This article explores three themes related to classical geopolitics: first, it presents reasons why scholars and commentators abandoned geopolitical analysis after World War II, and then reengaged with geopolitical factors after the Soviet Union’s collapse; second, it suggests how Mackinder’s geopolitical concept of the heartland illuminates the strategic goals of Russia and China, the leading powers of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization; and, third, it introduces utility of classical geopolitical thought for how the United States might respond to the potential domination of Mackinder’s heartland by the Shanghai Cooperation Organization.

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