Beginning Nov. 18, STRATFOR will launch the first of a series of special reports on countries we anticipate being under massive pressure and change in the months ahead. Our intent is to confer to our readership the depth of crisis in three specific states as each struggles with the titanic forces arrayed both against and within them. We will begin with Ukraine. Sandwiched between a resurgent Russia and a slowly splintering European Union and NATO, Ukraine is the chief battleground in the new Cold War. For Russia, the issue is transforming this key buffer state from a potential launch pad for dismembering Russian power to a launch pad for spreading that same power deep into Europe. For Europe, at stake is its eastern periphery and its goal of finally ending security threats to the continent. For the United States, the goal is simply to keep everything in play until American forces are able to redeploy from the Middle East to re-contain Moscow. And in the middle of the mix lies Ukraine, riddled with political, personal, economic and geographic splits. The territory that is now Ukraine has not faced such a crucible of forces — and such a prescient moment in history — since the time of the Mongols. Next we will turn to Mexico. The cartel wars are ripping the country to shreds. Basic security in the country's northern and southern extremities has become a rare commodity, and economic development is being overrun by the conflict. The political authority in Mexico City is finding itself under constant assault, even as the structure of the system itself seems unable to address the threats it faces. The struggle for the very existence of the modern Mexican state is under way at a fundamental level. Finally, we will turn our attention to Pakistan, the country in the crosshairs of the U.S. war on terrorism. The country is in a de facto state of civil war, and Islamabad is shattered as an effective government as it is seemingly unable to grasp the massive changes in its world. The United States is finally shifting from its short-term need to work with Pakistan to its long-term preference of allying with India. That simple — and still in progress — adjustment turns Pakistan's world inside out. Pakistan is shifting from being an ally of the United States into a target, a ward of the international economic system to a castoff, and participant in the war on terror into a battlefield. Beginning Nov. 18 and continuing for several weeks, STRATFOR.com will feature a rolling series of installments about these three critical — and extraordinarily dynamic — states. All three are positioned at the focal point of massive geopolitical pressure. All three are feeling immense pain as a result of the global financial crisis. And all three are staring down the possibility of devolving into failed states.