Here is a map of Europe. Spain, the Balkans, Northern Italy, Turkey and North Africa, are all very mountainous. By contrast, Russia, Northern Germany, and almost the entirety of the British Isles are flat. I've heard that there are "plateaus" in Turkey, and deserts in Spain, but all I see are mountains in both places, more rugged ones in Turkey than in Spain. The ones in North Africa look particularly fierce.
What does this all mean? What can this tell us about the nations of Europe and those in MENA, those around the mediterranean? What do geography and topography tell us about politics that we are at pains to understand without them?
At the least, I hope this will be a welcome reprieve from "But do you doubt the existence of God???" threads.
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The title should've been "What do geography and topography tell us about politics," but... anyways.
It means that France and Germany, Germany and Poland, Poland and Russia, Russia and Germany, are natural enemies. Other than that geopolitics were mostly centered around water, not mountains. Spain is hard to invade for France and vice versa, but the Moors had no issue invading Spain despite its mountains.
>Other than that geopolitics were mostly centered around water, not mountains
Are you insane?
Historical Hungary ran along the mountain range you see on the map. So did historical Romania (Wallachia and Moldavia). The natural border of both Spain and France are the mountain range. The traditional border of Italy runs along the mountain range. The borders of Norway are defined by its mountain range which is a major reason why Denmark could keep it from Sweden for such a long time while the Swedes were able to push its armies all the way down to Ukraine.
The mountain range on the European side of the Bosphorus is what the Ottomans managed to maintain from the Balkan wars and its today the European part of Turkey.
The arrowhead mountain in souther German is basically Sudetenland which was the traditional borders of Bohemia for hundreds of years.
Do I need to continue or are you starting to understand?
I mentioned Spain and France.
Most important forces in history have always been naval:
Phoenicians: naval
Roman Empire: naval
Radhanites: naval
Venetian republic: naval
Dutch republic: naval
England/British Empire: naval
Hanseatic league: naval
The huns/mongols and to an extent the russians/soviets are the exception and only cared about land.
And of course not to forget: American empire: naval (we have the strongest navy in the world)
Nobody gives a frick we got a bunch of mountains in our country.
plus aztecs and incans got toppled by a handful of spanish boats
Water was important, seas and rivers. No one denies this.
You are a complete idiot for saying mountains didnt have a critical factor in defining kingdoms and states. The vast majority of mountain ranges in Europe has defined the boundaries of a state or kingdom and they were absolutely taken into consideration
>the Moors had no issue invading Spain despite its mountains.
they were literally invited
Negative, it was a conquest
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muslim_conquest_of_the_Iberian_Peninsula
NTA but you are a fricking idiot
I bet you just linked that Wiki article without actually reading it
Or even having basic understanding on the subject.
The fact that you outed yourself as American makes perfect sense cause you have zero clue of European history while lecturing European anons here.
The anon was right and the moorish muslims were indeed invited to help win a civil war. This faction then converted to islam and the muslims simply opted to conquer the entire peninsula once the civil war was won. The visigoths were barely a centralized state at that time as well. Your whole narrative that mountains play no part is absolute bullshit because you ignore so many factors to prove your vague point.
Stick to ww1 and ww2.
>and the muslims simply opted to conquer the entire peninsula
They did not "conquer" sh*t. Unless you consider conquering some fortresses here and there and the city centers of 6-7 cities (in which the israelites were crucial because they opened their gates).
People mistake political maps with other things. If I go to New York city hall with 20 of my buddies and I "conquer it", historic books would have to paint all New York State as mine yet I only defeated the major. The same for the muslims: they just went to a few major capitals and a few castles and obtained the power of the influence area of those castles.
Or do you really believe that 300 moors (711) could really conquer, control and submit 500.000km2 and 5.000.000 in 7 years (in 718 Reconquista started)?? 99% of the natives never saw a muslim in their lives as 99% of Brits never saw a Roman in their lives despite Roma ruling Britain for 400 years.
