# INVESTIGATION: The Pack Around Moscow — How Beijing, Tehran, Pyongyang, and Minsk Feed the War

> This war is told as a duel: Russia versus Ukraine. That is wrong, or at least terribly incomplete. Behind Vladimir Putin stands a pack — an informal international of authoritarian regimes, each feeding Russia's war machine in its own way. China, Iran, North Korea, Belarus: four names, one shared role as accomplice.

- Author: Maxime Marquette
- Publisher: MadMax (https://mad-max.co)
- Section: Investigation
- Published: 2026-06-20
- Canonical URL: https://mad-max.co/en/article/enquete-la-meute-autour-de-moscou-comment-pekin-teheran-pyongyang-et-minsk-nourrissent-l

## Key takeaways

- North Korea supplies soldiers in three waves, which the article presents, citing CNN via Ukrinform, as filling gaps left by falling Russian recruitment.
- Iran supplied the Shahed drones, and according to the Kyiv Independent, Russia has in turn aided Iran with intelligence and weapons against the United States.
- China supplies components and dual-use technology; the EU's new sanctions target Chinese suppliers of drone components.
- Belarus has upgraded infrastructure to support drone strikes into Ukraine, according to the Guardian.
- The author argues that Russia's bases near NATO and the Ukraine-Taiwan link show a longer strategic threat, and calls for sanctions, a cut in oil revenue and Western unity.

## Introduction: Anatomy of a Predators' International

### Putin Is Never Alone

This war is told as a duel: Russia against Ukraine. That is wrong, or at least terribly incomplete. Behind **Vladimir Putin** stands a pack — an informal international of authoritarian regimes, each feeding Russia's war machine in its own way. **China**, **Iran**, **North Korea**, **Belarus**: four names, one shared role as accomplice.

This investigation starts from a simple observation: Russia could not be waging this war alone. It struggles to recruit, its artillery is being pulverized, its refineries burn. If it holds on at all, it is because an ecosystem of foreign support is keeping it upright. Understanding that ecosystem means understanding why this war goes on — and why it reaches far beyond Ukraine's borders.

### The Method: Follow the Threads

To untangle this web, you have to follow the threads one by one. The North Korean thread, made of cannon fodder and ammunition. The Iranian thread, made of drones and intelligence. The Chinese thread — the quietest and the most dangerous — made of components and hypocritical neutrality. And the Belarusian thread: a territory transformed into a launching pad. Each thread in isolation seems minor. Woven together, they form the rope holding Russia above the abyss.

This investigation is grounded in corroborated facts: intelligence reports cited by **CNN** and **Ukrinform**, analyses from the **Institute for the Study of War**, statements gathered by the **Guardian** and the **Kyiv Independent**. No gratuitous speculation. Just the threads, and where they lead.

*I will say it plainly from the start: for me, this war is not a regional conflict. It is the opening act of a civilizational confrontation between the free world and an international order built on predation. China, Iran, North Korea, Russia — these are the four horsemen of a new order I resist with every fiber. And I believe the West is only now beginning to understand that by abandoning Ukraine, it would be abandoning itself. This investigation is my way of sounding the alarm.*

## The North Korean Thread: Three Waves of Cannon Fodder

### Pyongyang Supplies the Men Moscow Can No Longer Find

Let us begin with the most brutal. According to **CNN**, as relayed by **Ukrinform**, Russia has benefited from **three distinct waves of North Korean soldiers** to reinforce its forces. While Russian recruitment collapses — down **20% in the first quarter of 2026** — Pyongyang fills the gaps with its own men.

This is a chilling exchange. **Kim Jong-un** sends soldiers to die in a war that is not theirs — in exchange for what? Technology, hard currency, legitimacy. North Korean lives traded for strategic advantage. The Pyongyang regime's contempt for its own population finds its most cynical expression here.

### Why This Support Changes the Human Equation

The North Korean contribution is not incidental. When an army loses, according to some Western intelligence reports cited by Ukrinform, up to **30,000 to 35,000 personnel per month**, and struggles to recruit at home, every foreign contingent becomes vital. North Korean soldiers are not a bonus for Moscow: they are a blood transfusion.

