This book contains a nice succinct recent history of the modern world. Perhaps it is oversimplified in parts but that's what makes it so readable in my opinion. One of the recurring discussions in the book is the greater role that natural geographic features such as mountains, rivers and coastlines play in identifying and shaping ethnicities than lines on a map. We see a number of examples where an ethnic group identifies more with the people on the other side of the border than with those with whom it shares a country. The Pashtun people of north-west Pakistan and south-east Afghanistan are a good example of this but there are plenty others. Another recurring discussion in the book is the role that a nation's natural geographic makeup plays towards its successes or its struggles. To summarise: This is an insightful book. Get it. Read it.
Below are some quotes from the book.
"... political realities are shaped by the most basic physical realities."
"The colonial powers drew artificial borders on paper, completely ignoring the physical realities of the region."
"Although 75 per cent of its [i.e. Russia's] territory is in Asia, only 22 per cent of its population lives there."
"When the Soviet Union broke apart, it split into fifteen countries. Geography had its revenge on the ideology of the Soviets and a more logical picture reappeared on the map, one in which mountains, rivers, lakes and seas delineate where people live, are separated from each other and thus how they develop different languages and customs."
"For Russia this [i.e. the control of Crimea] was an existential matter: they could not cope with losing Crimea, the West could."
"It doesn't matter if the ideology of those in control is tsarist, Communist or crony capitalist – the ports [to the north and east of Russia] still freeze, and the North European Plain is still flat."
"It remains a feature of China to this day that when China opens up, the coastland regions prosper but the inland areas are neglected."
"Demographics and geopolitics oppose Tibetan independence."
"If we take Europe as a whole we see the mountains, rivers and valleys that explain why there are so many nation states. Unlike the USA, in which one dominant language and culture pressed rapidly and violently ever westward, creating a giant country, Europe grew organically over millennia and remains divided between its geographical and linguistic regions."
"Geographically, the Brits are in a good place. Good farmland, close enough to the European Continent to trade and yet protected by dint of being an island race – there have been times when the UK gave thanks for its geography as wars and revolutions swept over its neighbours."
"What is undeniable is that the water around the island, the trees upon it which allowed a great navy to be built, and the economic conditions which sparked the Industrial Revolution all led to Great Britain controlling a global empire."
"... geography tells us that if humans do not constantly strive to overcome its 'rules', its 'rules' will overcome us."
"Almost the entire continent [of Africa] developed in isolation from the Eurasian land mass, where ideas and technology were exchanged from east to west, and west to east, but not north to south."
"Much of the land [in Africa] consists of jungle, swamp, desert or steep-sided plateau, none of which lend themselves to the growing of wheat or rice, or sustaining herds of sheep."
"Africa's rhinos, gazelles and giraffes stubbornly refused to be beasts of burden..."
"Most of the continent's [i.e. Africa's] rivers also pose a problem, as they begin in high land and descend in abrupt drops which thwart navigation."
"The continent's [i.e. Africa's] great rivers... don't connect and this disconnection has a human factor. Whereas huge areas of Russia, China and the USA speak a unifying language which helps trade, in Africa thousands of languages exist and no one culture emerged to dominate areas of similar size."
"... the Europeans... took maps of the contours of Africa's geography and drew lines on them – or, to take a more aggressive approach, lies... These lines were more about how far which power's explorers, military forces and businessmen had advanced on the map than what the people living between the lines felt themselves to be, or how they wanted to organise themselves."
"... the European idea of geography did not fit the reality of Africa's demographics."
"The notion that a man from a certain area [in the Middle East] could not travel across a region to see a relative from the same tribe unless he had a document, granted to him by a third man he didn't know in a faraway town, made little sense. The idea that the document was issued because a foreigner had said the area was now two regions and had made up names for them made no sense at all and was contrary to the way in which life had been lived for centuries."
"To this day most people [in Latin America] still live close to the coastal areas..."
"Until recently the riches [in the Arctic] were theoretical, but the melting ice has made the theoretical probable, and in some cases certain. The melting of the ice changes the geography and the stakes... The hunger for energy suggests the race is inevitable..."
"There are going to be a lot more ships in the High North [i.e. the Arctic], a lot more oil rigs and gas platforms – in fact, a lot more of everything."
"... wars are started by fear of the other as well as by greed..."
"... we have neither conquered our own geography yet, nor our propensity to compete for it."
"... geography does not dictate the course of all events. Great ideas and great leaders are part of the push and pull of history. But they must all operate within the confines of geography."
"... although we have broken free from the shackles of gravity, we are still imprisoned in our own minds, confined by our suspicion of the 'other', and thus our primal competition for resources."
