There are some vexing issues which threaten the continued existence of the United States as we know it.  To understand these issues one needs a long historical view of territorial claims and a knowledge of U.S. foreign policy in the last two centuries. 

In 1968 when “El Tigre” Reyes Lopez Tijerina, a New Mexico Hispanic political activist was campaigning to regain Spanish land grants in the United States from Anglo owners, I was treated to a spirited exchange in my office between two of my history students.  One was a Hispanic man from Denver and the other was a young man from Peru .  The young man from Denver agreed with Tijerina that Hispanics should recover, as he called it “our land.”  The Peruvian took a totally different position.  He said, “It isn’t your land, you couldn’t hold onto it.”  This exchange set me to thinking about the underlying basis for any land claim, or even to real estate property title deeds.  It occurred to me that all land rights are only as good as the implied military or police powers that protect them.  This brings to mind some vexing territorial disputes plaguing the world today.  One is very ancient, the others not so ancient.  Two of these are extremely important to the continued existence of the United States and the third could certainly create unintended consequences for Canada and the U.S.  

The first one is the perpetual crisis between the Arabs and the Jews and brings to mind a central question that effects far more than just the troubled Middle East .  Territorial conflicts have plagued the world throughout recorded history and will continue to do so as long as humans inhabit the planet.  Territorial disputes exist throughout the modern world and have serious implications for the United States as we attempt to control our national borders, but more on that later.   First let’s examine the Middle East conundrum. 

How is it that Jews and Arabs claim the same territory?  When Muslims speak of the “Israeli Occupation” they are not talking about the West Bank or Gaza but about the very existence of the nation of Israel .  To understand this dilemma it is necessary to look into the historic record and the religious claims of both peoples. 

The Jews entered the land of Israel as wandering herdsmen led by their patriarch Abram or Abraham about 4,000 years ago.  They conquered the Canaanites and Philistines and populated the conquered lands.  Jews occupied present day Israel and territories beyond the current Israeli borders for centuries.  The Jews were displaced a number of times in their history and have repeatedly returned to claim the land and rebuild their cities.  They were conquered and occupied by the Greek Empire of Alexander about 2,300 years ago.  The Roman Empire conquered the region two centuries later. Jews revolted against Roman rule and were defeated.  Roman authorities dispersed the Jews throughout the Empire in an effort to control them. In a forced Diaspora or dispersal, Jewish communities were established in Roman cities in Europe, North Africa, and the Middle East . 

Islam was founded by Muhammad around 630 A.D. in what is now Saudi Arabia .  Adherents to the new religion swiftly conquered lands in the Middle East and North Africa including the territory of modern-day Israel .  Eastern Roman or Byzantine authority in the region crumbled before the Muslim onslaught.  This gave the Arabs their first claim to the land that is now Israel .  While the Jews arrived in Israel around 4,000 years ago, the Arabs arrived much later, around 1,400 years ago.
What are the religious claims to Israeli territory?  According to the Torah and the Judeo-Christian Bible the Jews received a promise from God that they were to possess the land as the heirs of Abraham through his son Isaac the offspring of his wife Sarah.  According to the Arabs they received a promise from Allah that they were to possess the land as heirs of Ishmael the son of Abraham and the offspring of Sarah’s maidservant Hagar an Egyptian woman.  For the Arabs or the Jews to give up the land to the opposite claimants it would be necessary for them to disavow their most deeply rooted religious teachings.  Given the fervor of religious belief on both sides this will simply never happen. 

Fast forward to the 20th century.  Following World War I and the collapse of the Turkish Empire, Britain was given a Mandate to administer the territory of Palestine , which was populated by both Arabs and Jews.  During World War II, the Nazis of Germany murdered over six million Jews.  Following the holocaust, massive numbers of Jews moved from Europe and other areas into British controlled Palestine.  In 1947 the United Nations divided the territory into Arab Palestine and Jewish Israel.  The United States strongly supported the UN mandate and continues to support Israel's right to exist. 

The Arabs were outraged at this turn of events.  They refused to organize a nation state of Palestine in the UN mandated territory because such an act would tacitly approve the existence of Israel as a nation state.  Today when a Palestinian speaks of the “Zionist occupation” of Arab lands he is talking about the very existence of modern-day Israel.  Arabs view Israel as “ Palestine unredeemed.” 

In Canada, our northern neighbor, there are those who would dismember the nation.  The people of Quebec have come very close to voting for independence on several occasions.  In 1971 I was privileged to have a lengthy conversation with Mr. Louis St. Laurent, the retired Prime Minister of Canada at his home in Riviere du Loup, Quebec .  He assured me that dismemberment would never happen.  His aspirations for a unified Canada will not bear fruit if the younger generations have their way.   Since the British conquered Quebec in 1759 the Quebecois have constantly looked for ways to reverse the outcome of that war.  They may yet bring about an independent Quebec through a democratic vote either in the Canadian Parliament or in the province.  They view their homeland as “ Quebec unredeemed.” 

