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Unlikely Countries That People Don't Understand
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May 16, 2025
Get 100 FREE blades with your purchase of an incredible razor at http://hensonshaving.com/generalknowledge Thank you to them for making this video possible. ▶ In this video I talk about some other countries that, to the unaware observer, maybe shouldn't exist. My point isn't to defend this position. It is, rather, to contradict it: by explaining why these sometime criticized countries do deserve to exist. I speak about North Macedonia and its dispute with Greece, Switzerland and its language divides, East Timor and the attempted annexation by Indonesia, Kosovo and Serbia's refusal of accepting their sovereignty, Bosnia Herzegovina's multiple nationalities situation, as well as Iraq's contemporary chaos and the United Kingdom's potential for falling apart. ▶ TIMESTAMPS: 00:00 Intro 00:57 North Macedonia 02:45 Switzerland 05:44 East Timor 07:21 Kosovo 09:34 Bosnia & Herzegovina 10:50 Iraq 11:51 United Kingdom 13:15 Summary ▶ Support me on Patreon & get exclusive / ahead of time content! https://www.patreon.com/generalknowledge ▶ Follow me on Twitter: https://twitter.com/GKonYoutube ▶ Join the Discord Server: https://discord.com/invite/f4neAVWZfF
View Video Transcript
0:00
After my last video on this, you guys were quick to recommend a bunch of other countries that maybe shouldn't exist
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It's important to, again, start by giving a quick disclaimer. I'm not actually saying these countries shouldn't exist
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I'm simply listing countries that often people don't understand the existence of for various reasons
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Maybe they're too small, maybe they exist within another country, maybe they don't have their own language or a strong national identity
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or maybe they're just completely dysfunctional. But then again, which country doesn't have its own list of problems
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My point here is precisely the opposite of agreeing that they shouldn't exist because of these issues
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It is rather to explain and somewhat justify their reason for existing
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So let's take a look at some of these countries that, to the unaware observer, make no sense in existing
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starting with the ones on the thumbnail. First, North Macedonia. Greek people especially seem to have a bit of a quarrel against North
1:01
Macedonia, but I believe this is mostly due to their name. Macedonia was and is an historical
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region of Greece that at one point did include the current territory of North Macedonia
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but which was not centered there. The name dispute was finally resolved recently and Greece has
1:17
recognized the country in response, but a lot of people still don't understand their sovereignty
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After all, its population is in its largest majority, Slavic and not Greek
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North Macedonia was captured by the Kingdom of Serbia during the First Balkan War of 1912
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and was subsequently annexed to it, being known as South Serbia. After the First World War, the Kingdom of Serbia joined the newly formed Kingdom of Serbs
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Croats and Slovenes, which would then evolve into Yugoslavia, and North Macedonia went along with it
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There was a process of Serbianization where all Greek, Romanian and Bulgarian schools
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and priests were expelled and this shows us how there was in fact a different culture
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if the Serbs felt the need to do this. In 1925, the British Vice-Consul at Skopje wrote that the majority of the inhabitants
2:03
of southern Serbia are Orthodox Christian Macedonians. Ethnologically more akin to the Bulgarians than to the Serbs, he also pointed to the
2:11
existence of the tendency to seek an independent Macedonia with Salonika as its capital
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It remained a part of Yugoslavia until its dissolution. In the 1990s, it became independent, after a referendum where 95% of the people voted yes
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It's definitely not Greek, despite using a Greek name and symbol in its flag, but it's
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definitely not Serbian either, despite its historical union with them. They are their own type of Slavic people, close to the Bulgarians, who simply ended up living
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here and choose to be independent, as is their right. Then Switzerland
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Switzerland is a mixture of languages, German is predominant throughout, but the area closer
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to the French border speaks mostly French, as is the case with Italy. Plus, a few cantons speak a
2:56
minority of the local language of Romance. Throughout history, many have been the cases
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in which a proposed split would have taken place between these three countries based on language
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But the reality is, Switzerland's existence makes a lot of sense. I'm not even going to get into the
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benefit that there is in having a permanently neutral country in a continent that has been
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torn apart by war for centuries, but we just have to look at the history of its creation
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Switzerland was formed in 1291 that a long time ago by an alliance of cantons against the Habsburg dynasty Confederatio Helvetica or Swiss Confederation from which derives the abbreviation CH for
