With two-thirds of that time now passed, none of the countries listed have yet come to fruition, but the idea of some being created has come closer than others.
The year before the article was written, South Sudan, still the world’s newest country, was less than a year old.
So, whilst no country listed has been formed, how close did they come, and is there still the prospect of their creation?
Based in modern-day Mali, the article predicted that ethnic groups from Mali, as well as surrounding countries, might seek to form their own nation based on shared ethnicity.
At the time of the article, a Touareg rebellion had driven the army out of the country’s north. It declared independence, which would constitute 60 percent of Mali’s territory, although much of it would be deserted.
The claim was rejected by Mali and the international community, and the group renounced the claim in 2013. Since then, the country has been gripped by Islamic extremism and has seen French and British troops deploy to intervene.
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Comprised of Afghan and Pakistani Pashtuns, it was speculated that these two countries would form a wedge between Afghanistan and Pakistan and would be based on ethnic identities.
The article envisioned the withdrawal of US and British troops from Afghanistan as being the catalyst, along with political instability in neighbouring Pakistan.
Ultimately, troops did leave the country in 2021, and the Taliban quickly regained much of the country. There is no indication of enough turbulence in either country to make the formation of these two countries remotely possible.
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The article imagined a time when so many refugees fled from Yemen into neighbouring Saudi Arabia that the country would simply be swallowed up by the Kingdom.
Similarly, it envisaged a military incursion into Bahrain, which would create a Gulf union of states that would significantly increase Saudi Arabia’s land mass.
Since the article, Bahrain has decreased its economic reliance on the kingdom whilst Yemen continues to be a failed state, which became the subject of military action from the kingdom in 2015 targeting the Houthis.
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There are already two Congos: The Democratic Republic of Congo and the Republic of Congo.
Split primarily along colonial lines, the article wondered if the vast amount of ethnicities in tribes across the area, bound in nationhood by crude, colonially enforced lines, could lead to more areas breaking away.
Despite significant violence in the country and an abundance of natural resources, this has not yet happened.
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