Everything Everywhere Daily: History, Science, Geography & More - Exclaves and Enclaves

Episode Date: January 21, 2021

Normally, if a foreign country has you totally surrounded, that isn’t a good thing. However, in some parts of the world, it is a normal, everyday occurrence. Due to historical quirks in drawing maps, there are parts of some countries which are separate from the mainland and are totally surrounded by another country. Learn more about exclaves and enclaves on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Normally, if a foreign country has you totally surrounded, that isn't a good thing. However, in some parts of the world, it's a normal everyday occurrence. Due to historical quirks and drawing maps, there are parts of some countries, which are separate from the mainland, and totally surrounded by another country. Learn more about exclaves and enclaves on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily. What if your perceptions about the past were wrong? ThruLine is a podcast that takes you back in time to uncover the parts of the story that may have gone unnoticed.

It effectively turned day into night. And how it shaped the world now. Time travel with us every week on the Thuline podcast from NPR. This episode is sponsored by audible.com. My audiobook recommendation today is Prisoners of Geography. Ten maps that explain everything about the world by Tim Marshall. All leaders of nations are constrained by geography. In this audiobook, journalist Tim Marshall examines

countries around the world to see how their weather, seas, mountains, rivers, deserts, and borders provide a context often missing from our political coverage, how the physical characteristics of these countries affect their strengths, weaknesses, and the decisions made by their leaders. You can get a free one-month trial to Audible and two free audiobooks by going to audibletrial.com slash everything everywhere, or by clicking on the link in the show notes. We should probably start this discussion with some definitions. The definition of an exclave is a portion of a state or territory geographically separated from the main part by surrounding alien territory of one or more states. An enclave is just the opposite.

It is a territory or a part of one that is entirely surrounded by the territory of one other state. For the most part, one country's exclave is another country's enclave. However, it's not always the case. For example, Lesotho is an enclave of South Africa. If you've ever seen a map of South Africa, you've probably noticed a great big hole in the middle. Likewise, Vatican City and San Marino are both enclaves of Italy. However, none of these examples are exclaves as the entire country is surrounded and there isn't a part that's separate from the main part of the country. One example of an exception the other way around is of the Nakhjavan region of Azerbaijan.

It is totally physically separated from the rest of the country. However, it's sandwiched between Armenia and Turkey, so it isn't an enclave of either one of the country. of those countries. True enclaves and exclaves are not uncommon, but they're usually pretty small with small populations, and they're not really well-known outside of geography enthusiasts. One of the best known is the Italian exclave of Campione di Italia. It's on the banks of Lake Lugano, and it is totally surrounded by Switzerland. It's only about a half mile from the Italian border, but because it's totally surrounded by Switzerland, it has its own unique set of rules. Despite being part of Italy, they tend to use the Swiss franc instead of the euro, even though the euro is

technically the legal tender. They use Swiss tax rates for their value-ad-tax. The gambling laws are less strict than in Italy, which is why it's dominated by a giant casino. Campione di Italia isn't the only enclave that Switzerland has. In the north, there's the German exclave of Bussingen. As with Campione di Italia, Bussingen isn't that far from the German border. It's only 680 meters at its closest point. In 1918, the citizens of Bussingen voted overwhelmingly to become part of Switzerland, but it never happened, because the Swiss would have had to have offered Germany something in return, and they didn't have anything that they would want to part with. Here, too, they mostly use Swiss francs. Their electricity and water are provided by Switzerland,

and their local football clubs play in Swiss leagues. Germany also has another set of exclaves, and those are really odd. They're only separated from the rest of Germany, by a few meters. These are the five exclaves that were created by the Venban. The Venban was a train track that went through Germany. After World War I, one of the terms of the Treaty of Versailles was that the track would be seated to Belgium, but just the track. It was a narrow ribbon of land only a few meters wide that contained the track. This left several parts of Germany west of the track, physically separated from the rest of the country by just a few meters. In World War II, Germany took back the train tracks, but it was given back to Belgium after the war.

