The most important country you’ve never heard about, Mapped

breaking news because G's Hy Rebels they could attack a commercial ship and could bog the straight up for weeks if not months there is a part of the world that everyone is keeping an eye on right now the joint military strikes were in response to nearly two months of attacks by the iran-backed houthi movement on cargo ships in the Red Sea it is becoming more and more important for the global rivalries and tensions that are heating up on our globe right now it is this choke point in the Red [Music] Sea it's pretty small it's

a few dozen kilometers wide but through this little choke point flows a lot of important things the internet millions of barrels of oil per day 30% of all Container ships that connect Global markets and this choke point is surrounded by un stable situations countries that are in Civil Wars Rebel militias proxy wars unstable governments failed States and pirates in recent decades Pirates have hijacked thousands of ships here extracting hundreds of millions of dollars in ransoms a topic we did a whole Deep dive on in another video and lately as War has raged in the Gaza

Strip the fiercely anti-western hooti rebels in Yemen have been firing rockets at cargo ships traveling through this water leading the US and UK to strike back a ship attacked by Iran back to the rebels last month sank in the Red Sea the region is vital yet volatile all at once and yet in the middle of all of this is this one Beacon of stability a little piece of land that is easy to miss but that is more important than you might think it is the country of jaib [Music] boti jibuti is this small arid country

right on the choke point and it is home to the militaries of the United States of several European powers of Japan Japan's only foreign military base by the way and right down the road from the American base China's first Military Base outside of its [Music] country katar has peacekeepers here the United Arab Emirates ran the biggest Port Eritrea seized some of its territory recently and Ethiopia one of the largest countries in Africa runs almost all of its trade through Djibouti Ethiopia's landlocked and this is their like gateway to the world it's a lot jibuti is

a lot there's a lot going on in jibuti which is why today we are talking about this place I want to explore why so many Powers want to be here why everyone is converging on this little tiny patch of land the size of New Jersey and I want to ask if little Djibouti one of the poorest countries in the world can balance all these rival Powers against each other without falling victim to them you know 10 to 15% of global trade moves through the Red Sea we will not hesitate to defend lives and the free

flow of Commerce hey going to pause really quick I'm actually excited about today's sponsor cuz it's a tool that I have wanted to exist for a long time and now it exists as many of you have told me in the comments we live in a world where it's really hard to trust media and news there's so many different news outlets and more and more news outlets have a political bias it used to not be like this but now it is and social media makes it worse and so what are we to do those of us

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plan which gives you access to all of these features I like ground news I'm so glad it exist and I hope they keep sponsoring the channel because I would love to continue to get the word out that more balanced news consumption does exist so thank you ground news for sponsoring today's video Let's dive back into the story of jib boti this little choke point is called the Bob ALB or gate of Tears it used to be nothing but a recipe for shipwrecks it was known mostly for strong winds unpredictable crosscurrents and shallow reefs that made

navigating it dangerous and it wasn't very valuable because if you go through it you just end up in the Red Sea which was a dead end for most of history that is until a French company miraculously cut a canal through this part of Egypt and changed the world forever nearly having the time that it would take for Europeans to get to Asia where they were all racing each other to conquer colonize and bring back unfathomable wealth to their [Music] countries the Suz Canal was a massive upgrade to this hunt for resources was this video kind

of an excuse for me to buy these really old beautiful books about the Suez Canal yes it was for France this engineering Miracle called the Suez Canal was their chance to beat out their big rival the British Empire who was clearly winning the race dominating the routes to Asia before Suez opened the canal was supposed to change that so now you have a new front in this race a Scramble for control over this new route to Asia this windy little choke point was no longer just the Gate of Tears it was an important bit of

water one of the most important on Earth at least for the empires they had to keep an eye on [Music] it so the British take this little Island right at the choke point they put a lighthouse on it they also take control of a port just south of the choke point the Italians then show up and purchase this bit of Coastline from local Sultans eventually taking over this whole stretch of Coast called Eritrea and the French would start fixating on this strip of sparsely populated Coast right on the banks of the choke point the land

