A system for liberating a country makes it follow you.

[inland glacier]

When a country you have occupied is liberated and becomes subservient to you, all or most of the other countries will occupy that subservient country. I suggest that you at least allow me to defend that country, or place it under my guardianship, or begin a new relationship

[rapid tundra]

Well, you can defend your puppets, you just have to do so manually.

And you can control the AI behavior of the puppets I believe (though you can’t make direct actions)

[inland glacier]

My brother, I must station my army on my country's soil, and any country that attacks it, I must go to them and declare war to enable me to defend it. This is a long process because it's not One country is attacking, but many countries are involved.

This will make me an enemy of countries I don't want to be enemies of, including countries that are my allies. I suggest that when I liberate a country, it should have a new beginning in its relations with the rest of the world.

[rapid tundra]

A liberated country simply gets its relations from before, + 100 relations with you and the inability to declare war/break relations with you

the reason it gets constantly attacked is because it starts with 0 army, but if your army is strong it can act like a deterrent

[inland glacier]

I am not referring to relations with me personally, but rather with other countries. For example, I liberated Ethiopia, and I find that more than 20 countries have declared war on it, including some of my allies, even though my army numbers 200 million.

[rapid tundra]

Well if that puppet had bad relations with the rest of the world then it will likely get invaded

[inland glacier]

Yes, but here's the problem: theoretically, when it's liberated, it needs a new policy and diplomacy because it's a changed government. Therefore, I suggested it start by establishing friendly relations with everyone, or at least with allied and friendly nations.

[rapid tundra]

I guess that’s fair enough, but since its puppet is you, it really should be adopting some of your relations

plus in the real world countries may adopt a sort of stigma vs certain countries no matter what, whether its directly or through public pressure