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"Strategically important" location, region, area, territory or country is a claim often made about whatnot place as a reason for getting conquered over and over again.

Often enough the reasoning behind such a claim is vague or omitted. E.g.: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Moldova "Due to its strategic location on a route between Asia and Europe, Moldova was repeatedly invaded, among others, by the Goths, Huns, Avars, Magyars, Kievan Rus', Pechenegs, Cumans, and the Mongols."

So Moldova is one of many areas on one of many possible paths from Asia to Europe. Why would that make Moldova special from any other location in Asia or Europe? Forget that. That is not my question, just an example of vague reasoning behind the term.

  1. How is the term "strategically important" location defined?

  2. So where are currently the "strategically important" locations in Europe?

  3. If some locations are of particularly high "strategic importance", then by corollary there must exist regions that are of particularly low "strategic importance". Where are those locations?

EDIT: Guess it's a matter of perspective as Relaxed pointed out. Since there are currently only two significant military factions in Europe (NATO in the west and Russia & friends in the east) I'll ask from those two perspectives. I don't mean NATO vs. Russia head-on setting. Any interest involving one or the other.

snoukkis
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  • Poor peripheral regions that are not resource-rich or on the path of potential invaders might be some examples of strategically unimportant regions. Obviously, it depends on the technology available, on the perspective (strategic for who?), on the scale you are looking at, etc. but I am not sure I quite follow why this bothers you. – Relaxed Dec 02 '14 at 13:51
  • My interest is based on curiosity. The same fundamental reason why people bother to make lists+maps like the following: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_population http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_%28nominal%29 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_Human_Development_Index – snoukkis Dec 02 '14 at 14:04
  • Of course those are based on some simple (or composite) number. So I'm not expecting to make a nice colored maps of strategic locations. Still curious. – snoukkis Dec 02 '14 at 14:07
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    Wouldn't this be entirely context-based (ie, what is or is not strategic is purely in the eyes of the person with the strategy?) –  Dec 02 '14 at 17:22
  • I guess I'm guilty of zero-sum mentality where someones advantage is automatically someone elses loss. Guess it's a matter of perspective as Relaxed pointed out. Since there are currently only two significant military factions in Europe (NATO in the west and Russia & friends in the east) I'll ask from those two perspectives. I don't mean NATO vs. Russia head-on setting. Any interest involving one or the other. – snoukkis Dec 02 '14 at 19:35
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    I think one can safely say that neither Liechtenstein nor Monaco are strategically important. Other than that DA is wholly spot on. The Vatican is strategically important for Cardinals, but not conquerors. – Affable Geek Dec 02 '14 at 19:50
  • @DA. - yes and no. Geography rarely has "context". Neither do tanks requiring transportation through said geography – user4012 Dec 02 '14 at 19:55
  • @AffableGeek - the Vatican is NOT "strategically important" in a sense of geopolitics. Control of Vatican physically isn't what the power of Papacy rests on, AFAIK. – user4012 Dec 02 '14 at 19:56
  • I closed this question as too broad because in the end, it is essentially asking us to analyze the strategic significance of all of Europe, which is an unreasonable task for stackexchange – Sam I am says Reinstate Monica Dec 05 '14 at 21:59

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Strategically important locations are defined as locations control over which offers some sort of strategic benefit:

  • Areas that allow routes (invading army mast pass through them) - e.g. valleys, etc... Moldova fits that in a larger geographic sense.

    Importantly to your question's wording, all the invaders mentioned were mounted steppe nomads - which means horse-fodder-rich passes with access to water are critical. (except Kievan Rus... and frankly I'm skeptical that Kievan Rus controlled Moldova)

  • Areas that are highly defensible (this kind of mutates with military technology, but historically, elevated hill with farmland and access to fresh water; or a mountain range or river that serve as natural barrier).

  • Areas that are economically vital

    • e.g. sea access for Russia - thus all the stealing of Black-Sea-facing land from Ukraine.

    • Or Levant, with its location vital to West-East trade routes.

  • Areas with vital resources (witness elevation of importance of Arab world to Western powers and later Soviet block; after hydrocarbon resources became important... or most of southern strategy between USSR and Nazi Germany in 1942-43 which pivoted on access to oil).

  • Areas that allow one to project power (Philippines circa Spanish-American war and WWII)

  • Sometimes, areas of significant morale/psychological significance.

    • Moscow in 1941. It wasn't really THAT important militarily.

    • Jerusalem. Seriously, its military OR economic significance to either side of the conflict is close to nil. And by "conflict" I mean not just Israeli-Palestinian post-1949 tussles, but all the way back to Romans, Saracins, Crusaders and Ottomans and British.

    • Kosovo for Serbs.

So for Russia, areas of strategic importance are:

  • Peripheral territories that present natural defensive barriers (which Russia proper is wholly devoid of). Thus the push to control Ukraine, Eastern Europe, Chechnya, etc...

  • Areas of resource importance. Siberia. Coal and oil and gas in Ukraine and Central Asia/Caucasus.

    • As technology develops, Arctic becomes more of this.

