The Borders Among Arabian Countries Are Messed Up

Unsplash

The Arab empire. Arguably one of the greatest empires to ever rule on earth. Also one of the biggest. Stretching from the Atlantic ocean to all the way to India. Then came the Ottomans. Under their rule, the borders may have changed a bit here and there but the size of their rule was very comparable.

In the 1700s, Ottomans were at their peak when they drew a line of border with the Persian empire. They used the mountain lines on the Persian gulf as a natural indicator of their border. But the problem was a small bit of land at the end of mountain lines called Kurdistan. This part was inhabitated by arabs but were declared to be in a Persian state by the Ottomans and the Persians. This is the same place that was the single biggest cause of the Iran Iraq war in the late 1900s. Not the topic today. After this border ruling in the 1700s, 200 or so years went by. In 1916, the Turks joined Germany in the world war. Bad move which we all know. Even though the Ottoman empire couldn't be taken over during the war as we know about the bloody stories of Gallipoli. But after the war was almost ended, the allied forces looked at the Ottoman lands like candy in candy store. Big sale everyone, take whatever you can.

Britain took a chunk of land. France did too, so did the Italians. Istanbul was initially ruled to be conducted by an international government. They let the state of Turkey stay with the leftovers. All this was signed in the Versailles treaty. Turkey, as leader of the Ottoman forces who were on the losing side, did sign the treaty but never ratified it. The reason is simpl, Ottoman empire was carved and divided like a bloody cake. While Germany barely lost 20 odd percent of their lands. The Ottoman empire saw this huge takeover spree take place because the gulf region and the Mediterranean wss always a historically, naturally rich place to begin with.

After the terms of the Versailles treaty were made open to Turkey. They revolted. What followed was a three year long war of independence, with the dignity of Turkey on the line. At last they won. The Brits and French and other allied forces did leave. Turkey became the modern day Turkey, what they are today. But we all know whenever the westerners of Europeans leave, they draw a joke of a map, to keep the people of those countries against each other so they can never be under one flag and fight up to the people who colonized them in the first place.

Those of you who live in the subcontinent, must know about what those Brits did to the borders of then India and Pakistan. Borders of conflict and unrest. To always be fighting among themselves without a care of the outside. Same thing happened there too. Turkey has closely been newly bordered with 4 major groups of people all locked inside the borders. Syria also have a variety of ethnic groups. 4-5, I don't remember correctly. Same with Lebanon, the famous Palestine and Israel. Kurdistan, Azerbaijan almost all the countries inside or adjacent to the Ottoman empire have been given newly drawn borders which carefully binds multiple groups of people inside a tight border. With the people of those countries always against each other.

The Shia muslims and Sunni muslims have the biggest ongoing conflicts. And in fact of solving Shia muslims in one country and Sunni muslims in another, the Europeans made some squiggly lines that keeps a portion of both belifes along with many others in the same country. This makes sure that these countries are always in internal conflicts so the Ottoman empire can never rise again. Because to rise again the people first need to resolve within themselves and then resolve within countries. These lines over the years have strictly divided different arabian dialect groups or ethnic groups in different portions and so no certain group of people are settled in one single place.

For the Arabian countries to rise again, the muslims there must resolve within themselves to make life more peaceful. Because living on edge isn't always the option. And due to these internal unrests, the Europeans and the westerners are regularly making profit off these lands which should be their own.