We live in a troubled world
As the end of 2025 approaches, we can confirm the configuration and coexistence of various types of warfare that face an unstable, unexpected, and chaotic future.
The world coexists with regional armed conflicts, global trade conflicts and ideological conflicts that foster division between societies, which is increasing confrontation between them, including violent acts, as well as hate speech that is amplified on social media.
Those who are leading us into this global chaos are the world's leaders and their decisions. And I am referring to those who control the various powers, capable of penetrating political, economic and military structures, which have sufficient influence to alter and manipulate them towards interests, most often of individuals or compact groups.
There are global leaders who, from the highest levels of government, control and execute actions that are changing the course of history, currently towards a world in conflict. But there are also businesspeople who are accumulating great influence, especially those who are diversifying into technological areas, ranging from powerful artificial or quantum intelligence chips to cryptocurrencies and new weapons of mass destruction systems. Recently, drones have become more sophisticated, intelligent and effective devices that are lethal to any large-scale interest.
On the one hand, we are experiencing a traumatic war that has brought the Palestinians to the brink of extinction in the Gaza Strip, while those who have managed to survive do so in subhuman conditions. ‘Leaders’ have taken it upon themselves to turn this story into the most shameful events in human history.
These are powerful groups financed in turn by other major interests, on the one hand the terrorist group Hamas, cowards who use the Palestinians themselves as human shields, financed or hosted by other nations such as Iran and Qatar, who knew how to unleash the irrational fury of another antagonistic power group, the Israeli government in the hands of an extremist like Benjamin Netanyahu, who, after the kidnapping and murder of dozens of Israelis on 7 October 2023 by Hamas, launched into an extermination without reflecting that his decisions, like those of the terrorists, involved the death of thousands of civilians.
Netanyahu will inevitably bear the sword of condemnation that fate has in store for him.
The countries with the highest military spending in 2025 were the United States, Russia, China, India and South Korea. Russia, in particular, has waged a long war against Ukraine. An invasion that has lasted more than three and a half years and for which there is no real possibility of peace in the short term. The comfort zone that Russian President Vladimir Putin demonstrates in continuing to attack Ukraine shows the state of the world, which is to normalise war instead of accepting peace as our natural state.
At the same time, the United States has deployed ships, submarines and fighter planes in the Caribbean Sea and Puerto Rican territory. The pretext is to combat drug trafficking in that region, despite the fact that another major route, the Pacific Ocean, remains open. But, as I said, this is a pretext; the truth is that their objective is to overthrow the government of Nicolás Maduro.
The question is when and what tactics it will use. If it has already deployed its armed forces, it stands to reason that it will be soon, to carry out a surgical operation and thus arrest the dictator, who is accused by the US government of being a terrorist for leading the ‘Cartel of the Suns’.
As if that were not enough, the tariff war waged by Donald Trump's government has caused anxiety about the direction of the global economy and social development as a whole. Disproportionate taxes left and right have greatly strained international relations. An example of this is Mexico's surprise move to impose tariffs of up to 50% on multiple products from China. This move came a few weeks before the start of formal negotiations on the Free Trade Agreement between Mexico, the United States and Canada. The dragon's strength was not long in coming, sending veiled messages that it would react forcefully to Mexico's measures.
Far-right ideology is beginning to take hold in various parts of the world. Why is this a problem? Because its agenda is to return to the past, to a limited world full of nationalism, where individual and minority freedoms hang in the balance of conservative thinking rooted in religious fundamentalism. If this radical right wing prevails, the problems I raised in this column, and many others I left out, will lead us into a new dark age in our human history.
Omar Cepeda, presenter at @ElFinancieroTV, columnist at @ElFinanciero_Mx and @lasillarota
Article previously published in El Financiero de México on 17 September 2025.