Strategic Atlas No. 005

Written by Luca Salvemini

Here are all the previous issues on Mexico, Vietnam, the UAE, and Israel.

On July 7, in Ankara, Erdoğan received the heads of state and government of the Atlantic Alliance for a summit he had spent years positioning himself to host.

It was the second NATO summit on Turkish soil after Istanbul in 2004, and the image was that of a country planted firmly at the center of the Western security architecture.

In the very same weeks, Turkey was backing a government in Damascus that Israel was bombing, was being kept out of the stabilization force for Gaza by an ally’s veto, and was pursuing in Syria a line of its own in open competition with the interests of another partner of the United States.

Its public, meanwhile, wanted by a wide majority to stay clear of the Alliance’s posture toward Iran.

This is the Turkey of 2026.

A full member of the Western military alliance that in its own neighborhood behaves as an autonomous pole, often at cross-purposes with the allies who applauded at the summit.

The word “ally,” applied to Ankara, no longer describes an alignment: it describes a formal membership that coexists with an independent course of conduct.

Read more

Strategic Atlas | No. 4

By Luca Salvemini

Three years after October 7, war in Israel has ceased to be an exceptional condition and become a structural feature of collective life, with effects that extend well beyond the military sphere.

This issue examines four dimensions rarely read in relation to one another:

i) the psychology of a society in a state of permanent war, supported by clinical data that the military establishment has so far made public only in part;

ii) the demographic and political fault line running through the ultra-Orthodox world, which in recent months has already put the government’s survival at risk;

iii) the geometry of regional adversaries, from Tehran to Ankara;

iv) and the now deeply uncertain trajectory of the Zionist project.

Read more

Strategic Atlas | No. 3

By Luca Salvemini

At dawn, container vessels approach Jebel Ali as Dubai’s traders monitor, simultaneously, crude prices, Chinese markets and American interest rates.

It is a snapshot of unremarkable routine — and yet it encapsulates the most vertiginous ambition in the Gulf: to transform a small state, enriched by a fuel in long-term decline and hemmed in by chronic instability, into an indispensable node of the twenty-first-century international system.

Over the past six months, the Emirates have broken with OPEC, absorbed more than two thousand Iranian drone strikes, forged an operational security alliance with Israel, and repositioned their sovereign funds — worth $1.7 trillion — as instruments of foreign policy.

All this while the Middle East around them is being redrawn at unprecedented speed.

The question is no longer whether the Emirates have become a global actor.

They have.

The question is whether the model holds — and at what cost.

Read more

Strategic Atlas | No. 2

By Luca Salvemini

Vietnam occupies a unique position in the international order: as the only communist regime among the middle powers, with a long and conflict-ridden history with both the United States and China, it has built a foreign policy strategy based on two seemingly contradictory pillars—geopolitical autonomy and deep international integration.

By rejecting formal alignments and cultivating multiple partnerships, Hanoi does not merely navigate the rivalry between great powers: it actively uses it to expand its strategic space.

This analysis examines Vietnam’s internal structure, development trajectory, and global positioning through four axes: geopolitics, trade, technology, and energy.

The aim is to offer decision-makers, analysts, and economic actors a comprehensive understanding of a country that, despite its modest size, exerts a disproportionate influence on the dynamics of Southeast Asia—and increasingly on the architecture of the global order.

1. Historical Profile and National Identity

Vietnam—formally the Socialist Republic of Vietnam—shares a history spanning more than a millennium with China.

Conquered by the Han Dynasty around 111 BCE, it gained independence from the Chinese Empire after the Battle of Bạch Đằng in 938 CE, an independence that lasted until the 19th century, when French colonial ambitions turned toward Southeast Asia.

From the first half of the 1950s, Hanoi aligned itself with the communist bloc, a position it maintained throughout the North-South division of the country, through the Vietnam War, and until the end of the Cold War.

From 1950 to 1975, North Vietnam allied itself with the Soviet Union and the People’s Republic of China. Following China’s shift in strategy in the mid-1970s—particularly after the 1975 reunification — Hanoi decided to side with Moscow against Washington and Beijing, suffering Western and Chinese economic embargoes and political isolation following its intervention in Cambodia to overthrow Pol Pot’s genocidal regime, and subsequently the border war with China, both in 1979.

In the mid-1980s, the country plunged into a severe economic crisis that called into question the survival of the Vietnamese Communist Party. In 1988, a naval clash occurred in the Spratly Islands, resulting in Vietnamese territorial losses, without receiving any assistance from its communist ally.

Following these painful lessons, the Vietnamese leadership made the historic decision to shift its strategic direction from an ideology-based approach to one centered on international integration, pursuing three fundamental principles: political autonomy, deep international integration, and the expansion of global influence, while avoiding taking sides in rivalries between major powers.

2. Political System and Governance

As a one-party state, Vietnam has built a socialist-oriented market economy that is deeply integrated into the global system.

The Communist Party of Vietnam has gradually shifted its focus from ideological purity to legitimacy based on results. Peace and political stability are considered essential for development, while the leadership views endemic corruption and entrenched patronage networks as existential threats.

The 2024–2025 period marked significant transitions and political consolidation.

On Tuesday, April 7, Vietnam’s parliament unanimously elected To Lam, who is also the current secretary of the Vietnamese Communist Party, as the country’s new president.

