evidence: By June, the occupiers forced the hand of Tonga’s King Taufa’ahau Tupou IV. He annexed Minerva—claiming the reefs as traditional fishing grounds—scribed a 12-mile territorial limit around them, then visited in ships with 100 troops to dismantle the republic’s structures, and a four-piece brass band to play the obligatory national anthem. Oliver’s brief reign was over, though he would later attempt to establish libertarian states in the Bahamas and Vanuatu. Both failed. Tonga, too, would have its share of trials, facing challenges for the territory that still rage today. When the kingdom claimed the seabed 200 nautical miles from its coast under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, Minerva Reefs suddenly became politically relevant, overlapping with Fiji’s claim under the same treaty. Within the disputed region lies thousands of square kilometres of ocean and mineral deposits on the seabed potentially worth hundreds of millions in mining licences. This led to a naval stand-off, with the Tongans erecting a navigational beacon, and the Fijians tearing it down. Last year, Tonga suggested a land swap—Minerva Reefs for the Lau Group, which represents about half of Fiji’s territorial sea and would almost treble that of Tonga. The suggestion wasn’t taken seriously, and did little to settle international relations.