IntoGeo

North Korea loves to portray itself as the center of the world, which is part of their Juche ideology (self-reliance). Also, the farther away it gets from North Korea, like the Americas and Europe, the more distorted the maps tend to get.

Mexico has 31 states plus Mexico City, which is a unique federal entity similar to a state. I've personally visited two Mexican states—Quintana Roo and Yucatán. My wife and I were able to see a couple of Maya ruins: Tulum in Quintana Roo and Chichén Itzá in Yucatán.

Namibia is the highlighted country. Starting in 1884, Germany declared the territory German South West Africa, and it remained under German control until 1915, when South African forces occupied the territory amid WWI. The League of Nations granted South Africa a Class C mandate over the territory, which South Africa increasingly treated as another province rather than as a temporary mandate. In the 1960s, armed resistance began with the South West Africa People’s Organisation (SWAPO). Namibia did not gain independence until 1990, and it implemented a multiparty democracy, although SWAPO has won every national election ever since. 1/2

Known collectively as the Turkish Straits, A is the Dardanelles, or Hellespont, while B is the Bosphorus. Both straits, which separate Europe from Asia, have been strategically vital since antiquity. Persian kings Darius and Xerxes, as well as Alexander the Great, all crossed the Dardanelles during their campaigns. Constantine founded Constantinople and made it the new Roman capital in 330 AD. Its location along the Bosphorus provided major defensive and commercial advantages. Much later, the Ottoman Turks crossed the Dardanelles and established themselves in Europe, eventually leaving Constantinople surrounded by Ottoman territory. Constantinople was finally conquered in 1453 and gradually became known as Istanbul, leading to a big shift in global geopolitics. During World War I, the straits were once again seen as strategically important, leading to the Gallipoli Campaign, which ultimately failed.

A while back in Columbia, SC, I stumbled upon this gun that came off the USS Maine, which is next to the South Carolina State House.

The Don River is the highlighted river, which runs through the southern part of European Russia. Historically, it was known to the Greeks as the Tanais and was viewed by some ancient geographers as the boundary between Europe and Asia. It was also an important trade route connecting the Vikings, the Eastern Romans (Byzantine Empire), the Scythians, and the Middle East. During World War II, the river also played a crucial role in the Battle of Stalingrad. Although Stalingrad was located on the Volga River, the Don flowed nearby. During Operation Uranus in November 1942, Soviet forces smashed through the weaker Axis-allied Romanian armies defending the flanks of the German 6th Army. The two Soviet pincers then met at Kalach-on-Don, encircling the German 6th Army and trapping it inside Stalingrad.

Death Valley! Here’s an aerial of it and a tidbit about the mysterious “sailing stones”:

And here’s the world according to North Korea. Notice how everything gets more distorted the further away from Korea it is.

What’s wild is that Simon Bolivar Buckner, a Confederate general during the Civil War, had a son—Simon Bolivar Buckner Jr.—who served as a general during World War II and died during the Battle of Okinawa in 1945. These two father-son Kentuckians show how young but compact our American history truly is!

George Washington once worked as a professional land surveyor. He lacked the formal higher education that his older half-brothers had received, but he had studied mathematics and geometry and practiced surveying with his family’s tools. Thanks to his neighbor George William Fairfax, he joined a surveying expedition into the western Virginia frontier in 1748. This experience helped him secure a commission as surveyor for the newly formed Culpeper County, Virginia—at just 17 years old. Washington worked as a professional surveyor for approximately three years, from 1749 to 1752. This experience, understanding the ground and maps, would be invaluable to Washington in the wars to come.

Burkina Faso is the highlighted country. Its name means “Land of the Upright People.” This is a fitting name, as its people are widely regarded as straightforward, resilient, and proud. The name was changed in 1984 to shed the colonial name Upper Volta (given by the French), which referred to the upper reaches of the Volta River. However, since gaining independence from France in 1960, the country has been repeatedly rocked by coups and political instability. Jihadist insurgencies escalated sharply from 2015 onward, with militants seizing control of significant territory in the north and east. At the same time, the most recent coup occurred in September 2022, bringing Captain Ibrahim Traoré to power. He has moved the country away from France and the West and has aligned it more closely with Russia.

Pretty day in the Bluegrass!

What Paris was as Roman Lutetia compared to today!

Interestingly, Teddy Roosevelt became the first sitting US president to travel abroad when he visited the Panama Canal in November 1906 to inspect its progress. Earlier presidents avoided foreign travel to focus on domestic issues (slow communications) or due to concerns over the constitutionality of leaving.

Straddling the border between China and North Korea, Mount Paektu (or Baekdu Mountain) is the answer. The mountain is deeply symbolic for both North and South Korea and is even mentioned in both national anthems. In 2018, the two countries’ leaders made a historic joint visit to its summit. In the founding legend of the first Korean kingdom, Gojoseon (traditionally dated to around 2333 BC), it is the birthplace of Dangun, the mythical founder. According to legend, he was born there to a divine prince and a bear who had been transformed into a woman. In the modern era, the Kim regime has used the mountain for propaganda purposes. Official North Korean narratives claim that Kim Il-sung used the mountain’s forests as a base for anti-Japanese guerrilla operations and maintain that Kim Jong-il was born in a secret camp on its slopes. However, independent historians and Soviet records overwhelmingly indicate that Kim Jong-il was born in a Soviet military camp in the Russian Far East.

George Washington watching over the direct descendant of King George III