>Or do you really believe that 300 moors (711) could really conquer, control and submit 500.000km2 and 5.000.000 in 7 years (in 718 Reconquista started)?? 99% of the natives never saw a muslim in their lives as 99% of Brits never saw a Roman in their lives despite Roma ruling Britain for 400 years.
then why did the reconquista last 1 century for only a few hundreds moors to be ousted.
because spaniards are child sacrificing phoenicians who deviously and willingly converted to islam to work together with the israelites
spawn of carthage they are, nothing more
>Other than that geopolitics were mostly centered around water, not mountains
I hope this is the dumbest thing I'll read on IQfy in a while. jesus christ anon
you gonna send your trade route through the mountains? you dumb fricking c**t?
you gonna dig a suez canal through the mountains? fricking idiot holy shit low iq moron
You are exactly demonstrating the part that mountains play in geopolitics without even realising it. Even as you sat and typed out the words, it didn't even dawn on you. You have a dangerously low IQ man. Mountains exerted an enormous influence on the development of civilisations for exactly the reasons you posted. Sometimes the route you can't take is far more important in terms of geopolitics than the one you can. God you're moronic
I don't get why the other anons are calling you dumb; there are literal wars being fought over water. India and Pakistan often duke it out over Kashmir for control of the tributaries of the Indus and other rivers that supply the fertile plains of Punjab. The Houthis' major power play in the region is denying Israel and it's allies access through the red sea, which Israel is trying to counter by occupying the coastal regions of Gaza. China's sphere of influence in the far east depends entirely on their control of the South China Sea, where they've stacked up their navy.
Nobody really gives that much of a shit about mountains anymore. In ancient times they might have shaped borders because of their inaccessibility, but that barrier is insignificant now because of planes and whatnot.
Yes, this is something that has only changed within literally the last hundred years (and even then only slightly). Before that, mountains were possibly even more of a determiner in the shaping of geopolitics than water was
Probably just mountain people, not every people saw the bigger picture
Hence why you had people fighting in the mountains while Venetians were building a giant shipbuilding fleet and dominating the Mediterranean Sea
You can see how Rome as well as Constantinople were protected by mountains and how easy it was for hordes from the east to reach france like the Huns for example.
It explains why India was never 'imperialist', didn't expand/conquer other peoples etc
they're a military and defense asset.
Mountains were overrated
Rome was a naval power
Carthage was part of a naval power and defeated by another naval power, mountains didn't do jack shit for them
Romans be like
>what’s Hannibal gonna do?
>cross the Alps?
Hannibal be like
>observe and take notes you dumb guidos
>loses half his army traversing the mountains
Better than losing your entire society because you're surrounded by water (Japan)
Remind me-is it Japan or the Carthaginian empire that still exists?
They explain why the Incan empire expanded north to south instead of east to west like most empires do. Well also the jungles but those jungles probably exist because the of the Andes blocking rain coming across South America from reaching the Pacific Ocean.
Mountains are just one aspect of geography and climate which affects economics and warfare and thus states and civilizations and the way they functioned. As agriculture gradually developed since the late bronze age, this changed the game also. I've roughly marked out various regions of note.
Green: late bronze age
Yellow: antiquity
red and orange: later middle ages onwards
red: areas which saw early industrialization
Plains were not particularly important until the middle ages brought the heavy plow, crop rotation and other innovations. More important in antiquity was the Mediterranean climate, which of course lay in various valleys and small plains amidst mountainous terrain. The bronze age saw great civilizations arise on river flood plains with the Hittites and Mycenaeans beginning to improve agriculture in their own climate.
You can thus imagine how this affected the polities that lay on them. The "god emperor" centralism of the Egyptians and the Mesopotamian civilizations, the latter of which were more exposed to invaders. The Greek city states and Mycenaean "palaces", each drawing supplies from a local area and largely separated from other cities by mountainous terrain. The Diadochi, Carthage and of course Roman Empire which effectively subdued the various cities dotted around the Mediterranean coast. The later Roman Empire which began to move into continental Europe as agriculture there developed and there was "corn" for their legions. European nation states that LARPed Rome but were in fact very different, based upon congruous areas with plains and intensive agriculture, extending their influence into surrounding regions rathe than the Roman Imperial system that brought together vastly different groups.
Here we can see the history of early Rome. The Etruscans to the north in cooler rougher terrain, Naples to the south in a plain like Rome but smaller. To the far north the Gauls and to the south the Greek colonies separated by mountains. Maybe it is hindsight bias but it seems almost inevitable that Rome would end up leading the Latins and Etruscans and once in control over this production region gain hegemony over the rest of Italy.