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Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky meets with US Army Secretary Daniel Driscoll amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Kyiv, Ukraine, on November 20, 2025.
What We’re Watching: Kyiv gets a nugget US peace plan, Election day in Guinea-Bissau, Two men from Queens meet at the White House
A nugget for Kyiv in the US plan for ending the war
The United States’ 28-point plan for ending the war in Ukraine appears to contain many items from Russia’s wish list, but it has emerged that it also has something for Kyiv: a security guarantee akin to NATO’s Article 5, which says that an attack on one member state is an attack on all. The US and its European allies would be part of this guarantee. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who faces domestic pressure over a corruption scandal, said on Thursday he’s willing to engage with the plan – although he did draft a statement with European leaders that disavowed parts of the proposal. The Kremlin said it hasn’t formally received the plan.
This West African incumbent may struggle to win reelection
Guinea-Bissau, a West African country of two million people that plays a central role in global cocaine trade, is holding the first round of its presidential election this Sunday. One-term incumbent Umaro Sissoco Embalo faces fierce competition from opposition leader Fernando Dias, who has centered his campaign on security and keeping soldiers out of politics – a rather tough challenge in a country that has had several military coups. The issue hasn’t gone away, either: there was reportedly a coup attempt this year. Most incumbents have won reelection on the continent this year, often amid reports of vote-rigging. Will it be different in Guinea-Bissau?
Two men from Queens walk into the Oval Office
New York City mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani is heading to the White House today to meet with Donald Trump, setting the tone for the relationship between the leader of the US’s biggest city and the US president – and there’s plenty that could go wrong. While they both hail from Queens, they represent movements on vastly different sides of the political spectrum. If things go south, Trump holds a more powerful hand: he has threatened to cut off funding for the city, flood its streets with ICE agents, and send in the national guard. While Mamdani may hesitate to provoke the president, he’ll lose his base if he’s seen as cowing to the president.
Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi holds talks with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Gyeongju, South Korea, on Oct. 31, 2025.
Hard Numbers: China-Japan spat could hurt tourism, Pro-Russian pair accused of attacking Polish railway, Neo-Nazi pleads guilty to poison plot in NYC, South Africa blocks arrivals of Palestinians
650,000: Roughly 650,000 Chinese tourists visited Japan in September, but those levels are under threat amid a diplomatic rift between the two countries. Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi suggested that her country would intervene if China attacks Taiwan, prompting Beijing to cancel tour groups to Japan and ban employees of state-owned enterprises from traveling there.
2: Two Ukrainian men, who are believed to have been working with Russia, have been identified as the culprits behind the rail sabotage attacks in Poland over the weekend. The men are believed to have been recruited by Russian intelligence.
18: A Georgian man who hatched a plan to feed poisoned candy to Jewish children in New York City pleaded guilty on Monday to soliciting hate crimes. Prosecutors will seek an 18-year jail sentence. The man led a Russian & Ukrainian neo-Nazi group that has sought to sow violence worldwide.
2,000: The South African government announced that it will block the arrival of any further flights of Palestinians after hundreds arrived by air in recent weeks. Passengers said they paid $2,000 per ticket to an aid agency offering them a route out of the country, but South African Foreign Minister Ronald Lamola denounced the flights as part of “a broader agenda to remove Palestinians from Palestine.”
Drone wall plan tests Europe’s cohesion
First there was the Russian drone in Poland. Then Romania. Then Russian jets flew into Estonian airspace, while some unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) shut down Denmark’s airports.
In recent weeks, Russian aircraft have been illegally violating European airspace with greater frequency and boldness.
What are the Europeans going to do about it? One possible answer emerged last week, when the European Commission announced it would explore building a so-called “drone wall,” an air defense system involving radars, sensors, and missiles that aims to detect and destroy drones that pass through Europe’s eastern borders.
One former NATO leader suggested the wall could be operational within a year.
The idea for a drone wall, though, will test Europe’s – and, more broadly, NATO’s – ability to agree on the system’s costs, deployment, and even its purpose. The subject will be one of the hottest items on the agenda as European Union leaders meet in Copenhagen this week to discuss the continent’s collective defense.
Eurasia Group’s Europe Director Jan Techau said there are a few different paths that Europe could take. It could build a drone wall along NATO’s eastern flank that would involve shooting down UAVs, create a system that merely jams Russian drones to make them inoperable, or simply boost drone defenses as part of a broader effort to update Europe’s air defenses across the continent.
“The big, decisive question is,” said Techau, “when the EC’s defense chief Andrius Kubilius brings the defense ministers together in Brussels for an EU defense ministers meeting, how much support will [the drone wall] get?”
Some, such as German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius, are already pouring cold water on the idea, arguing this week that it would take at least three or four years to build such a defense mechanism.
“Drone defense, of course,” he said, “but not by a drone wall.”
There are also questions over the rules of engagement for any new anti-drone defenses. If a Russian UAV enters NATO airspace, it’s “fair game” for a NATO country to shoot it down, per Techau – Poland did just that last month. But some say the system should aim beyond that.
At Eurasia Group’s Europe Summit last month, former US Ambassador to NATO Ivo Daalder suggested shooting down Russian drones before they enter NATO territory, creating dicey dilemmas.
“What if Europeans shot down Russian drones in Ukrainian airspace? Would that make them a party in the war?” Techau questioned. “So far, most Europeans fear that the answer is yes. So they won’t do it. Which is why Daalder’s suggestion sounds unrealistic to me.”
Still, the spate of recent drone incursions in Eastern Europe – as well as the increasing role of UAVs in modern warfare – has created urgency around the need for more effective defenses against unmanned aircraft.
“Something will happen. There will be more drone defense. There’s a greater sense of urgency,” said Techau. “Now the big question is whether it can be a pan-European effort, or whether it will be individual national efforts.”