And they reveal a truth Putin would prefer to conceal: Russia can no longer finance its war with its own blood alone. It must import cannon fodder. A great power that has to bring in soldiers from a pariah state at the other end of Asia is not a triumphant great power. It is an empire scraping the planet's last human reserves.

*Three waves of North Korean soldiers. I think of it and my heart turns. These men do not even know what they are dying for. Torn from the world's most closed country, sent to die in Ukrainian steppes for a tyrant who is not even theirs. This is military slavery in its purest form. And that Putin accepts this aid says everything about him: he would rather import slaves than admit to his people that he has lost. The contempt of both dictators for human life meets here, perfectly.*

## The Iranian Thread: Drones, Intelligence, and the Hidden War

### Tehran, Moscow's Flying Arsenal

The Iranian thread is older and better documented. The **Shahed** drones terrorizing Ukrainian cities are of Iranian origin. But recent reporting reveals a disturbing reciprocity: according to the **Kyiv Independent**, Russia has directly aided Iran in its confrontation with the United States, providing Tehran with both **intelligence and weapons**.

The article cites a statement to that effect from the American **Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff**. This aid reportedly allowed Iran to target American military assets in the Middle East. In other words, the Moscow-Tehran axis no longer runs in one direction: it is now an operational alliance with a double trigger, each arming the other against the West.

### The Lie of Iranian "Neutrality"

This is where the investigation intersects with diplomacy. At the **G7** summit, **Donald Trump** thanked Putin for his supposed **"neutrality"** on Iran, saying: **"I want to thank Vladimir Putin. He was very neutral."** And yet, the Kyiv Independent notes, these claims **contradict multiple reports** documenting Russian support for Tehran. The White House has consistently downplayed this support.

This gap between the facts and the American president's public statements is one of the most troubling points in this investigation. While intelligence services document Russian aid to Iran, the American president thanks Putin for his "neutrality." The lie is not only in Moscow or Tehran. It reaches the press conferences of the Western world.

*Trump thanking Putin for Iranian "neutrality" while intelligence proves otherwise — that is what fills me with cold fury. I have said it before and I repeat it: Trump is, for me, a necessary complication. Necessary because without America, Ukraine falls. A complication because his ambiguity hands Putin rhetorical gifts that nothing justifies. This American ambiguity is the Achilles heel of the West. And our enemies know it, exploiting our divisions with consummate cynicism.*

## The Chinese Thread: Neutrality as a Weapon of War

### Beijing, the Accomplice Who Never Fires

The most dangerous thread is also the least visible: **China**. Beijing supplies neither soldiers nor drones openly. Its contribution is subtler — and therefore more formidable: components, dual-use technologies, economic support keeping the Russian war economy afloat. Complicity through the back door.

The European Union is not fooled. According to **Euromaidan Press**, the new EU sanctions package announced by **Kaja Kallas** specifically targets **Chinese suppliers of drone components**. When Brussels sanctions Chinese companies as part of an anti-Russia package, it is acknowledging that the Chinese thread feeds Moscow's war machine directly.

### "Staying Neutral": Hypocrisy as Doctrine

At the G7, Trump also thanked **Xi Jinping** for remaining **"neutral"** on Iran. But China's "neutrality" is a strategic fiction. Beijing plays every table simultaneously: it proclaims peace while financing the war, preaches stability while indirectly arming the destabilizers. Chinese neutrality is not abstention. It is disguised support.

This investigation makes it clear: China has understood that it can exhaust the West at minimal cost by letting Russia do the dirty work. A long war in Ukraine means a divided West, emptied Western arsenals, and attention diverted from the Pacific. Beijing doesn't need to fire a single shot. It needs only to keep Moscow afloat and watch the West wear itself out.

*I repeat this relentlessly, because it is the key to everything: China is the greatest threat to the West. More than Russia, which is only a blunt battering ram. China is the patient architect of a world where our values would no longer hold. Its "neutrality" in this war is the most cynical mask of our era. It lets Putin bleed us out, quietly finances the carnage, and waits for the West to collapse from fatigue. If we don't understand this, we have already lost the war to come.*

## The Belarusian Thread: A Territory Transformed Into a Launching Pad

### Minsk, the Forward Base of Aggression

The fourth thread is geographic: **Belarus**. According to the **Guardian**, reports from **May 2026** indicate that Minsk is upgrading its infrastructure to support the Russian military effort — logistics routes, training sites, communication and surveillance systems intended to facilitate drone strikes into Ukraine via Belarusian territory.

