New Countries That Might Exist By 2030

in September of 2012 authors Frank Jacobs and parab Khanna wrote an article in the New York Times titled the new world in this opinion article they outlined 10 countries that they believed could be created in the near future although not specifying a date we talk about potential countries in the channel a lot so in this video I thought it'd be interesting to take a look at the ones mentioned in this article checking if they match the ones I usually speak about and learning if it still makes sense to consider these as potential new countries 10 years after the article was written the first mention and article is the breakup of Mali at the time the article was written in 2012 a Touareg Rebellion drove the Mali Army from the northern half of the country soon after their movement declared the independence of a territory called azawad which would take up over 60 percent of mali's territory although much of it is Desert the Declaration was not accepted by Mali nor any foreign entity and in 2013 the movement itself renounced its claim for Independence and asked the Malian government to start negotiations on its future status perhaps aiming to achieve more autonomy the failure of azawad was already predicted by the authors of the opinion article and their point was that this first Rebellion may be a first piece in a domino of Berber nationalism their point was that many of these Western and Northern African countries hold within their population or territory different ethnic groups namely of Berber or Touareg origin which might soon demand their own sovereignty either again in Mali or perhaps in Algeria with the cabal people although mentioning the ever-present West Sahara issue in my view if no significant developments have happened in the last 10 years from 2012 to 2022 when it comes to these people's potential desires for Independence it doesn't seem like that will be the case by 2030 either although their point is valid with the potential self-determination of these minority groups I don't see it as happening in the short medium term future in Asia they mentioned the apathetical breakup of Pakistan and Afghanistan together they claim that the predicted U.S withdrawal from Afghanistan would leave the region in this array and they weren't even aware of how truly chaotic the full Retreat would end up being their argument here was that the Afghan president at the time had no successor and that Pakistan's state was losing power and becoming more and more divided I'm honestly not knowledgeable enough about either of these topics to weigh in on if they are right or not but they presented the scenario of two new countries emerging both of which have their territory splits and between Pakistan and Afghanistan this ethnic map shows us that the southern half of Afghanistan and the northeast of Pakistan is home to the Pashto people divided by an arbitrary border while the south of both countries is home to the baluki people they stated the chaos in both countries could lead to a breakup and the desire of these now divided people to reunite also mentioning the fact that balukistan is rich in natural gas which could fuel a drive for Independence that's apparently been around since the 1970s a time when up to 37 percent of the locals favored Independence of the two I guess balukistan would be the most likely to be created although if it was then maybe pashtunistan would be as well a collapse of both countries would be needed and despite the fact they are in a fragile region I don't see this specific outcome happening another one is an Arabian Gulf Union you need to remember the list they made is based on events of 2012 but that's precisely the point of the video seeing if their project actions hold up and if those events remain relevant they talked a potential Union of the entire Arab Gulf led by Saudi Arabia and they Justified this with the military incursion by the Saudis into Bahrain which they claim made them militarily and financially dependent on them adding to this The Exodus of people from Yemen into Saudi Arabia which they State could create a hostile merger whatever that means in addition they stated the Sunni Arab monarchies began considering a proposal to rename their Gulf cooperation Council the Arabian Gulf Union emphasizing the need for tighter Regional integration to counter the rising Iranian threat the renaming didn't actually happen and I think we can take this as evidence that the gulf Union will not happen either Qatar I believe doesn't get along particularly well with the Saudis and Oman is quite independent despite sharing the region Yemen is chaotic and the UAE seems strong enough to hold its own against the Saudis as well I would argue this may have seemed likely at the time but not anymore now before we keep going a quick thank you to betterhelp for sponsoring this video betterhelp is the world's largest therapy service and it's 100 online with better help you can tap into a network 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their argument here is also interesting there are already two Congos so why not more they point out that the existence of the two Congos one having been colonized by the French and the other by the belgians is proof of how local borders are just a result of arbitrary Imperial divisions the ethnic and coherence of the countries could make it so that more Congos come to exist and to one point that's true but that could then be true for literally almost all countries in Africa whose borders results from Colonial divisions but they offer additional justification especially focusing on the Democratic Republic of the Congo stating their state is so weak that some even question the government's de facto rule over their entire territory the provinces of kivo in the East had apparently drifted