In both geometry and geopolitics, the term “Axis” carries a revolutionary implication; for the former, it describes the fixed line around which a body revolves, for the latter, it implies a desire to reorder the international system by replacing the existing centre of power.

The term gained political meaning on November 1, 1936, when Italian dictator Benito Mussolini gave a speech in Milan about the newly-signed treaty between Italy and Nazi Germany:

“This Berlin-Rome line is not a diaphragm, but rather an axis around which can revolve all those European states with a will to collaboration and peace.”

His use of the word ascia (axis) was a calculated piece of rhetorical branding; he was positioning the Rome-Berlin axis as the new European centre of gravity and suggesting the old Anglo-French dominance of the continent was obsolete. When Japan joined them in 1940 with the signing of the Tripartite Pact , the metaphor expanded to a global scale.

From the outset, the term was inherently exclusionary. States outside the Axis were, by definition, “out of orbit.” For fascist regimes, the Axis implied order, inevitability, and historical momentum. For the Allies, it became shorthand for an existential threat to Western civilisation.

It is important to understand that an Axis is a designation of alignment rather than alliance that shares mutual defence pacts and binding treaties.

While members of formal alliances sign treaties and share mutual defence pacts – for instance NATO’s North Atlantic Treaty and the "one-for-all" commitment of Article 5 respectively, an Axis functions more like a constellation of interests - members may never sign a single piece of paper together. Instead, they are grouped together based on their shared desire to disrupt the status quo.

Members may even be openly hostile to one another; Two members of the "Axis of Evil," Iran and Iraq, were grouped together despite being historical enemies because their independent actions served to undermine the same global framework.

For this reason, it is helpful to think of an axis as sharing a revisionist outlook which focuses more on a shared “no” to the current world order than a shared “yes” to a specific, unified future.

In contemporary geopolitical discourse, the label is rarely self-applied; instead, it is typically used by external observers to frame a group of adversaries as morally equivalent to the totalitarian regimes of the 20^th Century and therefore fundamentally hostile or threatening to global stability.

Designating a group of actors as an axis carries several specific connotations:

This moral framing was most explicitly deployed by then-US President George W. Bush in his 2002 “Axis of Evil” speech, in an effort to galvanise domestic and international support for his War on Terror.

The danger of employing Axis rhetoric is that it can become a self-fulfilling prophecy. When the West designates nations as part of an Axis, it signals to those nations that they are being excluded from the global order – unwittingly driving them into a marriage of necessity.

Throughout history, there have been four major axis designations:

The prototypical Axis emerged from Mussolini’s Rome–Berlin formulation and was formalised by the 1940 Tripartite Pact between Germany, Italy, and Japan. It remains the only Axis underpinned by a fully codified, multi-continental military alliance. Its objective was explicit: the creation of a “New Order” to replace the League of Nations system.

The result was total systemic rupture and global war. The Axis failed through total military defeat in 1945, but it established the linguistic template for all future usage.

Coined by speechwriter David Frum and popularized by George W. Bush in his 2002 State of the Union address, this designation targeted Iran, Iraq, and North Korea. Unlike the original Axis, this was an external label applied by the US to link state-sponsored terrorism with WMD development.

There was no internal agreement between members; in fact, as previously mentioned, Iran and Iraq were enemies. Geopolitically, it was employed to justify the "Bush Doctrine" of preemption and the War on Terror. The designation is considered a strategic failure by many analysts, as it inadvertently reinforced the belief among some "rogue states" that possessing nuclear weapons was a necessary measure to ensure national security and deter external threats, particularly from the United States.

Originating in 2002–2003 as a direct response to the "Axis of Evil" designation, this designation was first used by a Libyan newspaper and later adopted by Iran and Hezbollah. It is a self-identified, informal coalition of state and non-state actors (Iran, Syria, Hezbollah, Houthis, Hamas, and a wide network of smaller militia groups) aimed at countering US and Israeli influence in the Middle East. It relies on "strategic depth" and proxy warfare rather than formal treaties.

This axis is ongoing and highly resilient; despite member suffering significant leadership assassinations in 2024 and major degradation from Israeli and US strikes and the fall of the Assad regime in 2025, it remains the primary driver of regional "grey zone" conflict and anti-Western sentiment.

This is a contemporary designation coined in 2024 by CNAS analysts Richard Fontaine and Andrea Kendall-Taylor to describe the growing coordination between Russia, China, Iran, and North Korea (also collectively known as the acronym “CRINK”). Designated to highlight a "coalition of convenience," its members are unified by a mutual desire to dismantle the Western-led "rules-based order."

This axis is ongoing and intensifying, and is primarily driven by transactional needs (many of which are related to the conflict in Ukraine): North Korean shells and Iranian drones for Russian energy and Chinese tech. With its capacity to erode Western leverage by “sanctions-proofing” economies and diffusing military pressure across multiple theatres, it poses the most significant challenge to US global hegemony since the Cold War.

It is increasingly clear that the world’s geopolitical centre of gravity is shifting away from US and Western dominance. Whether this emerging alignment of revisionist powers consolidates into a durable reordering of global power, or fractures under the weight of its own internal contradictions, is likely to represent one of the defining turning points of modern history.