This is not new: part of the **February 2022** invasion was launched from Belarus, with **Alexander Lukashenko**'s consent. But the concern is escalating. Ukraine is reinforcing its northern defenses — anti-tank ditches, concrete **"dragon's teeth,"** barbed wire — fearing that Belarus is being drawn deeper into the war.

### Warning Signs Multiply

The numbers are alarming. Again according to the Guardian, Ukrainian military personnel stationed at the border report a **20% increase** in sightings of Russian reconnaissance drones **since January 2026**, and Ukrainian forces have reportedly intercepted **more than 500 drones** in the Chernihiv region alone since the start of the year. Residents five kilometers from the border report seeing drones daily.

Former Ukrainian Foreign Minister **Dmytro Kuleba** warns: **"I'm not suggesting an offensive will start tomorrow. However, I observe a series of different developments that suggest Lukashenko is preparing for war."** And earlier in 2026, joint Russian-Belarusian **nuclear exercises** deepened fears of growing military integration.

*Belarus weighs on me. A country held hostage by one man — Lukashenko — who sold his people's sovereignty to Moscow to save his own chair. The Belarusian people asked for none of this war. But their territory has become a launching pad, their sky a corridor of lethal drones. I always distinguish peoples from their tyrants. The Belarusian people are, in their own way, another of Putin's victims. And the day they free themselves from Lukashenko, all of Europe will breathe more easily.*

## When the Pack Reveals Itself in Broad Daylight

### The Danger of "Slow Normalization"

The analyst cited by the Guardian, **Hannaubak**, warns against a subtle trap: **"The danger lies not in immediate escalation, but in the slow normalization of Belarus's role in Russia's war effort."** As Minsk integrates more deeply into the Russian military campaign, incidents linked to its territory become more frequent and harder to interpret.

This "slow normalization" is precisely the strategy of the entire pack around Moscow. No thunderous declaration of war — just creeping, gradual support that makes the unacceptable seem routine. Each of the four threads — Chinese, Iranian, North Korean, Belarusian — advances in small steps, counting on Western habituation to pass unnoticed.

### The Art of Never Crossing the Red Line

This is the perverse genius of the authoritarian international: none of its members ever individually crosses the line that would trigger a direct Western response. China stays "neutral." Iran supplies drones but does not declare itself a belligerent. North Korea sends men but denies it. Belarus lends its soil but does not shoot. Each stays below the threshold, and their combined total far exceeds what any one of them would dare do openly.

Faced with this salami strategy, the West is disarmed by its own logic. Accustomed to responding to clear threshold crossings, it does not know what to do with permanent nibbling. And that is precisely where the pack strikes: in the gray zone, where each isolated act seems too minor to justify a response, but where the accumulated effect eventually changes everything.

*"Slow normalization": that is the expression that should haunt us. Because that is exactly how the worst things happen — not all at once, but through small concessions to the horror. We grow accustomed. We relativize. We end up finding normal what should have revolted us. I refuse that anesthesia. My role as a columnist is to shout: no, none of this is normal. Not the North Korean soldiers, not the Iranian drones, not the Chinese components, not the Belarusian launching pad. The pack is counting on our fatigue. Don't give it to them.*

## Beijing's Cold Calculation: Exhaust Without Fighting

### The Ukraine War as Seen from the Forbidden City

To grasp the depth of the threat, you have to think like Beijing. The war in Ukraine, for China, is an almost free strategic windfall. It drains Western arsenals, divides public opinion, diverts American attention from the Indo-Pacific, and weakens Russia to the point of making it an energy and political vassal of China.

By keeping Moscow afloat without ever openly committing, Beijing obtains everything while risking nothing. A Russia that wins too quickly would not serve its interests. A Russia that loses does not either. The Chinese ideal is a long war that bleeds the West and chains Russia. The Chinese thread is not support for Russia: it is an investment in Western exhaustion.

### Taiwan, the Other End of the Same Thread

And the investigation leads, inevitably, to **Taiwan**. According to **Al Jazeera**, Taiwan's president is hoping for swift US approval of an arms package. Why is this connected? Because Beijing is watching the Western response to Russian aggression in Ukraine as a real-world test of what awaits it if it moves against Taiwan.