into the orbit of Rwanda which which had military presence in them and the copper-rich katanga province in the South could attempt to spin off as well perhaps fusing with its neighbor the more stable and prosperous Zambia although we could consider these more like border disputes than Breakaway countries maybe this could happen the DRC is in fact quite unstable but they also recently stated their desire to incorporate the East African Federation which includes precisely Rwanda the drc's lack of regional control may continue but I doubt it will escalate to anything more especially not local Independence the most realistic one they mention in my opinion is Somaliland because the region is already de facto independent and its only obstacle towards becoming an official country is foreign validation the government of Somaliland regards itself as the successor state to British Somaliland which upon Independence United with a former colony of Italian Somalia Somalia is pretty much the poster child for a failed State and so the comparably stable region of Somaliland has been able able to assert Regional dominance and Achieve de facto Independence a lot of calls for recognition have begun emerging inside other countries and with Somalia not getting its act together I would say somaliland's officialization as a new country becomes more and more likely the article authors State the neighboring region of puntland could follow its footsteps which would reduce Somalia to only a third of its original territory further north in Syria is a potential alawite State at the time the Syrian internal conflict was more uncertain by now it becomes clear that the old government has been able to maintain control over most of the territory or at least retake it but back then they predicted a potential breakup of the country after the conflict ended if it ever did the state of Aleppo could emerge in the North and the state of Damascus in the South but the authors focus on the coastal region and the potential independence of alawite State predicting that the regime's forces would lose and not be able to retake the rest of the country renaming itself and occupying only this area we're running to close copy of the way the French divided the region when they ruled it as a colony the development of serious conflict over the past 10 years have shown this to be unlikely and close by an independent Kurdistan also connected to the role that the Kurdish took and take in serious internal conflict the authors predicted that this combined with the never-ending fragility of the Iraqi State could lead to an effective establishment of Kurdistan as a country Kurdish people are spread across the modern official borders of Syria Iraq Iran and turkey they state that in 2012 the Kurds were the closest they had ever been in their 3000 years of History to achieve their own State I don't know if this is true and I believe they may be further away today that they were 10 years ago although Kurdish control of Syria has diminished the Kurdistan Regional government of Northern Iraq Remains the country's most stable region and perhaps that could lead to a country in the future I would say this one is possible but not necessarily very likely and less than it was at the time the article was written and finally in the Caucasus a greater Azerbaijan this one has an interesting parallelism with 2023 because it focuses on Iran's troubles at the time they stated Iran was at risk of internal implosion I'm not sure why back then but today Iran is still seeing vast protests inside Northern Iran there are 20 million ethnic azeris and if for whatever reason Iran were to break up these could join up with Azerbaijan expanding its territory in this case of Iranian troubles perhaps Kurdistan itself would be reinforced too but I find it tremendously unlikely even if the internal problems ever ran led to a drastic regime change I don't think this would result in a breakup of the country's territory so those are some of the countries that these authors of an opinion article in the New York Times in 2012 thought could soon be created they also mentioned the typical cases of Belgium breaking up and Korea reuniting but those are so common I didn't find them worth mentioning as for the rest they raised some interesting examples and even if the specific cases they chose are no longer relevant the causes and triggers that they point out as potentially leading to the creation of new countries are still valid and could be used in other regions of the world today according to them back then the world could have seen the creation of azawad and other Regional Berber nationalist movements a breakup of the DRC either into independent states or losing territory to its neighbors due to the inability of effectively controlling all their land Somaliland and perhaps puntland alawite Syria as well as the states of Damascus and Aleppo an Arabian Gulf Union resulting from Saudi Arabia's increasing power and Regional influence and independent Kurdistan a greater Azerbaijan as well as a potential emergence of an independent Balochistan and pashtunistan nationalist ethnic movements failed States internal conflicts and Rising Powers remain a reality even if in other places so what do you think could any of these examples still happen with these new countries being created or could these causes be applied to other regions in the world and in that case which new countries do you think might actually exist by 2030 let me know in the comments thanks so much for watching this video subscribe if you want and I will see you next time for more general knowledge [Music] thank you

Channel: General Knowledge

Views: 182,869

Keywords: generalknowledge, funwithflags, countriesthatdon'texist

Id: D93s2_QVgRQ

Length: 12min 1sec (721 seconds)

Published: Fri Jul 14 2023