Once upon a time, stop me if you’ve heard this story before, Anglo diplomats surveyed the ruins of a fallen empire, and hatched a nefarious plan. They insisted on the creation of a militaristic right-wing pseudostate, with borders drawn up in a way that would be deliberately provocative to her neighbors. Then the Western powers all swore that this weird artificial state had inviolable sovereignty and signed unenforceable mutual defense pacts with her. Just creating this imaginary country was a weird and stupid idea, and that decision was made even more weird and stupid by the following mutual defense agreements. Even a small border dispute would immediately and inevitably erupt into a world war, and of course that’s exactly what happened.