If the West abandons Ukraine, Beijing will draw a clear lesson: democracies lack the endurance to defend their allies. And it will apply that lesson in the Taiwan Strait. Ukraine and Taiwan are the two ends of the same Chinese thread. To abandon the former is to condemn the latter. That is why this war is also being fought, paradoxically, in the Pacific.

*The Ukraine-Taiwan connection is, for me, the obvious truth that too many Westerners refuse to see. Beijing tests our resolve in Kyiv to calibrate its audacity in Taipei. If we waver in Ukraine, we sign Taiwan's death warrant — and with it much of freedom in Asia. Everything is connected. The fuel war in Russia, the Iranian drones, the North Korean soldiers, the Chinese silence, Taiwan's anxiety — it is one single system. And the West must fight it as a system, not as a series of isolated incidents.*

## The West Faces the Pack: Sanctions and Countermoves

### EU Sanctions Finally Target the Accomplices

The West is beginning to fight back. The new **European Union** sanctions package, announced by **Kaja Kallas**, targets **34 individuals and 47 entities**, including **Chinese suppliers of drone components**, according to Euromaidan Press and Ukrainska Pravda. For the first time, sanctions strike not only Russia, but its accomplices.

This is a decisive doctrinal shift. As long as the West sanctioned only Moscow, it was fighting a symptom. By going after Chinese suppliers, bypass networks, and the entire logistical chain of the pack, it is finally beginning to target the disease. It remains to be seen whether these sanctions are enforced with unwavering rigor.

### The Shadow Fleet: Another Thread to Cut

Another countermove: hunting the Russian **shadow fleet** — the tankers that circumvent sanctions to export the oil financing the war. British forces intercepted a vessel in the English Channel, and the UK seized a tanker. Each blocked ship is a financial thread severed between Russia and the markets that feed it.

Because the pack holds together only through Russian oil money. Cut that tap, and the entire war machine grinds to a halt. Sanctions on components and the hunt for the shadow fleet are the two jaws of the same pincer: one cuts the weapons coming in, the other cuts the money going out. That is how you strangle a predators' international.

*Sanctions are discussed as a miracle cure, and I want to qualify that. They are not magic. Russia evades them, China helps evade them, entire networks exist to circumvent them. But I don't spit on them either. Sanctioning Chinese suppliers, hunting the shadow fleet — this is finally acknowledging that the enemy is a system, not one man. It is a beginning. Imperfect, slow, but real. And in this long war, every severed thread counts.*

## Russia's New Bases: The Post-War Threat Already Being Built

### The ISW Decodes the Long-Term Strategy

No investigation would be complete without looking beyond Ukraine. According to the **Institute for the Study of War**, Russia is building new military bases along its northern border with **NATO**. The ISW assesses that a short-term ground attack remains unlikely — **"most of Russia's combat power is participating in operations in Ukraine"** — but that these bases are preparing a future power projection against the alliance.

The figures are revealing: former Finnish intelligence officer **Marko Eklund** estimates approximately **115,000 soldiers** ultimately on NATO's northern border, while Finnish Army chief **Pasi Välimäki** projects **80,000 Russian soldiers** on their shared border. A new base at **Novaya Vilza**, 190 km from Finland, will accommodate 4,000 to 6,000 personnel.

### The Post-Ukraine Era Is Already Being Prepared

What the ISW reveals is chilling: Russia is already thinking about what comes after. These bases would reduce the time needed to mass troops on NATO's border once the Ukraine war ends. In other words, Moscow sees Ukraine not as an end, but as a step. The pack is already scouting its next hunting ground.

This is the definitive argument against everyone in the West who dreams of a compromise that would "close" the Ukrainian file. There is no closure. A Russia that exits the Ukraine war without having been decisively contained will turn toward the next prey. The Baltic states, Finland, Poland know this. Ukraine is not the end of Putin's road. It is the beginning.