  • Sea access. St. Petersburg founding and wars with Turks for Black Sea access and with Swedes and Lithuanians to northern seas access historically. Stealing black sea access from Ukraine in recent events.

user4012
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I'll try to compose a rough list of strategic importance myself based on criterions from DVK. Individual rankings as well as their wight to importance are simple guesstimates. Please comment you criticism.

Perspective is that of Russia / NATO interest because those are currently the only significant military factions in Europe.

Component lists:

Sea/land invasion route to/from Russia:

Russia, Norway, Ukraine, Sweden, Romania, Czech Republic, Azerbaijan, Austria, Serbia, Bulgaria, Slovakia, Georgia, Armenia, Denmark, Turkey, Finland, Estonia, Kazakhstan, Poland, Iceland, Hungary, Belarus, Moldova, Lithuania, Latvia

... Kazhakstan buffers against China, but it's excluded from discussion about Europe.

Can provide/deny sea access:

Russia, Ukraine, Finland, Estonia, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Turkey, Spain

Nice islands from where to project power:

Iceland, Greece, Italy

Nice mountain range between NATO & Russia hearthlands:

Norway, Sweden, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Ukraine, Romania, Serbia, Bulgaria, Macedonia, Albania, Montenegro, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Slovenia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Armenia

High nominal GDP/area. Over 5 million USD / km^2:

Monaco, San Marino, Liechtenstein, Malta, Netherlands, Luxembourg, Belgium, Switzerland, United Kingdom, Germany, Denmark, Italy

I think my data was from 2012 CIA factbook (I did the numbers over a year ago). See visualization: https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/2454917/map.png . Unfortunately large areas with lots of variance like US/Russia/China/Australia tend to average out a lot.

Moral:

Vatican

High net foor exporter after own consumption:

United Kingdom, Netherlands, Germany, Italy, Belgium, Spain, France

Energy exporter (oil/gas/coal/uranium):

High: Russia, Kazakhstan
Medium: Norway
low: Poland, United Kingdom, Netherlands, Ukraine

Metal producer (iron/aluminium/copper):

High: Russia
Medium: Kazakhstan
low: Poland, Norway, Ukraine, Germany, Sweden, Iceland

Composite list of strategic importance (grouping):

I don't know how to weigh any of the components properly, but here goes:

  1. Russia
    Largest single country on earth/in Europe. Attacking/defending Russia means there's a lot of land, sea, energy and minerals to capture/defend.

  2. Kazakhstan & Norway
    Both are rich in energy and metals, though Kazakhstan much more so. Then again Norway has a mountain range and is a possible (mostly) land route to Russia. Can close Baltic sea access. Kazakhstan buffers agains China, though not strictly an Europian interest.

  3. Ukraine
    It's a tried and true invasion route to Russia. Carpathians shield it to the southwest. Has Black Sea access (Crimea/Sevastopol). Also has some energy and metal resources.

  4. Sweden
    Sweden has mountain range between NATO and Russia. It's a possible land route to Russia. Can close Baltic sea access.

  5. Iceland, Poland, Germany, United Kingdom, Netherlands, Denmark, Italy
    Iceland is a good place to project power, it's and invasion route to northers Europe and it has some metal production. Poland makes this category because it is on a convenient route to Russia and has some metal and energy production. The rest are all high GDP density countries. With the exception of Denmark and Iceland, all have also a large food surplus. Italy with it's islands is also a good place to project power from. Denmark can close Baltic sea access. Germany has some metal production. UK and Netherlands have a little energy exports too.

  6. Belgium, Romania, Czech Republic, Azerbaijan, Austria, Serbia, Bulgaria, Slovakia, Georgia, Armenia, Turkey, Finland, Estonia, Spain
    These countries are on an invasion route to Russia (except Belgium & Spain). They also have nice mountain ranges between NATO/Russia to defend with (except Belgium, Turkey, Finland, Estonia, Spain don't have any or aren't "in between"). In addition Finland, Estonia, Turkey and Spain are in position to easily block Russian sea access.

  7. Luxembourg, Switzerland, Malta, Liechtenstein, San Marino, Monaco, Hungary, Belarus, Moldova, Lithuania, Latvia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Albania, Macedonia, Slovenia, Montenegro, Vatican City, France, Greece
    Most of these countries have only one of the following to make them significant:

    • easy invasion path
    • nice mountain ranges to block land access.
    • high GDP density

      Also france is significant for high food surplus, Greece for nice islands from where to project power from and Vatican gets an honorable mention.

  8. Portugal, Ireland, Cyprus, Andorra, Kosovo
    These countries don't seem to be strategically very important.

Now comments please.

snoukkis
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  • Kosovo is somewhat important - it's strategically important to Serbs moreale-wise; and Serbia to Russians (datapoints to consider: Serbia was the reason Russia entered WWI; and also the NATO invasion of Kosovo was the reason Russia started its anti-US/Western pivot recently as far as popular opinion as well as powers that be. – user4012 Dec 04 '14 at 17:15
  • Also, why would you consider Spain important as far as sea access (I'magonnaguess, Mediterranean-to-Atlantic passage) but omit Portugal and Morocco? – user4012 Dec 04 '14 at 17:16