The United States is situated on lands that were once occupied by and claimed by many different peoples. One important claim is to the almost mythical land of Aztlan .  Aztlan is believed to have existed in Arizona and Northern Mexico .  It is the place from which the Aztecs are believed to have migrated southward to conquer and hold the central part of Mexico .  Why is this important to us in the present day?  Listen closely as Latino activists in the U.S. speak of their right to carve off the American Southwest into a redeemed nation of Aztlan.  The speakers are serious.  They are not joking on this subject. 

When Columbus discovered the islands of the Caribbean and reported back to the Spanish monarchs, Portugal was offended.  Pope Alexander VI simply drew a line around the world and gave the western half to Spain and the eastern half to Portugal .  The two Christian nations were to conquer lands in their respective hemispheres and convert the native peoples to Christianity.  The two nations adjusted the Papal line by a few degrees of longitude in the Treaty of Tordesillas in 1494.  By this arrangement all lands in North, Central, and South America were claimed by the Spanish with the exception of Brazil.   Brazil fell within the Portuguese hemisphere as portions of it lay east of the line of Tordesillas.   The western half of the world was claimed by Spain. 

All subsequent English, French, Dutch, and Russian settlements in North America were regarded by the Spanish as illegal and several times fueled colonial wars between the European powers.  Upon learning that Russia had established settlements from the Aleutian Islands all the way south to the coast of California , Spain sent its armed forces and settlers into California in 1776.  Spain already had settlements in New Mexico dating from the 1500’s and was not about to tolerate an invasion of foreigners. 

When Mexico won its independence from Spain in 1821 it was over twice its present size and included the current U.S. states of Texas, New Mexico, California, Nevada, Utah, and part of Colorado , perhaps more if one studies the various maps of the day. 

A border dispute between the United States and Mexico erupted into war between the two nations in 1845.  In the subsequent treaty in 1848 the United States took possession of more than half of Mexico ’s national territory.  There are many in both Mexico and in the American Southwest who are of a like mind with the Quebecois of Canada.  They view this territory as “ Mexico unredeemed.”  They hold out hope of growing their population in the U.S. to such an extent that they will be able to use a democratic solution at the ballot box to reclaim what Mexico lost in 1848.  Others harking even further back into Mexico’s antiquity hold out hope of creating a separate nation state of Aztlan by carving out California, Arizona, and New Mexico and possibly more if the opportunity arises. 

Given the recent political unrest in Mexico , a sudden rush of refugees across our southwest border is a distinct possibility.  President Felipe Calderon won by an incredibly thin margin.  Leftist candidate Manuel Obrador refused to concede defeat and formed what he called a parallel government.  This was an act of open rebellion against the legally elected government of Mexico .  Huge crowds of demonstrators rebelled in Oaxaca .   Obrador’s supporters choked the streets of the national capitol in Mexico City .  It was but a short step to open civil war.  Try to remember the influx of Cuban refugees into south Florida following Castro’s overthrow of Cuba ’s government in 1959.  Developments in Mexico may well accelerate the invasion of the American Southwest.  There is already a nascent Hispanic political movement toward secession in some of our southwestern states. 

Those who recall American History remember that Southern Confederate secession didn’t work very well.  The Union Army invaded and conquered the south in the 1860's.  But would an American Army with a large percentage of Latino enlistees defend the Union with the same zeal shown in that earlier conflict?  Will a future American President defend the Union with the same zeal shown by Abraham Lincoln?  Will it come to blows?  We can only hope not.  To fail to defend the Union from secessionist movements would jeopardize the very existence of the United States. 

In the Middle East will the United States defend Israel , its long-time ally and friend?  To do so may require an extremely difficult choice of using our weapons of mass destruction.  Will we do that?  To do so will infuriate actual and potential enemies and thereby jeopardize the very existence of the United States .  Not to do so may also jeopardize the existence of the United States and certainly would jeopardize the very existence of Israel. 

Israeli land claims date back four-thousand years.   Arab claims to Palestine and Israel date back fourteen-hundred years.  French claims in Canada go back four centuries while U. S. claims to the Southwest were generated by our military conquest of Mexico a scant hundred and fifty years ago. 

In the twentieth century we witnessed massive changes in the map of the world.  We saw the end of colonialism in Africa and Asia.  The demise of the Soviet Union resulted in the creation of newly independent nations in Eastern Europe and Central Asia.  The United States recognizes and supports the existence of new nation states in Africa, Asia, and Eastern Europe.  Will other nations support a future UN mandate to divide the United States into more than one nation?  One wonders what maps will look like a hundred years hence.  Will the United States still exist? Whose land is it anyway? There are tough choices ahead for all concerned.  Stay tuned.