible edge of the geopolitical.

In this episode, Steve Hsu.

Where to start with Steve? He’s a member of that tiny sliver of humans who have managed to make significant contributions to multiple fields of academia, including quantum physics, dark energy, and computational genomics.

Outside academia, Steve has founded multiple startups and has been involved in AI and information security. He's also one of the most prominent of the Silicon Valley adjacent public intellectuals.

Tonight we'll be tapping the capricious brain of this polymath to address two of the questions most pertinent to the future of American Power. AI and the future of warfare.

Can America beat China in the AI race? What are the differences in the approaches the two are taking beyond the well-known cost differential? What are the various likely scenarios for the outcome of this highest of high stakes versions of the VHS versus Betamax race, and what does it all mean for humanity?

Meanwhile, how have cheap drones and missiles really changed the nature of warfare? And do they spell the end for the two century long era of maritime powers dominating the world?