Northern Mariana Islands

The Chamorro and later Carolinian peoples have called these islands home for over 3,500 years, developing a seafaring culture whose latte stone pillars still stand across Saipan and Tinian. Spain claimed the archipelago in the 16th century, ruling for more than 300 years before selling it to Germany in 1899, and Japan then administered it under a League of Nations mandate from 1919.

In 1944, Saipan and Tinian became the sites of ferocious Pacific War battles; Tinian's North Field later launched the B-29 bombers that dropped the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The United States took over as UN trustee after the war, and islanders voted in the 1970s to become a U.S. commonwealth rather than pursue independence, a status formalized in 1986 with U.S. citizenship for residents.

Today the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands blends Chamorro and Carolinian traditions with a tourism economy centred on Saipan's beaches, diving, and duty-free shopping, much of it historically drawing visitors from East Asia. Garment manufacturing once dominated the economy before its decline in the 2000s, and the islands now lean on tourism and light industry, with WWII heritage sites drawing history-minded travellers.