One of the facets of military history that I personally find fascinating are the numerous small conflicts that occur from time to time around the globe. One of these small conflicts barely crept onto newspaper pages recently – that over the disputed Bakassi Peninsula. For years this tiny spit of land has been the centre of a row between the Cameroonian and Nigerian governments. Aside from the fact that the peninsula is surrounded by some of the best fishing waters in the world there doesn't initially seem to be any reason for the disagreement. Until you realise that it has been classified as being ‘oil rich’ which means that whilst there have been no major finds of oil, everyone is pretty certain that there is oil there somewhere. A war based on scientific guess work...
Yet this conflict pales into insignificance when one considers the case of the Kurile Islands seized from Japan by the Russians at the end of World War 2. Russia has recently been accused of tightening her grip on these islands by pouring millions into building work and infrastructure. The most ridiculous part of the standoff is the fact that because of the Russian occupation of the islands, Japan and Russia technically still remain at war with each other, having never signed a peace treaty at the end of the Second World War.
Ridiculous!