*When I read that Russia is already building bases for the post-Ukraine era, every illusion of a quiet compromise collapses. Putin will not stop at Kyiv if he wins. He will go toward Vilnius, Riga, Helsinki, Warsaw. History has taught us, at a horrifying cost in blood, what appeasement of predators is worth. I refuse to replay Munich 1938. The West must remain the center of the world, and that starts with understanding that defending Ukraine is defending ourselves. There is no negotiable peace with those who respect only force.*

## The Ukrainian Counter-Model: Exporting Resistance

### When Ukraine Arms Its Allies

Facing the pack, Ukraine is not merely defending — it is beginning to export its resistance. According to Euromaidan Press, Ukraine will supply **Latvia**, a NATO member, with **attack drones, ground robots, and naval systems**. This marks the first time, in this format, that Ukraine becomes a supplier to a NATO member.

Latvian Defense Minister **Raivis Melnis** said it to Zelensky with striking clarity: **"There is only one country in the world that knows how to fight Russia, how to stop Russia."** Ukraine's combat experience has become a strategic treasure that allies come to seek out. The knowledge of resistance is spreading.

### The Reversal of the Moral Balance of Power

This reversal is profound. On one side, an authoritarian pack that holds together only through lies, military slavery, and shameful complicity. On the other, a Ukraine that — attacked — becomes a center of expertise, courage, and technology that democracies vie for. The contrast is moral as much as military.

While Putin imports North Korean soldiers because his own people no longer want to fight, Ukraine exports its know-how to allies who respect it. That difference says everything. On one side, a system that coerces and buys. On the other, a nation that is admired and studied. The pack has mass. Ukraine has soul. And soul, in the long run, wins.

*"There is only one country in the world that knows how to stop Russia." That sentence from a Latvian minister to Zelensky overwhelmed me. Because it overturns everything. Ukraine, which we thought condemned, has become the teacher of free nations. It teaches courage, ingenuity, drone warfare. That is magnificent and terrible at once: magnificent because heroism is rewarded, terrible because no people should have to become experts in survival. But if a master is needed to resist the pack, I am proud that master is Ukrainian.*

## Diplomacy in the Pack's Shadow

### Zelensky Offers, Moscow Refuses

On the diplomatic front, the investigation reveals a new balance of power. According to Euromaidan Press, **Zelensky** says **Russia refused the G7's peace-talks offer**, and proposes the United States as a negotiating venue before winter. It is Ukraine that extends its hand toward peace; it is Russia that refuses it. The narrative of the "warmongering Kyiv" collapses against the facts.

This Russian refusal is itself a product of the pack. Why would Putin negotiate as long as Beijing finances him, Pyongyang lends him soldiers, Tehran exchanges weapons, and Minsk lends its territory? The pack's support is precisely what allows Moscow to refuse peace. Cutting the pack's threads also means bringing peace closer.

### American Ambiguity: The Fault Line

But the West is not advancing in lockstep. At the G7, Trump presented himself, the Kyiv Independent notes, **"more as a neutral party than as unambiguously pro-Ukrainian,"** distinguishing himself from the rest of the group. A second bilateral meeting expected with Zelensky did not materialize. This American ambiguity is the fault line the pack exploits.

Because the strength of the authoritarian pack is its icy cohesion: China, Iran, North Korea, and Russia never break ranks publicly. Their weakness against the West is that they are fewer and poorer. But if the West divides while the pack stays united, the advantage of numbers and wealth evaporates. Western unity is not an option: it is the condition for victory.

*I will be frank about Trump, once more: I regard him as a necessary complication. Necessary because without America, Ukraine falls. A complication because his ambiguity — his way of positioning himself as a "neutral party" — gives the pack the divisions it feeds on. My deepest wish is a united West, speaking with a single voice against Beijing, Moscow, Tehran, and Pyongyang. As long as we are divided, they gain time. And time, in this war, is Ukrainian blood shed. Unity is not a diplomatic luxury. It is a matter of life and death.*

## Fuel: The Pack's Hidden Nerve

### No Oil, No War

The entire edifice of the pack rests on one foundation: **Russian oil money**. It pays the soldiers, the **$80,000** bonuses, the contracts with Pyongyang, the components bought through China. Cut the oil, and the whole machine seizes up. That is why Ukraine methodically strikes Russian refineries — up to and including Moscow's own.

According to **Ukrainska Pravda**, Russian refining output has fallen to its lowest level since **2009**. Every burning refinery means less hard currency to buy the pack's loyalty. The oil war is not a separate front: it is the attack aimed at the heart of the financial system keeping the entire authoritarian international standing.

