China has the undisputed claim of having the largest population in the world. With more than one and a quarter billion people, China's nearest rival is India, which has just over one billion people. Thus, Asia's two most populated countries, India and China, have a combined population of more than 2 billion people. Indonesia, the world's fourth-largest country in population, is also entirely in Asia. Russia, the fifth-largest nation in population, reaches substantially into Asia. Japan, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Thailand, and Vietnam are other large Asian countries whose populations rival those of the largest European nations.
Since Asia is proportionately more crowded than most other continents, it is a likely location for serious conflicts resulting from population pressure. Crowding is the function of the number of people in comparison not only to land in general, but also
To valuable land. Such land may be valuable for farming or for mineral resources, particularly oil, located beneath the surface. Border disputes have been common in Asia. Population pressures often underlie controversies over borders. China has had border disputes with India, Russia, Mongolia, and Vietnam.
The remoteness of some of these borders has sometimes made it difficult to determine their precise extent. The boundary between China and its neighbors in Southeast Asia, for example, is both mountainous and densely forested, creating difficulties in defining the exact border between China and each of its individual neighbors. In other remote areas, the shifting course of rivers constituting boundaries between China and Russia have caused conflicts over which river islands belong to which country.
Underlying language, cultural, religious, ethnic, and political differences mean that these border disputes are not easily resolved through negotiation. Even small disputes often seem to threaten the very existence of these states.
In the past, conflicts have been influenced and sometimes inhibited by geography. Since Asian geography includes mountains and open seas that have hindered direct conflicts between China and its neighbors to the south and east, China has historically worried most about its neighbors to the north and west. China built the Great Wall to defend itself from attacks from those directions. However, the difficulties of sea and air travel were negated by technological advances during the twentieth century, making all borders subject to potential invasion.
World History
