Alex Salmond is not a Nazi. He’s not even a Fascist.

Every so often you come across an article so bizarre it forces you to re-examine long-held certainties on a subject about which you happen to be tolerably well-informed. This year that’s Scotland and her independence referendum and this time the article in question is Simon Winder’s epistle in the latest edition of Standpoint.

Having duly re-examined everything I conclude that it is the maddest article I’ve read this year.

So bonkers – really, not too strong a term – that you wonder what the magazine’s editors were thinking when they agreed to publish it. They have every right to do so, of course, and publication does not equal endorsement. But still. No-one paused to say ‘hang on, this is laughable’.

I am getting ahead of myself. Let’s see how Winder opens his case:

Last summer, when I was checking the proofs for my book about the Habsburg Empire, Danubia, I found myself reflecting on the way that across Central Europe over the past century and a half different forms of nationalism have done almost untold damage.