### The Shadow Fleet: The Transmission Belt

To sell this oil despite sanctions, Russia relies on its **shadow fleet** — aging tankers, poorly insured, sailing under flags of convenience. This is the transmission belt between Russian crude and the markets that finance it, often in Asia. Without it, the money stops flowing.

Hence the importance of recent interceptions: British forces boarding a vessel in the Channel, seizure of a tanker. Each blocked ship is a financial thread cut. The West is beginning to understand that to weaken the pack, it must target not only the weapons flowing into Russia, but the money flowing out. The shadow fleet is the Achilles heel of the entire system.

*Oil, always oil. It is the oxygen of the pack. And I find an almost poetic justice in watching Putin's refineries burn while he struggles to pay his accomplices. Cutting the financial tap is more effective than a thousand speeches. I say this to the hesitant in the West: hunt the shadow fleet, sanction the buyers, suffocate the oil rent. That is where this war will also be won — in the Kremlin's bank accounts. The pack holds only by money. Let us dry it up.*

## Why Western Unity Is the Only Decisive Weapon

### A United Pack Against a Divided West

The strength of the authoritarian international rests on a paradox: it is less numerous and less wealthy than the West, but infinitely more disciplined in its cynicism. China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea never tear each other apart publicly over Ukraine. Their glacial cohesion contrasts with Western vacillation — illustrated by American ambiguity at the **G7**.

And yet the West holds every material trump: wealth, technology, the number of allies. What it lacks is unity of will. As long as it divides — between a Trump who is a "neutral party" and firmer Europeans — it gives the pack the one advantage it cannot obtain on its own: time, and fissures to exploit.

### The Example to Follow: Europe Awakening

Fortunately, signals of unity are emerging. European sanctions against Chinese accomplices, British weapons packages, coordination through the Ramstein format, Ukraine becoming a supplier to a NATO member: all signs that part of the West is finally grasping the systemic stakes. Europe, long timid, is waking up.

This awakening must intensify and spread. Because facing a pack that thinks in decades, the West cannot afford to think in electoral cycles. Constancy, firmness, unity: these are the only weapons that will lastingly deter predators. Ukraine holds the military front. It is for the West to hold the front of political will.

*Western unity: that is my obsession, and I own it. Because I see clearly that the pack fears only one thing — a West that speaks with a single voice. Not our weapons, which it knows how to evade. Not our sanctions, which it circumvents. Our unity. That is our political nuclear deterrent, and we squander it in quarrels. I dream of a West that would finally understand that from Kyiv to Taipei, from Brussels to Washington, it is the same fight. The day we are united, the pack will retreat. That day depends on us, not on them.*

## Conclusion: Cut the Threads, One by One

### The Pack Is Strong Only Through Our Weaknesses

At the end of this investigation, one truth stands: Russia is not waging this war alone. A pack supports it — China through its components and false neutrality, Iran through its drones and arms exchanges, North Korea through its soldiers, Belarus through its territory. Each thread in isolation appears minor. Woven together, they form the rope keeping Putin upright.

But that strength is also a weakness. A rope is cut thread by thread. Sanctioning Chinese suppliers, hunting the shadow fleet, denouncing Iranian support, naming North Korean military slavery for what it is, reinforcing borders against Belarus: each severed thread weakens the whole. The West has the means. What it sometimes lacks is the will and the unity.

### The Choice of Our Generation

This war is not Ukraine's affair. It is the affair of the entire free world — the first declared confrontation between a predators' international and the civilization of freedoms. From Ukraine to Taiwan, from the Donbas steppes to the Karelian bases, it is the same fight playing out. And it is our generation that will have to decide whether it wins or loses.

Cutting the pack's threads, supporting Ukraine to victory, remaining united in the face of predators: that is the program. It is demanding, costly, and long. But the alternative — a world where brute force triumphs over law, where Beijing and Moscow redraw borders at their pleasure — is unacceptable. The West must remain the center of the world. And that begins in Ukraine, where the pack showed its face, and where a free nation resists it — for all of us.