that would become jibuti The Sultans here told the French that yes they could have a bit of this newly strategic land in exchange for protection the locals here knew what was going on the great Empires were all scrambling and racing and they were going to use their Prime real estate to get what they wanted to Leverage The Situation smart and totally a theme throughout this [Music] video so the French set up their colony they call it K Fran de Somali or French Somali land this choke point would become a key base for projecting power and

refueling on their way to carve up and plunder Asia France would hold on to their little Colonial invention for a long time even as the world would decolonize after World War II France held on to this strategic Colony along the choke point until eventually the locals rose up there were protests they clashed with the local authorities and it led to an independence vote and in 1977 Djibouti became a new [Music] country jibuti was independent but they had a problem in the words of some New York Times reporting from 1977 the tiny new nation had no

Army less than one square mile of aable land and no resources except for sand salt and 20,000 camels yeah not good so once again they made a deal with France jib boti wouldn't be France's anymore but they would be allowed to retain a military base in the country in exchange for security and protection as well as economic aid but this didn't change the fact that jibuti had very little natural resources or arable land their economy fell into a crippling depression eventually there was a civil war and it wasn't looking good for Djibouti djibouti's salvation would

eventually come when they realized that they should hearken back to the old days and start exploiting the thing that had made them valuable all those years ago their location let's go go go stop shoting believe has crashed into the world TR very Freedom came under attack a series of deliberate and deadly terrorist Acts 3 months after 9/11 the United States was about to come crashing into the Middle East in a new way and they asked jibuti if they could set up a base there and jibou says yes suddenly after the global war on terror America

realizes that it's one of the key locations it matters to be there you had you know alqaeda in Yemen you had alqaeda in even Horn of Africa so they needed a base and jibuti was one country which was willing to offer them it would become America's only permanent military base on the continent of Africa and and it would be a key jumping off point for George Bush's war on terror and reminder that it's now the 21st century things have changed in the world and this little choke point was becoming more valuable again but for different

reasons than the old days number one the world had become addicted to fossil fuels oil and gas which was the lifeblood of their economies and most of that oil and gas was coming from over here from the land and Waters of the countries around this Persian Gulf where it was then put on ships and sent around the world a lot of it heading west through this vital choke point up the Red Sea into the Suez Canal and onto Europe the world knew that their energy was vulnerable because Egypt in earlier decades had weaponized the canal

by closing it by blocking it one time for 8 years inflicting immediate pain on the countries that rely on this constant flow of energy and goods [Music] by the way semi side note this flow of energy becomes even more important when Europe almost entirely Cuts ties with Russian natural gas after Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022 so they have to get more natural gas from this region Qatar was not sad about that let's put it that way anyway we're getting off topic Europe needs this route to stay stable they need these little dots to keep flowing

so that's one reason that the choke point has become more vital than ever the other reason is China china Rose to become a manufacturing superpower they make a lot of stuff and they send it to the west and a lot of that comes through this choke point and all of this vital trade is happening in a region that is full of unstable governments rising anti-western militias and Somali pirates making this route precarious and dangerous and subject to problems so jibuti has become this vital place here at the choke point an incredibly important strategic location in

a sea of turmoil okay but there's more in addition to all of this global economy importance there's also Regional importance to Djibouti notice djibouti's neighbor Ethiopia the second most populous country in Africa and as you can see one that is totally landlocked it is not good to be a big country that is landlocked because the water is where we trade so jibuti is the gateway to E Ethiopia's millions of people to trade with the world 95% of Ethiopia's trade passes through jibuti so jibuti this colonial creation from France in the 1880s is now once again

an incredibly important place on the map it's become once again a highly strategic location and when there are highly strategic locations superpowers start moving in in 2011 Djibouti approved Japan a passive IST sort of non-military country to open a military base on jouti their one and only foreign military base then you have Italy who set up a military base here in 2013 Spain and Germany also have a military presence here they are not permanently hosted with a base they're actually hosted by France and the soldiers live in these hotels permanently okay that's not weird at

all but yeah as you can see the great powers are back they're back in Djibouti like the old days not to compete with one another but to all band together to police this vital choke point so that the global economy that has brought prosperity to all of us can stay stable everything keeps flowing everyone is happy and this solved a big problem for Djibouti who again didn't have a big industry or any kind of resource they make a lot of money off of these leases to foreign countries which has helped build their economy and like

