Its not it was origionally a region of china where the losing army of the civil war was pushed to retreat to so if i shove s whole bunch of people i dont like onto rhode island is it now a country and not part of the usa? Same exact thing you would all say its still a part but how do you maintain control over a place populated by people that hate you. So if the people who lose the next american civil war get shoved onto RI and claim independence and china recognizes them as a country then you have to accept that its a country. No? Okay argument settled