Thailand

Ethiopia was the only African country never colonised by the Europeans. It is the reason so many flags in the world bear the Ethiopian colours once they gained independence. Thailand is the only Southeast Asian nation which did the same. Modern Nations only became a real thing after French Revolution and when Napoleon decided to dissolve the Holy Roman Empire (in 1806) and crown himself, shifting power from the Church to 'The People'. Like the Muslim Ummah (a supra-national community), the Catholic (universal) Church aimed to include everyone. France and England aimed to rule, and 'civilize'. They continued their European rivalry in the attached colonial arms race of Nation building. Able Thai rulers were able to exploit those tensions, and Thailand became a buffer state between British and French interests. From the mid-C19th century Thailand began its own industrialization process, which included nation-building along western lines. As war industrialised, it was difficult/impossible not to. By the time of World War I, nations needed soldiers prepared to die in production line like trenches. In 1917, then known as Siam, Thailand joined its colonial neighbours as part of the Allies.

Territorial Losses