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Switzerland, was formed that year. Although only in 1847, when a new constitution was adopted, was the present nation formed
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but still, it was just a change and they did exist that far back
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Switzerland also has the oldest policy of military neutrality in the world
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It hasn't participated in a foreign war since its neutrality was established by the Treaty of Paris in 1815
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which marked the end of the Napoleonic period. Because of this and their step aside from wars, their concept of national identity differs from almost all other countries in the world
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but it still exists and has been in the making for over 800 years, which I think justifies their existence
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All the way in Oceania, we have Timor-Leste. Why does half a small island exist in the middle of
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the gigantic country that is Indonesia, which controls all the other surrounding islands
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plus the other half of this island precisely? The answer lies mostly in the separate identity
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that the people in this half of the island have, and a lot of it is caused by colonialism
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Indonesia was mostly colonized by the Dutch, while East Timor was a Portuguese outpost in the 17th century
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This established a further difference in the cultural identity of the Timorese people
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which came to learn and adapt certain Portuguese customs. At the same time, the massiveness of Indonesia caused Dutch integration to be less successful
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and even in the cases that it was, it was still different from the Portuguese. However, I would say that one key difference here was something that the Portuguese succeeded at
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but the Dutch failed, religious conversion. The Portuguese were incredibly successful in converting
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Timur, today the country is 99% Roman Catholic. Perhaps due to being Protestant and less dedicated
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to the conversion of colonies the Dutch didn succeed at this With only 7 being Protestant today and 3 Catholic Indonesia remains a largely Muslim country To be fair it much easier to convert half a small island than it is to do so in a gigantic
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archipelago of millions of people. Upon independence, Indonesia actually invaded and occupied Timur between 1975 and 1999, and oddly enough, the Portuguese were instrumental
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in campaigning for Timur's independence and fought alongside with Australia diplomatically to make it happen. A referendum was held and independence was chosen
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Back in Europe and back in the Balkans, Kosovo. This was one I was warned about mentioning
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but hear me out. Serbia claims Kosovo as their own, not accepting their independence. At the
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same time, many people from other countries claim it should just join Albania as its population
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is ethnically the same, so for one reason or another, why is it its own country? Being
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Being ethnically Albanian since very early on in history, it became mostly Muslim due
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to Ottoman occupation for hundreds of years, which constitutes a further difference from
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Orthodox Serbia. Kosovo's modern history can be traced to the Ottoman Sanyak of Prizren of which parts
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were organized into the Kosovo Vilayet in 1877. Following the Balkan Wars in the early 20th century, Kosovo and the surrounding Balkans
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broke free of Ottoman rule. In 1913, their territory was split, mostly being attributed to Serbia, but some to Montenegro
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Just like with North Macedonia, a period of Serbianization followed and many Albanians
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left the region. As Yugoslavia was created, their status worsened. Kosovar Albanians' right to receive an education in their own language was denied, alongside
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with other non-Slavic or unrecognized Slavic nations of Yugoslavia, because the kingdom
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only recognized the Croats, the Serbs and the Slovenes as constituent nations, and Albanians
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and other Muslims, such as the Bosniaks, were forced to emigrate. After the Axis invasion of Yugoslavia in 1941, most of Kosovo was assigned to Italian-controlled
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Albania, which, on the contrary, briefly reinforced the differences. After the war, though, Yugoslav rule was restored and tensions grew more and more, to the point
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of war breaking out. With the dissolution of Yugoslavia, Kosovo was eventually able to establish its own independence
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from Serbia in 2008 against Serbia's will. So now we've understood how they are different from Serbs and how-why-they achieved independence
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but then why not join Albania? The answer seems to be quite simple, to not cause further issues
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Right now the memory of the devastating war that led to independence is still pretty recent
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and nobody wants to further upset anyone by doing something that could cause a return
