Sofiastan did not like Vespucia, not one bit. But with Vespucian military dominance, with the fact that half of the Vespucians had at least one rifle in their home, and sometimes ten, any possibility of military victory was about as likely as winning the Powerball.
Sofiastan had recently gotten into a war with a Vespucian ally, Zeron, and gotten its teeth handed to them, and its army pretty much annihilated.
So Sofiastan began arming its new recruits with high-tension crosswbows of revolutionary design. It spent a great deal of money creating these new weapons, but despite their vast improvement over older crossbows, they were not an adequate replacement for automatic battle rifles.
Everyone laughed at them.
And then they released their second weapon, the one they had been secretly developing. The Gun Virus. Anyone who had ever handled the Vespucian firearms, with their peculiar combination of powders to make the high-grade Vespucian gunpowder, was instantly stricken.
Adrenal glands were burned out in a week-long fever with some violence, and any further contact with anything related to gunpowder created the most extremely itchy rash on the hands. Thus were the Lackluster created. They had been warriors and pillars of society, but now they had to work themselves up to going out to the mailbox for the mail.
Sofiastan invaded in a flotilla of cruise ships. With their devastating crossbows, they swept through the Coast of Vespucia, and those who might have stopped them were sitting in front of TV sets mournfully watching the Invasion. The rest, those who had never held a gun, were generally of the Wuss persuasion. They had no ability to organize, or sacrifice, no patriotism, and little courage. They surrendered quickly.
Some resistance occurred where people tried to use gasoline bombs, but a tweaking by the Sofiastanner gengineers solved that problem.
But then arose a Resistance Force. Bold and true. Giant men, who dwarfed their fellows, who in turn dwarfed the rather short and skinny Sofiastanners (long years of poor food in a dictatorship don't yield NBA players), strode forth from their Medieval Reenactment Meetings and met the Sofiastanners in open battle in the streets of Vespucia. The Knights of Ancient Days fought with sword and kevlar reinforced shield against the vile invaders with each Kingdom of a province of Vespucia vying for the honor of doing in more Sofiastanners than the next Kingdom.
And so it was that war came to the streets and cities of Vespucia...