the old days when one side shows up the Rival won't be far behind China has agreed to set up a support base in jibou so the Chinese base is right here and they are going to be watching us as we're watching them in 2016 jibuti announces that they've been talking to China and that they've agreed to give them land to open their own military base which was built and opened right down the road from the American base in 2017 so China says they're there because of pirates pirates have been wreaking havoc in this area so

they're there to stabilize their economic interests because of pirates but as we discovered in our Deep dive on Pirates by 2017 the pirate issue was basically over there was almost no hijackings in this region I me look at this graph oh and the Chinese base has this big deep Pier that is like large enough to handle an aircraft carrier and nuclear submarines so this isn't about Pirates China also did the most China thing when they moved in here which was instead of just building a base they also came with of these big ticket infrastructure projects

as like gifts to win the favor of the locals we're talking Railway pipeline Port all very expensive all putting jibuti into a lot of debt to China they're doing this all over Africa which we talk about in another Deep dive video we did on the topic mapping all of China's giant infrastructure projects in Africa and what that means and a lot of shout outs to other videos today huh so jibuti is now the only place on Earth where the United States and China these two Rivals have military bases right next to each other and so

far everyone's been playing nice there's been no Shenanigans other than both sides accusing each other of spying on each other constantly oh and there was the lasers the US says that China was pointing lasers into the eyes of Pilots while they were taking off which like if they really did that that's just like why why would you do that like why did you do that don't do that okay but jibou doesn't let every country in Russia wanted to have their own base in jibuti and jouti said no it probably helped that the American national security

adviser flew to Djibouti and told them that the US would double how much they're paying for their lease if Djibouti didn't let Russia in okay but what about the people jibuti isn't just one big military base there's almost a million people who live here and their day today probably consists of a lot of jet engine sounds for got to talk to my old grad school Professor David Vine who is an expert on us military bases and how they affect the locals so what we were talking about is a foreign government foreign military occupying large swas

of land fenced off and uh hosting large amounts of Weaponry high-powered Weaponry of many many kinds because these bases are so close to like the big city there have been accidents especially with drones the US used to take off their drones and some would fall and actually crash onto like civilian infrastructure so they had to open a separate air [Music] strip apart from occasionally running over cows the soldiers mostly keep to themselves US soldiers don't even go into the city to like buy stuff all of it is flown in creating a little slice of America

right in Djibouti like they don't even drink the water from jouti it's all flown in and then there's the dictator well I want to welcome president G and his delegations here today the US base in particular but also the French and Chinese bases which are the largest of of the collection are all helping to prop up undemocratic regime that has you know been accused of widespread human rights abuses every time a foreign power makes a deal with jibuti and pays them a lot of money in exchange for them being able to be there they basically

validate this terrible dictator who's been in power for 25 years there's no real elections Free Press freedom of speech plenty of Human Rights abuses but on the other side there's at least one way that regular people in Djibouti benefit from all of this fewer people go hungry today than at the conclusion of the Civil War and even though the economy is still poor all of this foreign aid still does support it is that worth it to them I don't actually know and another version of this video that I want to do someday is to go

there and talk to the people and hear what their thoughts are about the bases in jib and what that feels like to live so close to all of these foreign militaries for now we're talking about the geography the history the [Applause] geopolitics okay speaking of geopolitics there is another angle to this story that is devilishly complicated to get into and I'm not going to get into all the juicy details you'll understand why when I start talking about it it has to do with the regional geopolitics the rivalries and the concerns and the issues of all

of these countries that are right next to Djibouti not just the outside Powers I want to just give you a little sampling of what this looks like because it's pretty wild so you have all these Gulf countries and some of them are not totally on the same team but almost all of them are thinking about the future and they're realizing that oil is not going to be a big part of their future because oil is not going to be a big part of any of our future hopefully and they're realizing that they're going to need

to invest in the Horn of Africa this region here which they believe is probably going to be the future of their food their future Bread Basket so so hold that for a second and then look at Ethiopia and Eritrea Ethiopia as we mentioned uses Djibouti as their gateway to the world they need it to feed their millions of people all of this geopolitics is also playing out in jibuti this little country that has to navigate everyone's interests so here's a quick episode of this drama to give you an idea of what it looks like the