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of the conflict and annexation by Albania would certainly fall under that category
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And one of its old Yugoslav partners, Bosnia and Erzgovina. Bosnia and Erzgovina is a country that is effectively split into very autonomous areas
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with three nationalities amongst them, the Federation of Bosnia and Erzgovina and Republika Srpska
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Bosnia and Erzgovina is populated by Bosnians and Croats who are mostly Muslim and Catholic respectively
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Republika Srpska, in turn, is populated by Serbs who are mostly Christian Orthodox
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From this moment, you can see why it's chaotic. So, why not just split up
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Well, the answer is pretty similar to that of Kosovo not joining Albania to avoid further conflict
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The Bosnian war that led to the current status quo of the country, which allows for great
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autonomy of the Serbian regions was one of the worst wars Europe has seen with Bosniaks Croats and Srpska Serbs first fighting amongst each other and then the first two joining up against the latter who also had
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the aid of Serbia proper. The Dayton Accords, mediated by the European Union and the United States, brought peace
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and a much needed ceasefire. It's not perfect but since it seems neither side wants to agree with what the other wants
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it's the simplest solution for now. Republika Srpska keeps threatening to break away, I made a whole video about it, but it
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doesn't seem like it'll happen anytime soon. In the Middle East, Iraq
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Now, Iraq is definitely a nation in itself, its population is mostly Iraqi Arabs, followed
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by Kurds and Turkmen. It has always been around and these people, for the most part, have always been there
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Modern Iraq can trace its existence to being ruled through several vilayets of the Ottoman
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empire, then becoming a British protectorate until achieving modern independence. The Ashimit dynasty has ruled it from 1921 and remained in power until 1958
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The biggest question that is put regarding their existence and the cause for some to claim maybe they should just not be a country
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is the complete chaos in which the territory has been immersed for the past decades
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in which at certain points their control was almost limited to the capital of Baghdad
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However, this instability, however permanent it may seem to us now, is reasonably recent and arguably caused by external factors
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Iraq as a nation has been around for a very long time, and its people definitely deserve to have a country of their own
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The temporary and contemporary chaos doesn't take that away. And finally, back in Europe, the United Kingdom
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where the cause for criticism regarding their existence is oddly similar to Iraq
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chaos in governing, although comparing the scale of the two is quite unfair
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Still, every year, cries of the end of the United Kingdom take place. After all, they are made up of four very different constituent countries
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England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. And while desire for independence has, in various polls, increased, especially across Scotland and Wales
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this seems to be irrelevant. Scotland had a chance to leave but rejected it, although granted in very different circumstances than today
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and the percentage of Welsh people that favor independence is still very much in the minority
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However, Northern Ireland becomes more and more Catholic, and current events seem to be pushing for a unification with the Republic of Ireland sooner rather than later
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However, despite this overall discontent and claims by many that a single country doesn't make sense anymore
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it seems that the alternative is still not preferable to the current situation for most people
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Furthermore, their connection is at this point historic. Wales joined England in the 16th century and Scotland in the 18th
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They've been together for quite a long time and went through rougher periods than this one
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If it should exist is one question, I guess open for debate depending on what you think
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of it, whether it will continue to exist is another and I think one that we can answer
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positively at least in part for now. So, those are some of the countries that maybe shouldn't exist but that when we take time
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to learn about and understand, definitely make sense in existing. What do you think
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Do you agree these countries should or shouldn't exist and which other countries in the world
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would you include in these categories? Let me know in the comments. Thanks so much for watching this video, subscribe if you want, and I will see you next time
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