 Once powerful states or nations were in decline and yet in denial, they felt that they were as robust as ever, that the enemy wouldn't dare attack them, that there would be allies on the horizon to save them, that even if they were attacked, the nature of their enemies were not, they weren't existential. They didn't want to destroy them. Who would want to do that? And yet, so when I finished, I wrote an epilogue and looked at various places around the world where