Today, the train no longer runs, and it's now just a bicycle path. There was talk of it going back to Germany now that it's no longer a train track, but Germany agreed that Belgium could keep it. And why not? It's basically a bike path in Germany, mostly used by Germans, that Belgium has to pay for. Speaking of Belgium, they share one of the most messed up ex-clave-onclave arrangements in the world with the Netherlands. The town of Barl-Hurtog has 20, islands of Belgium inside of the Netherlands. The unique border came about from the 1843 Treaty of Maastricht.

The border literally goes through several buildings. The rule was that whatever country had the front door was the country that building was considered in. People who had a house that straddled the border would often change the location of the front door where the taxes would be most beneficial. Moreover, within some of those islands of Belgium surrounded by the Netherlands, have within them exclaves of the Netherlands. These are called second-order enclaves. There's another second-order enclave in the Middle East, within the borders of the United Arab

Emirates, is a part of Oman, known as Nawa. Inside Nawa is more territory of the UAE, known as Mata. Thankfully, the UAE and Oman don't bother with border controls in this particular area, so it's easy to get around. However, the worst, or best, depending on your view, case of exclaves and enclaves was between India and Bangladesh. After the partition of British India, the border held on to some traditional exclaves and enclaves, which dated back for centuries. There were 102 exclaves of India inside of Bangladesh and 71 exclaves of Bangladesh within India. Moreover, there were 21 Bangladeshi counter enclaves and three Indian counter enclaves. And just to put the cherry on top, in the ultimate act of geographic inception,

there was a counter-counter enclave called Dahala Kagrabari. This was an island of Indian territory, inside Bangladeshi territory, inside Indian territory, inside Bangladesh. The sheer number of these enclaves was horrible for anyone who lived there. There were a total of 50,000 people living within the 198 enclaves between the two countries. India and Bangladesh require passports and a visa to cross borders. Anyone who lived in one of these enclaves was effectively trapped because they couldn't leave to get a visa because they would have to cross the border to get the visa in the first place. In 2015, India and Bangladesh signed a treaty that effectively eliminated all of the enclaves.

They just wiped all of the enclave borders on either side of the main border. While the treaty was undoubtedly necessary, it did leave many people on both sides of the border who were suddenly in the wrong country. Within the United States, there aren't many true exclaves. The Kentucky Bend is the westernmost point of the state of Kentucky, and it is totally surrounded by Missouri and Tennessee. It was created by a bend in the Mississippi River caused by the 1812 New Madrid earthquake. It's a peninsula that's surrounded by the river, which belongs to Missouri, and a land border

with Tennessee. According to the last census, Kentucky Bend had a population of 18. Ellis Island and Liberty Islands in New York Harbor are technically part of New York. New York State, but they are totally surrounded by the waters of New Jersey, making them exclaves of New York. There is sort of a counter-enclave in Arizona. Jedito, Arizona is part of the Navajo Nation, which is inside of the Hopi Nation, which is inside of the Navajo Nation. Such things as embassies are not counted as enclaves because those involve extraterritoriality, and that will be the subject of a future episode. A penny enclave is a territory that could only be reached by land by going through another

country, but it's not necessarily totally surrounded. All of Alaska is functionally a penny enclave because you have to drive through Canada to get there. Likewise, Point Roberts, Washington, and the Northwest Angle in Minnesota are also penny enclaves. They're connected to the U.S. by water, but to go there by land, you have to cross into Canada. There are also such things as practical enclaves, where it might be contiguous with the territory of a country, but realistically, you have to go through another country to get there. There are usually mountain valleys where the mouth of the valley opens up into another country. The Spanish village of Azda Civis is fully within Spain. However, the only way to get there by road is to drive

through Andorra. I've really only scratched the surface when it comes to geographical oddities. There are dozens more enclaves, penny enclaves, practical enclaves, and cultural enclaves around the world, all of which have a unique story as to how they wound up being a country inside of another country. Executive producer of Everything Everywhere Daily is James McAla. The associate producer is Thor Thompson. Remember to leave a five-star review to get your review read on the show. They can be left at Apple Podcasts, Podcasts, Podcast Republic,

or wherever you listen to the show. Also, you can help support the show over at patreon.com. Patrons can get merchandise like t-shirts and hoodies, as well as having direct access to provide suggestions for future episodes.