Greetings and welcome! My name is Conor Salcetti and I write the Weaponized newsletter. Think of Weaponized as my running commentary and analysis examining the intersection of national security, great-power politics, (de)globalization, decoupling, and strategic technology.
My interests are fairly omnivorous, however, so while I try to tie everything I write into those core themes, I will also delve deeply into areas like American domestic politics, the future of liberal democracy, and the growing economic and geostrategic clout of the Indo-Pacific region. Because my background is in political science and international affairs, that’s generally the framework through which I approach things.
What’s going on?
To be blunt, it feels like we’re living through a profound and tumultuous moment in human history. Powerful currents—impersonal, interconnected, and difficult to understand, much less control—are driving events. The US-led liberal international order that prevailed following the end of the Cold War is (de)evolving, if not collapsing.
So what does that look like?
It’s a world where a novel coronavirus emanating from an inland Chinese metropolis turbocharges a remote work revolution across North America and Western Europe. It’s a world where Moscow’s territorial revanchism on the edge of Europe jacks up food, fuel, and fertilizer prices—exacerbating a global calorie crisis and destabilizing governments from South America, to Southeast Asia, to Sub-Saharan Africa. It’s a world in which one miscalculation, whether over the Korean Peninsula or the Taiwan Strait, wreaks havoc on global supply chains. It’s a world in which the two leading superpowers attempt, in fits and starts, to unwind decades of economic integration. It’s a world in which powerful platforms like Meta and TikTok—purportedly connecting ur—polarize societies and subvert liberal democracies, as conspiracism ascends and trust shatters. It’s a world in which many possess the ability to speak their minds but few feel truly empowered to affect change.
Why subscribe?
Globalization used to be synonymous with connectivity and opportunity. Now it’s often seen as a threat…or a weapon. The ties binding us together have become the primary engines of conflict—social, political, technological, and geostrategic. New risks are sprouting up anywhere and everywhere in an age of ever-increasing complexity and interdependence.
Put simply, Weaponized is my attempt to make sense of how we got here and where we’re going.
What does a typical Weaponized post look like?
I wouldn’t say there’s a “typical” Weaponized post, per se, but here is a handful of articles that I feel best capture the newsletter’s tone (or vibe, if you will):
On AI risk: Three (Very Plausible) AI Dystopias
On US-China and chips: US-China & The Escalating Chip Conflict
On TikTok: Examining Tiktok
On Latin America: Latin Democracies Are In Trouble
Thanks for taking the time and I do hope you subscribe. There are tectonic changes afoot and I believe they’re worth paying attention to!