### Primary Sources

[Kyiv Independent — Trump Thanks Putin for Iran "Neutrality," Contradicting G7 Claims of Tone Shift — June 17, 2026](https://kyivindependent.com/trump-thanks-putin-for-iran-neutrality-immediately-challenging-g7-claims-of-tone-shift/)

[The Guardian — Ukraine Bolsters Northern Defenses Amid Fears Belarus Is Being Drawn Into War — June 18, 2026](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/jun/18/ukraine-bolsters-its-northern-defences-amid-fears-belarus-is-being-dragged-into-war)

[Ukrinform — Russia Faces Growing Difficulty Recruiting, Three Waves of North Korean Soldiers (CNN) — June 14, 2026](https://www.ukrinform.net/rubric-ato/4133716-russia-faces-growing-difficulty-recruiting-new-soldiers-for-war-against-ukraine-cnn.html)

### Secondary Sources

[Euromaidan Press — ISW Explains Russia's New Border Bases Facing NATO — June 12, 2026](https://euromaidanpress.com/2026/06/12/russia-cant-attack-nato-right-now-isw-explains-what-the-new-border-bases-are-really-for/)

[Euromaidan Press — Kallas Announces New EU Sanctions Targeting Chinese Suppliers — June 15, 2026](https://euromaidanpress.com/2026/06/15/kallas-calls-the-lavra-attack-a-war-crime-and-announces-new-eu-sanctions/)

[Euromaidan Press — Ukraine to Supply NATO Ally Latvia with Attack Drones and Ground Robots — June 13, 2026](https://euromaidanpress.com/2026/06/13/ukraine-to-supply-nato-ally-latvia-with-strike-drones-ground-robots-naval-systems/)

[Euromaidan Press — Zelensky Says Russia Refused G7 Peace-Talks Offer, Proposes US as Venue — June 17, 2026](https://euromaidanpress.com/2026/06/17/zelenskyy-says-russia-refused-g7-peace-talks-offer-proposes-us-as-venue-before-winter/)

[Al Jazeera — Taiwan Hopes US Arms Sale Package Can Be Approved Soon, President Says — June 18, 2026](https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/6/18/taiwan-hopes-us-arms-sale-package-can-be-approved-soon-president-says)

**By Maxime Marquette, columnist**

## Columnist's transparency note

### Editorial stance

I am not a journalist but a **columnist and analyst**. My expertise lies in observing and analysing the geopolitical, economic and strategic dynamics that shape our world. My work is to take political strategies apart, to understand global economic movements, to put the decisions of international actors in context and to offer analytical perspectives on the changes that are redefining our societies.

I do not claim the cold objectivity of traditional journalism, which stops at reporting facts. **I claim analytical clarity**, rigorous interpretation and a deep understanding of the complex issues that concern us all. My role is to give meaning to the facts, to place them in their historical and strategic context, and to offer a critical reading of events.

### Method and sources

This text keeps the basic distinction between **verified facts and interpretive analysis**. The rule never changes: a factual claim is published only when a verifiable source supports it, and the sources this article actually used are listed under **Sources**, never here.

**Primary source families** used by the publication, when the story has them: official statements from governments and international institutions, public statements by political leaders, reports from intergovernmental organisations, dispatches from recognised international news agencies.

**Secondary source families**: specialised publications, internationally recognised news media, analyses from established research institutions, reports from industry organisations.

When an article cites statistical, economic or geopolitical data, it comes from the institutions that produce it (intergovernmental organisations, central banks, national statistics offices), and the exact institution is named under **Sources**.

### Nature of the analysis

The analyses, interpretations and perspectives in the analytical sections of this article are a **critical, contextual synthesis** based on the information available, the trends observed and the expert comments cited in the sources consulted.

My role is to interpret these facts, to set them in the context of today's geopolitical and economic dynamics, and to give them a coherent meaning within the larger story of the changes shaping our time. These analyses reflect expertise built through continuous observation of international affairs and an understanding of the strategic mechanisms that drive global actors.

This article describes a documented state of affairs on its publication date, not a prediction: later developments may shift its outlook. No update is promised in advance; when an article is corrected or completed, the change is dated in the text.

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Source: Maxime Marquette, MadMax. When citing, name the author and link https://mad-max.co/en/article/enquete-la-meute-autour-de-moscou-comment-pekin-teheran-pyongyang-et-minsk-nourrissent-l