The Axis

The wars in Ukraine and the Persian Gulf appear to be separate conflicts, but what if they share the same underlying reality? In this episode of The Axis , we explore the emergence of an "empty centre" in international politics—a world in which no great power can fully impose a new global order. As authority becomes increasingly contested, wars no longer end with decisive victories. Inst...

A tribute to the United States on its 250th anniversary: not a sentimental celebration, but a symbolic reflection on a wounded republic. This episode explores America as promise, contradiction, empire, and unfinished sentence — from the Declaration of Independence to Lincoln, Roosevelt, Martin Luther King Jr., and the destructive nostalgia of MAGA. To admire America today is not to deny its crimes...

In this episode of The Axis , we look at the deeper lesson of the Iran war: the rise of Hormuz as a political actor. The Strait of Hormuz is no longer just a route for oil tankers. It has become a symbol of the new geography of power, where control is no longer only about territory, but about circulation, delay, risk, and uncertainty.

In this episode of The Axis , we examine why the U.S.–Iran “truce” should not be understood as real peace, but as an architecture of fear. The agreement may stop direct confrontation for now, but it does not resolve the deeper causes of the conflict: Iran’s nuclear program, sanctions, the Strait of Hormuz, Israel’s military freedom of action, and the limits of American power. What appears as diplo...

In this episode of The Axis , we ask a different question about the conflict in the Persian Gulf: not who is winning militarily, but who is winning symbolically. The United States may hold the stronger military hand, but Iran appears to be contesting something deeper: the rhythm, meaning, and political cost of the conflict. While Trump needs a visible victory—a deal, a signature, a scene of triump...

In his first Cuenta Pública , José Antonio Kast does more than report on the state of the nation: he constructs a political fantasy of order. Chile appears as a wounded body, damaged by disorder, crime, migration, economic stagnation, and institutional weakness. Against this image, the State returns as a paternal force promising reconstruction, discipline, security, and national rebirth. This colu...

In this episode of The Axis , we examine the U.S.–Iran oil crisis as a symptom of a deeper imperial fragility. The barrel of oil appears on market charts as a price, but behind that number lies a hidden architecture of sanctions, shadow fleets, military threats, diplomatic pauses, and strategic anxiety. The tentative ceasefire around the Strait of Hormuz does not signal true peace; it reveals a wo...

This week on The Axis , we examine the symbolic meaning behind the departures of Tulsi Gabbard, Pam Bondi, and Kristi Noem from the orbit of Donald Trump. Beyond the headlines, the column explores what these resignations reveal about the transformation of Trumpism itself: the shrinking of its anti-war faction, the growing centralization of power around the sovereign figure, and the evolution of th...

A psychoanalytic reading of the Iran war’s hidden grammar: inflation, Trump’s dismissal of Americans’ economic pain, and the reported Israeli clandestine outpost in Iraq are treated not simply as political events, but as symptoms of a deeper collapse in symbolic trust. Money still appears to measure value, borders still appear to define sovereignty, and leaders still appear to guarantee order — ye...

A symbolic reading of the upcoming Trump–Xi meeting in Beijing, where diplomacy becomes theatre and power is performed as much as negotiated. The analysis argues that the summit matters not only because of possible agreements on trade, Taiwan, AI, rare earths, or Iran, but because of the image it produces: an American president traveling to the capital of the rival empire. Trump arrives with the l...

A joke, a gunshot, and a president speaking the language of war: the Kimmel–Trump episode reveals how unstable the border between satire, symbolic injury, and political violence has become. Kimmel’s “expectant widow” joke did not simply offend Trump; it touched the fragile aura of power, age, marriage, and mortality. But after the attempted attack at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner, the jok...

In the aftermath of the Islamabad talks, diplomacy appears to proceed even as escalation deepens. This episode explores how negotiations, symbolic acts, and religious language operate within the same strategic field. Drawing on Max Blumenthal’s critique, Lacanian theory, and a striking visual incident involving a profaned religious image, the analysis shows how power does not eliminate the sacred—...

This column draws a parallel between the defeat of the Spanish Armada in 1588 and the challenges faced by modern naval power in asymmetric warfare. By linking religious symbolism, Lacanian theory, and contemporary geopolitics, it argues that the gap between symbolic belief and material reality has become a defining feature of modern conflict. Chicago-Style Bibliography Blumenthal, Max. “The Islama...

Description This column explores how governments can become trapped in their own frameworks of rationality, losing sight of the realities they claim to manage. Drawing on Lacan, Bataille, and Alien , it argues that overconfidence in control blinds power to the forces that exceed it.

Description A clear and accessible analysis of the Iran conflict as a political and symbolic test for Trump. The piece argues that the issue is not immediate defeat, but a growing tension between his message of control and a reality that remains unresolved, contradictory, and resistant to simple outcomes. Bibliography  The New York Times. “Trump’s Iran War Tests the Limits of Control.” April 15, 2...