This is a notable decision: Vietnam is not a democratic country (the Communist Party is the only one recognized by the Constitution), but the fact that a single person now holds both the role of president and that of party leader is quite unusual, and gives To Lam enormous personal power.

Until now, in fact, the two positions were held by different people, and political decisions were traditionally made collectively. Lam, who was confirmed in January for a second term as Party Secretary, will serve a five-year presidential term, making him the most powerful leader in Vietnam in recent decades.

Tô Lâm’s leadership has launched an ambitious reform agenda, aiming to strengthen the role of the CPV and implement comprehensive institutional reform.

The anti-corruption campaign intensified in 2025, extending to private-sector businesspeople with the resolution of 220 long-standing complaints by mid-2025. The campaign led to significant leadership reshuffles without altering fundamental strategic directions.

Structurally, the system’s main weaknesses remain: a domestic private sector that is underdeveloped relative to its potential, excessive reliance on foreign direct investment for exports, and the persistence of inefficient state-owned enterprises.

Society, Demographics, and Rights Demographic Data and Digitalization

Vietnam’s population reached approximately 101.59 million people in January 2025, with an urbanization rate of 41.4% and an average age of 33.4 years.

Society is increasingly digitized: 79.8 million internet users (78.8% penetration) and 66.2 million active social media users, accounting for 65% of the population.

The country has made significant progress in poverty reduction, aiming to reduce the number of poor households to over 1.25 million by the end of 2025.

However, income inequality persists, with the Human Development Index falling by 16% when adjusted for inequality.

Fundamental rights

According to Human Rights Watch, the country suppresses fundamental freedoms: freedom of expression, association, peaceful assembly, movement, and religion, with independent organizations banned.

The judicial system is not independent, and the courts routinely deny the right to a fair trial. Press freedom remains severely restricted, with Vietnam ranked 173rd out of 180 by Reporters Without Borders.

The media are under strict state control and serve as mouthpieces for the party.

Ethnic and religious minorities continue to suffer serious rights violations: the Hmong and Montagnard Christians, in particular, face intense repression and discrimination because of the ethnocentricity of mainstream Vietnamese culture.

3. Bamboo Diplomacy: A Foreign Policy Strategy

Hanoi practices what it calls “bamboo diplomacy”: firm on fundamental interests and principles, but flexible in strategies and tactics.

By remaining anchored to multilateral norms and cultivating diverse partnerships, Vietnam encourages both Washington and Beijing to compete for influence through incentives rather than threats.

Vietnam maintains friendly ties with all major powers and with countries such as Iran, Cuba, and North Korea.

It is a member of nearly all major multilateral institutions — from the UN and WTO to ASEAN, APEC, CPTPP, RCEP, and IPEF— and has signed over 20 free trade agreements.

It maintains diplomatic relations with 193 countries and plays active roles in bodies such as the United Nations Security Council. Hanoi has expanded its network of high-level diplomatic partnerships, including comprehensive strategic partnerships with China, the United States, Russia, Japan, India, Australia, South Korea, France, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and four ASEAN states, as well as strategic or green partnerships with South Africa, Germany, Brazil, and Denmark, among others.

Vietnamese decision-makers do not see themselves facing a binary choice between Washington and Beijing, but believe they can engage flexibly with a matrix of options tailored to specific sectors and contexts.

Hanoi knows from experience that when great powers get too close, even smaller nations can fall victim: a state of competition without direct confrontation between great powers—“not too hot, not too cold”—brings strategic opportunities.

Vietnam’s strategic goal is not only to avoid being trapped, but to create an environment in which such binary choices remain avoidable.

Read more

Strategic Atlas | No. 1

By Luca Salvemini

I have decided to launch the new column in the Foreign Affairs Newsletter from Mexico because I firmly believe it is the world’s leading rising power.

Few countries in the world can match Mexico’s demographics, which have grown by over 100 million in seventy years—from 25 million in 1950 to the current 131 million—with an average age of 29.

It is one of the few countries bordering two oceans, the Atlantic and the Pacific, with a dual focus on Europe and Asia.

It experiences significant internal violence, which can therefore be channelled outward.

It is the world’s largest Spanish-speaking nation, the primary speaker of the third most widely spoken language, with an unrivaled cultural heritage, blending Aztec and Iberian influences.

It remains immune to the cultural influence of the United States and Europe. Here, only 6% of the population identifies as Evangelical Protestant, unlike in Costa Rica, Venezuela, or Brazil, where converts account for 55%, 30%, and 28% of the total, respectively.

Above all, Mexico can undermine the United States from within.

North of the River live 38 million Chicanos, variously unassimilated, rediscovering their motherland. A potential fifth column to bring the house of cards crashing down.

Who possesses such a sharp weapon against the enemy?

In the first installment of Strategic Atlas, the question I will try to answer is not whether Mexico will succeed in becoming what it wants to appear to be—a stable democracy, an emerging economy, an autonomous international actor.

The question is whether the structures underpinning the country are compatible with that transformation, or whether they are instead systematically working to prevent it.

The answer, as we shall see, is not binary.

Mexico is a country where the state both exists and does not exist at the same time; where sovereignty is real in some places and purely nominal in others; where economic integration with the United States is so deep that it has produced a dependency that no declaration of independence can dissolve.

Before the storm, it is therefore advisable to assess Mexico’s power. To grasp our times. To fill the void.

Understanding Mexico means learning to hold these contradictions together without resolving them.

Make yourselves comfortable and take your time on this long journey.

Let’s get started.

Read more