The Principality of Sealand: The World's Most Successful Micronation

     No doubt, most people with an above average IQ have at some time started a sentence with the phrase “If I had my own country...” Idealistic college students, eccentrics, social theorists, crackpot windbag amateur political commentators, gregarious barroom drunks...probably most of society’s discontents have entertained the idea of running their own nation for at least a few seconds. There was, however, once a man named Paddy Roy Bates who went all the way, declared himself king, and founded the Principality of Sealand. His venture into obscure political history did not come without its conflicts but many would say it was worth the trouble in the end.

     Sealand is located on HM Fort Roughs or Roughs Tower as it is more commonly known. The British navy built the structure during World War II as a defense fortress for the sake of fighting off German invaders, coming from across the sea. Roughs Tower is built on the seabed; it has two pillars and a deck that connects them across the top. The deck has a landing pad for helicopters. The structure is about seven nautical miles off the coast of England. The closest city is Suffolk.

After England’s victory at the end of World War II, Roughs Tower was abandoned. By the 1960s, it had been discovered and taken over by a group of young pirate radio broadcasters who transmitted their Wonderful Radio London station across the waves and into Great Britain. Then came Paddy Roy Bates.

     Bates had formerly served as a major in the British navy. After re-entering civilian life, he gained some experience as a pirate radio-station operator. Eventually he decided to seize Roughs Tower and use it for his own purposes. In 1967, the British government claimed his radio station to be illegal and guilty of broadcasting entertainment without a license. Rather than contesting the charges in court, he declared himself King Roy Bates (although King Badass would have been just as suitable) and established the Principality of Sealand, thereby stating that Great Britain had no jurisdiction over Roughs Tower; this claim had some validity since British territorial waters ended six nautical miles offshore and the fledgling micronation was located one nautical mile beyond that point. The King of Sealand then made his family the official royal family. He wrote up a constitution, eventually went on to mint money and publish passports which, inevitably, were never recognized internationally for travel to other countries. Sealand hired a composer to write a national anthem, established an order of knighthood, and even put together their own national football team, albeit one that was made up of non-citizens, never receiving recognition from FIFA. King Roy Bates kept Sealand afloat financially by running his pirate radio station, raising revenue by running his own offshore radio shows and charging advertisers for airtime, a lucrative business in those days since Britain’s established radio programming was known for being lackluster and boring.

     Then some troubles began. Ronan O’Rahilly, the founder of another pirate station called Radio Caroline tried to seize Roughs Tower from King Roy Bates. O’Rahilly and his gang were met with gas bombs when they tried to come ashore. The bombings made so much noise that the British navy sent out a few soldiers to calm the conflict down but upon arrival, the king’s son, Prince Michael, began firing warning shots with his rifle. The navy eventually took command of Sealand, King Roy and Prince Michael were arrested, and taken to court in England on illegal weapons possessions charges. The court dropped the case because, as previously stated, Sealand’s location was in international waters and not under the rule of the U.K. King Roy later used this incident as, some might say, rather flimsy evidence to meet the minimum requirements for declaration of statehood under United Nations law, the minimum requirement being recognition of legitimacy by another established nation.

     After declaring Sealand an official country, the smallest nation in the world no less, King Roy continued to scheme. He envisioned the dismal looking Roughs Tower as being an ideal site for an offshore hotel and casino. In 1978, he attracted the attention of a German lawyer and Sealand passport holder named Alexander Achenbach. This individual lured King Roy to meet a group of investors in Austria but the investors never showed up for the conference. Meanwhile, the con-man Achenbach had landed on Roughs Tower with a group of mercenary soldiers that he hired for the operation. Prince Michael was taken captive and thrown into prison (actually the room at the bottom of one of the pillars) where they kept him for three days without food or water before Achenbach declared himself the new king of Sealand.

     The ever-resourceful King Roy built up a mercenary army of his own and hired a helicopter pilot, who had worked as such in a couple James Bond movies, to lead a counter-attack on Sealand and end the coup d’etat. Upon arrival, King Roy’s band of soldiers seized caches of weapons that were hidden in secret locations throughout Roughs Tower, captured Achenbach and then thew him into prison in place of Prince Michael. King Roy declared ransom money for the return of the German lawyer, causing diplomats from the Netherlands, Germany, and Austria to put pressure on Great Britain to get the faux-revolutionary released. After pay-offs and negotiations, Achenbach was released and returned to Germany. His Sealand passport was revoked and the nutty lawyer continued calling himself the official and unfairly deposed king of Sealand, claiming to be running a government in exile from Germany. Since international diplomats had been involved in the affair, King Roy again declared de facto international recognition in further attempts to gain official recognition of statehood.

     The Principality of Sealand remained a quiet outpost of individual freedom until the 1990s and the dawn of the internet era. An internet businessman approached King Roy about operating an offshore data management firm from the platform of the micronation. The deal eventually fell through. The Swedish file-sharing website Pirate Bay also approached King Roy about operating off Roughts Tower since it was a place where copyright infringement was not considered a legal issue. That deal never got off the ground either. Alexander Achenbach showed up once again, this time in association with an organized crime gang based in Spain and made up of human traffickers from Russia and Iraq; the gang was using Sealand passports issued by Achenbach’s government in exile to smuggle human cargo into and out of Hong Kong. King Roy and the royal family responded by revoking all Sealand passports and ceasing to print any more. King Roy had no problem with offshore gambling or transmitting porn into countries in the Middle East but slavery just was not his game.

     At the onset of old age, King Roy was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease and spent the rest of his days in an English nursing home on the mainland. He died in 2012 and his son, Prince Michael, became the reigning monarch, though he lives ashore in the UK where he manages the political affairs of Sealand, the most successful micronation in history.

Strauss, Erwin S. How to Start Your Own Country. Palladin Press, 1984.