4 ms·

They forgot the most important part, without which a country can't be created: the army that protects the borders

• LoSboccacc 10y ago
  Lichtenstain, the Vatican and San Marino disagree. Unless you count in fervent catholic bodies as an army
  • dragonwriter 10y ago
    You forget the Vatican Swiss Guard.
  • pluma 10y ago
    San Marino has a military. Lichtenstein and the Vatican have contracts with other nations, effectively "renting" their protection. You don't need a standing army, but having military protection of some kind is vital to maintaining your sovereignty. All that aside, the only real way to have a nation is to have other nations acknowledge its existence. Good luck claiming sovereignty when not a single member of the UN is willing to say you exist.
    • runn1ng 10y ago
      > the only real way to have a nation is to have other nations acknowledge its existence I always think of Taiwan / Republic of China. While most countries don't officially acknowledge it (and, slightly amusingly, Taiwan doesn't officially acknowledge communist China), it is without a doubt its own country with its own military and democratic government, etc. But yeah the only reason is that there is water between China and Taiwan and China never bothered to attack.
      • jamiek88 10y ago
        The onky reason Taiwan is there is that it has US support for it's existence.
    • pyvpx 10y ago
      Somaliland keeps trying.
• nils-m-holm 10y ago
  Costa Rica permanently abolished its army in 1949. OK, they probably had one when the country was created, but they seem to do well these days without one.
• mikro2nd 10y ago
  You might want to do a little fact checking before making bogus statements: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_without_armed_forces https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_without_arme...
• losvedir 10y ago
  Right? They don't necessarily need their own army, but they need some military might with vested interest (whether through treaties or outright monetary payments or culture or whatever) in their sovereignty. I've been thinking about it lately with regard to Trump's talk of isolationism and withdrawal from NATO and whatnot. There are predictions that Russia will annex more Eastern European states, but at some level if the state can't protect itself what business does it have being considered one? That's kind of the only real obligation or definition of the state. Those countries are currently protected by the US, so they are currently filling that obligation, but I'm not sure I see why it's in my interest as an American to enforce this arbitrary political line. We don't have much cultural history or overlap with them. It seems in their and the rest of Europe's best interest to band together through treaties to protect themselves. I know this comes across as "might makes right", which I don't agree with at the local level, but at the sovereign level I'm beginning to think that's all that matters.