Humanity has spent millennia creating laws and refining protocols so that our many countries can get along with one other, at least for a little bit. You'd think that at this point in history, we'd be semi-competent at good old-fashioned diplomacy. And we are ... most of the time. Other times, the rulebook goes straight into the fireplace and whole countries turn into the geopolitical equivalent of your crazy cousin who brought a gun to Christmas dinner.

5 Vietnam Pulls A Batman-Like Kidnapping In Germany

Trinh Xuan Thanh was your run of the mill Vietnamese businessman/politician. Well, aside from the small matter of the state-owned company he ran, PetroVietnam Construction, losing $150 million during his tenure. Now, that's a terrible loss, but it's not illegal to be just ... really bad at your job (thank god). Well, we should say it's not illegal here. Thanh was charged with corruption, and unlike in America, that wasn't a ticket to Club Fed -- he was potentially facing the death penalty. The Vietnamese government had cleared him of wrongdoing, but then a more conservative wing of the Communist Party came to power and decided that they had a case against him. So instead of waiting around to see if he'd be executed, Thanh made his way to Berlin, where he applied for political asylum.

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Under international law, Vietnam couldn't get Thanh back without Germany's say-so. But the extradition process was really long and boring. You know what's more fun? Batman.

Vietnam stole a page from The Dark Knight's playbook and straight up abducted Thanh from the middle of Berlin. No one knows exactly how they did it; all we know for sure is that it involved Vietnamese Intelligence crossing the border from the Czech Republic, a white van, and balls that wouldn't fit in the Reichstag. It might have also involved a mole in Germany's Federal Office for Migration and Refugees.

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For Germany, the whole thing was a little too reminiscent of the Soviet abductions of German citizens before the fall of the Berlin Wall. So they expelled Vietnamese diplomats and extradited a possible suspect from the Czech Republic, a dude only known as N.H. Long. Sources have yet to confirm whether he's a Metal Gear Solid character, but search your heart, and you'll find the truth.

Meanwhile, Thanh went on live TV and said that he had a "change of heart," although his asylum lawyer argues that he was under duress. No one can say for sure, but looking at his eyes here ...

Trinh Xuan Thanh

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... and here ...