In the 2014 Scottish referendum, Alex Salmond promised voters national independence. What he actually offered them was a confederated union nested in a wider European confederal structure. This new Scotland would have remained within the UK’s monetary and monarchical unions as well as in its Common Travel Area with Ireland. By acquiring EU membership, as Salmond promised, an independent Scotland would also have stayed in a single market and customs union with the rest of the United Kingdom (referred to in Scotland as rUK). This model would theoretically mean that Scottish voters would avoid being outvoted by their English counterparts in UK general elections to determine who would exercise the powers hitherto reserved for Westminster, including the fiscal regime for the Scottish oil and gas industry. After appearing to have this prize in its grasp, the SNP fell short in 2014 because the UK government insisted that monetary union inside the UK would be unobtainable. When the ballots were counted, too few voters were willing to call Westminster’s bluff.