United Arab Emirates UAE used to be like best friends with jibuti it was like one of their most important Partners the UAE built and owned this giant Port that basically runs djibouti's entire economy but then the UAE got really close to jibuti neighbor and kind of enemy Eritrea this was very worrisome because jibou doesn't want Eritrea to become the new jibou they're a mortal threat they don't want the UAE to just shut down djibouti's like strategic offering okay fast forward to like 2017 the UAE with their close friends Saudi Arabia are in a feud with

Qatar which also has a military presence in Djibouti right up here on this border now that Qatar and the UAE are fighting with each other they turn to jibuti and say Hey you are too close with the UAE we're out of here Qatar takes their soldiers out of this border area and right away Eritrea takes some of this land from Djibouti this may seem like some petty border skirmishes but remember where we are here this is the vital choke point Bob ALB every inch of land matters every little conflict could be the spark that stops

the global economy and what this little flareup shows us is how Djibouti finds itself in the center of conflicts between other countries that it kind of doesn't want to be in the middle of but like has found itself in the middle of because it hosts all of their militaries but wait there's more Djibouti is actually really good at this they know how to play the game and to play all these Powers off of each other and we'll see what happens next so they're kind of beholding to the UAE UAE has way too much leverage over

them so finally it all comes to a head and they kick the UAE out from this really vital port and they give a massive chunk of it to wait for it China the new arrival to jib boti that no one wants to mess with they now have the port and jibuti is now on their side and the UAE can't do anything about it jibuti saved itself from one power by pleasing a bigger power do you see how this works do you see what game they're playing here [Music] so that is why this tiny country in

East Africa is so important it's kind of the definition of geopolitics politics happening because of geography to project legitimacy this choke point is only going to become more important day by day we're seeing it happen I mean like right now as I'm filming this the houie rebels are like potentially cutting internet cables in this choke point three crew members have been killed in a the first death since houthi Rebels began attacking shipping in the Red Sea after months of bombing Merchant ships to punish the West for supporting the IDF war in Gaza I mean it's

this kind of threat that jibuti was set up to handle that is why all these foreign militaries are here and yet for me there is a subtler threat that is emerging here which you can see when you just look at this map of bases jibuti hosts rival countries during a time when we are Transit iing away from a rules-based order where all the great Powers have an incentive to work together under one system that is dominated by the United States that deeply benefits the United States and its allies but that works because the United States

imposes and protects those rules those rules are being challenged and what is emerging is a system that is Messier more disruptive to these reliable rules that have kept everything stable kept the United States on top and unfortunately we know all too well what happens when great Powers start competing with each other more and more over vital resources and vital geographies in fact most of the history of war is what happens when great powers are competing with each other it's ugly it's messy it's violent it provokes a zero Su way of thinking competition racing to secure

and control and exploit vital geographies like strategic choke points that lead into the most important Waterway on the planet as this rivalry heats up jibuti role is going to become more complex its government will continue to do what it's done playing the big Powers off each other exploiting its great real estate to benefit itself but I believe that there comes a point in every escalating conflict where you kind of have to choose sides I want jouti to continue to embody the positive some thinking that has kept the world relatively stable these last 70 years but

it's definitely playing with a very delicate Balancing Act and there's a chance that it could stumble so as you all know I will be keeping an eye on the global order as well as jib boti to try to see where this is going to see if the great powers can continue to cooperate and compete but cooperate or if we're heading back into the old days where competition threatens to rip the world apart I don't think it's inevitable but it's going to take effort to avoid [Music] it hey thanks for watching and thanks to the New

York Times for having the times machine which is every one of their newspapers ever digitized in nice highres so I can read what the New York Times was reporting on in 1977 love it for those who don't know we have a new channel called search party which is coverage from my old colleague Sam Ellis who was the creator of Vox Atlas he now has his own channel that we started together the search party is geopolitics and Global Sports publishes every couple of weeks is really good stuff if you like the stuff on this channel you'll

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and different videos continue to improve for all of you so thank you for being here I'll see you in the next one [Music]