Publisher's Synopsis
Will China invade North America in the 21st century?
The Bantu invaded southern Africa 2500 years ago. Polynesians occupied the Pacific some 1500 years ago. Europeans invaded the New World 500 years ago. Why is it that some human groups are more invasive than others? In this provocative rethink, Mark Hecht, a former university instructor of geography, offers a new perspective on how the natural environment influences us. Jared Diamond in Guns, Germs and Steel argued that some natural environments are endowed with plants and animals that offer opportunities for domestication which then facilitates expansion and outward migration, while other natural environments are not so richly endowed. By examining the latest research in ecology and biogeography, with a focus on Europeans invasion of the New World, Hecht shows how natural environments and landscapes can explain the rise of European powers over the last five-hundred years, and what eventually happens afterwards. The Dutch landscape of waterlogged peat for example, and the struggle to keep the North Sea at bay forced internal cooperation which lead, strangely enough, to the creation of multinational corporations. The Spanish Meseta honed aggression in its men where self-worth was to be found in the glory of fighting and heroic journeys abroad. The English were in many ways, quite unintentional invaders. Each European society was propelled to outward migration but for very different reasons, all of which can be explained by looking at their flora, fauna and natural landscapes. While Hecht applies the latest research to explain why natural environments facilitated European invasion of the New World, he also goes on to show how Brexit was inevitable, the European Union will disintegrate, and political boundaries in the 21st century are going to face unparalleled shifts. The Rules of Invasion is a holistic interpretation of how the natural environment has long shaped political boundaries around the World and how it will continue to do so, especially in North America. Don't expect the USA or Canada to remain the way they are but don't give up your passports just yet, either. To understand the future, Hecht argues that we must look at biodiversity, topography and natural patterns which show that human cultural boundaries always gravitate toward re-alignment with natural boundaries. Sixty-percent of pre-Columbian indigenous languages in North America were found between the Rocky Mountains and the Pacific Ocean. That overlaps almost perfectly with biodiversity. Sixty percent of all temperate North American biodiversity exists between the Rocky Mountains and the Pacific Ocean. In other words, the most biologically diverse regions were the most linguistically diverse regions. It will happen again with enough time. California has the most biological diversity of all states today. California also has the greatest number of secession movements. Hardly a coincidence. Some factors are more important than others in predicting which societies will be invasive in the future. Attention is given to Australia, China, the Netherlands, Spain, and the English before he comes back to suggest that the United States and Canada will face massive internal pressures to splinter, but not where one might first assume. It is California, Utah and the entire west coast, bubbling with rapid socio-cultural changes and underlying influences of geography, that will have the greatest desires for self-determination. Hecht dedicates the final chapter to predicting where 'the next invasion' will be. This is classic geopolitics through the lens of the natural environment. Globalists won't be pleased but this confirms what many already intuit; the natural landscape shapes who we are and in the 21st century we can expect dramatic changes to current political boundaries because of it.
