In 1948, American businessman Russell Arundel purchased Outer Bald Tusket Island, a tiny rocky outcrop off Nova Scotia, for $75 to use as a tuna fishing camp. What began as a joke quickly escalated into an elaborate micronation named the Principality of Outer Baldonia. Arundel drafted a constitution guaranteeing citizens the right to lie, drink, and sleep, while appointing all citizens as Admirals in the Baldonian Navy.
The legal absurdity reached its peak when the Soviet state publication Literary Gazette published a scathing critique of Outer Baldonia's capitalist charter. Offended by the article, Arundel utilized Outer Baldonia's declared territorial waters and sovereign status to issue a formal declaration of war against the USSR in 1950. The micro-state ordered its fleet of fishing vessels to prepare for combat and banned Soviet vessels from entering Baldonian waters.
While the Soviet Union ignored the declaration, Nova Scotia charter maps briefly recognized the island's unique legal standing, and the diplomatic maneuver was covered by major international press outlets. The principality ultimately dissolved when Arundel gifted the island to the Nova Scotia Bird Society in 1973, leaving behind one of the oddest Cold War diplomatic disputes in history.