This video was made possible by Brilliant.
Learn complex topics simply for 20% off by being one of the first 200 to sign up at brilliant.org/HAI.
Hey there kiddos; I need to talk to you about something.
It might be a little awkward, but it’s important for you to understand.
When two countries love each other very much, or sometimes, hate each other very much, one
of the countries will invade the other one.
And it’s perfectly natural, and it’s okay, and it can be great, just so long as they
plan for it, because the thing is, if you’re not careful sometimes invasions can happen
by accident.
Or at least, that’s what happened in May of 2020, when Poland accidentally invaded
the Czech Republic.
This is Poland.
It’s called that because it’s the land of Po, the red Teletubby, who wanders through
the country at night, kidnapping babies and turning them into the sun, and this is…
wait, what is this?
I know it’s a republic, but which one?
Let me check.
Oh it’s the Czech Republic.
Good thing I checked.
Now, both the Czech Republic and Poland are part of the Schengen Area, a set of 26 countries
in which you can travel freely without border control or passports.
Think of it like Disneyland—once you get into the park, you can go to any part of it
you want: Fantasyland, Tomorrowland, Adventureland, Monetizing-Nostalgia-land, Cash-Grab-Sequel-Land,
Corporate-Consolidation-land, Ruining-Star-Wars-Land, and Toontown!
Who doesn’t love Toontown—it’s a town full of toons!
The point is, anybody can cross from Poland to the Czech Republic, or the other way around,
anytime, anywhere, no questions asked.
At least, that’s how things are normally—but things aren’t normally at all right now.
I don’t know if you heard, but there’s some virus going around called something like
Coronovinrus… wait no…coronavusus… no…Corbin Blue-ness… uh …that’s not it… wear-a-mask-you-selfish-morons-virus?
Yeah that last one sounds right.
Anyway, because of that, countries have started to act on a provision of the Schengen Borders
Code that allows member states to temporarily close their borders, “in the event that
a serious threat to public policy or internal security had been established.”
Now I’m not sure how it’s going to help to close their Borders; I mean Borders went
bankrupt in 2011 and to my knowledge all the stores are already closed—they probably
should have shut the Barnes and Nobles—but the point is that they can.
A border closing can be enacted by an individual nation, and cannot be vetoed by the European
Commission, though the Commission does have the ability to issue an opinion on it, which
does nothing, but people always feel better when they get to voice their opinion, even
if it won’t change anything.
Speaking of which, leave a comment down below with your opinion on an Israel-Palestine two-state
solution!
Since COVID hit, a lot of EU nations have exercised their authority to close borders,
including Poland and the Czech Republic.
This meant Poland had to start doing something they haven’t historically been very good
at: protect their borders from invasion.
So, they stationed soldiers at the border, including here, in Pielgrzymow, a Polish border
town, but there’s where the problem came: every building in Pielgrzymow is in Poland,
except for this church, which is in the Czech Republic… and also this house, for whatever
reason.
But the Polish soldiers were apparently too busy doing whatever Polish people do—pole
dancing, polishing, pol-ates, who knows—to realize that, so soldiers had stationed themselves
at the church thinking it was the furthest point of the border in Poland.
When Czech people came to their church, in the Czech Republic, the Polish soldiers stopped
them and they were like “hey you can’t come in here, this is Poland.”
Then the Czech people were like “no it’s not.”
And then the Polish people were like “yeah it is, and also by the way, get out of here.”
Which meant that the Polish military was blocking citizens of the Czech Republic from entering
a part of the Czech Republic, and when that happens, it’s usually called an invasion,
and it’s what political scientists refer to as “kind of a big deal.”
Eventually, word got back to the Czech Republic that they had been invaded, and so then they
went to the Pols and were like, “hey uh…. did you invade us” and the Polish people
were like “I don’t think so, but let me check.”
And then they checked and the check showed they’d invaded the Czechs, basically putting
them in a diplomatic checkmate.
Ultimately, though, things turned out fine—the Poles said it was an accident, the Czechs
believed them, and after a bunch of fancy official statements smoothing the whole thing
out, things went back to as normal as things can be in 2020.
Believe it or not, this wasn’t even the first time a country has accidentally invaded
another country.
Back in 2010, a Nicaraguan official noticed a Costa Rican flag flying over here, across
the San Juan River in the Isla Potillos, which made him very angry, not only because the
Costa Rican flag has an insignia with writing in the middle of it, which is a terrible flag
design, but also because he was pretty sure that that land belonged to Nicaragua.
Just to be certain, he opened up Google Maps to check, and sure enough, the Costa Rican
flag was in Nicaragua, and so he and 50 of his troops crossed the river, took down the
flag, and stationed themselves there.
Now normally when Google Maps is wrong, it means I arrive late to my meeting of YouTubers
who secretly fix the price of interesting factoids—no big deal, I’m just late—but
for the Nicaraguans, Google Maps’ mistake meant they had just invaded Costa Rica by
accident.
Ultimately, to avoid war, both Google and the Nicaraguan government had to issue an
apology, and the mistakes of big tech companies went on to never stoke global conflict ever
again.
If you want to work for one of those big global tech companies, or if you just want to learn
how to code because it’s a super useful skill, you should check out Brilliant, the
problem-solving based website and app that helps you achieve your goals in STEM learning.
Learning new stuff can be hard, which is why Brilliant breaks down complex topics into
easy-to-follow, bite-sized chunks that’ll engage you with storytelling, coding, interactive
challenges, and problems to solve.
They’ve got a super wide range of courses, so whether you’re hoping to brush up on
geometry, build neural networks, write algorithms, learn a new coding language, understand machine
learning, or something else, Brilliant’s got you covered.
Go to brilliant.org/HAI to sign up for free, plus, the first 200 to sign up will get 20%
off their annual membership.