Warplanes strike Russian drones inside Poland
In this episode of GZERO Europe, Carl Bildt discusses Russia’s drone incursions into Poland.
Nineteen drones crossed into Polish airspace with some intercepted and shot down by warplanes. Bildt says the move by Russia was intentional and warns that “this is a clear act of aggression."
If tolerated, Bildt cautions it risks setting “a pattern where Russia step by step is going to up and increase this sort of direct, indirect attacks … not only against Ukraine… but also against NATO countries.”
Zelensky, Trump, and NATO: A united front on Ukraine?
In this episode of Ian Bremmer’s Quick Take, Ian breaks down Zelensky’s latest trip to Washington, this time joined by a united front of European leaders.
Ian explains why this visit is such a sharp contrast from February, when Zelensky came to the White House alone and left with little to show for it. Today, he arrives alongside key allies from the UK, Germany, France, Finland, Italy, EU and NATO leadership, a powerful symbol that Europe is stepping up.
Europe’s role in supporting Ukraine has shifted dramatically. As Ian notes, European military and financial aid to Kyiv now outpaces that of the United States, giving Europe greater leverage in shaping the war’s future. That includes discussions of “near Article 5” guarantees for Ukraine, signaling long-term security commitments even without NATO membership.
The meeting also highlights the growing importance of maintaining a unified transatlantic stance. While Putin continues to resist any ceasefire, the presence of Europe’s top leaders in Washington underscores that NATO is stronger and more coordinated than it was just months ago.
The key question now: Will Trump remain aligned with Europe’s position — or leave Putin more room to maneuver?
A school of fish swim above a staghorn (Acropora cervicornis) coral colony as it grows on the Great Barrier Reef off the coast of Cairns, Australia October 25, 2019.
Hard Numbers: Great Barrier Reef suffers worst coral damage, US cuts mRNA vaccine funding, South Korea opens visa-free tourism for Chinese visitors, & More
39: Australia’s Great Barrier Reef – the biggest living ecosystem in the world – has suffered its largest annual coral decline since monitoring began 39 years ago. Tropical cyclones and coral-eating starfish are partly responsible, but experts say rising sea temperatures due to climate change are the main culprit.
5: Law and Justice-backed Karol Nawrocki began his five-year term as Polish president after his inauguration earlier today. Nawrocki will be a consistent thorn in the side of centrist Prime Minister Donald Tusk: unlike Tusk, the new president supports tax cuts and doesn’t see a place for Ukraine in NATO nor the European Union.
$500 million: US Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. canceled nearly $500 million in funding for mRNA vaccine research. mRNA technology, which gives genetic instructions to the body on how to fight diseases, enabled the rapid development of the COVID-19 vaccine. Several large studies say mRNA is safe, but the technology has faced scrutiny from Kennedy Jr., vaccine skeptic groups, and other members of the Trump administration.
2: Just how big is the AI spending boom? Over the past two quarters, investment in artificial intelligence has contributed more to American GDP growth than consumer spending, according to Renaissance Macro, an economic research company.
30: South Korea announced it will temporarily allow Chinese nationals to visit with a tour group for 30 days without needing a visa. It’s the first time that Seoul has allowed Chinese tourists to enter without a visa like this. The pilot program, which runs from Sept. 29 to June 30 next year, is part of a cautious thaw in bilateral relations.
The return of the nuclear threat, with Admiral James Stavridis
Listen: The world is heading toward a new nuclear arms race—one that’s more chaotic and dangerous than the last. The Cold War built rules of deterrence for a world of dueling superpowers and static arsenals. But in a fragmented, GZERO world of fast-moving technology and unpredictable leadership, the safeguards are fraying. On the GZERO World Podcast, Admiral James Stavridis, former Supreme Allied Commander of NATO, sits down with Ian Bremmer to discuss the growing nuclear threat and what we can do to stop it.
The indicators are alarming: China is stockpiling nuclear warheads at record speed. Russia continues to rattle its nuclear saber in Ukraine. Even US allies are privately and publicly questioning whether they need a deterrent of their own. So how serious is the nuclear risk? How do we guarantee security in a world where the weapons (and the rules) are changing? Are we ready for a future where not just missiles, but lines of code, could end civilization? Stavridis and Bremmer assess the current arms race and what it will take to lower the nuclear temperature.
“We're already involved in a proxy war with a nuclear power,” Stavridis warns, “We'd be smart to try and continue to have strong alliances to balance China and Russia drawing closer and closer together.”
Why life sciences are critical to national security
Listen: What if the next virus isn’t natural, but deliberately engineered and used as a weapon? As geopolitical tensions rise and biological threats become more complex, health security and life sciences are emerging as critical pillars of national defense.
In the premiere episode of “The Ripple Effect: Investing in Life Sciences”, host Dan Riskin is joined by two leading voices at the intersection of biotechnology and defense, Dawn Meyerriecks, former CIA Deputy Director for Science and Technology and current member of the National Security Commission on Emerging Biotechnology, and Jason Kelly, co-founder and CEO of Ginkgo Bioworks. Together, they explore the dual-use nature of biotechnology and the urgent need for international oversight, genetic attribution standards, and robust viral surveillance. From pandemic preparedness and fragile supply chains to AI-driven lab automation and airport biosurveillance, their conversation highlights how life science innovation strengthens national resilience and strategic defense.
This timely conversation follows the June 25th, 2025 Hague Summit Declaration, where NATO allies pledged to invest 5% of GDP in defense by 2035—including up to 1.5% on resilience and innovation to safeguard critical infrastructure, civil preparedness, networks, and the defense industrial base. This limited series, produced by GZERO’s Blue Circle Studios in partnership with Novartis, examines how life science innovation plays a vital role in fulfilling that commitment.