Fire Time

accompli could be accepted, if not given legal sanction. After all, Naqsa never had claimed the entirety of Mundomar: an oversight, though an easy one for Naqsans to make. What they could not tolerate would be the direct presence of Terrestrial authority in a region they considered stolen.

We do not know if this was the bargain. The record has never been shown us. We only know that the northern fourth of Mundomar was now the independent Republic of Eleutheria, eager for more immigration and more investment from Earth; that Earth recognized it as a legitimate country but Naqsa did not; that the Naqsans in the tropics of that planet felt more embittered and menaced than ever before.

Soon afterward, Earth’s attention was diverted by a fresh crisis elsewhere. The Final Society of Alerion occupied the colony world New Europe. This appeared to be a far more determined and formidable opponent than Naqsa. Sentiment in favor of compromise or thinly disguised surrender ran high in the Federation, leading to a series of domestic conflicts with those who advocated firmness. In the end, as we all know, the resistance party prevailed. A short, sharp space war made Alerion yield every important point at issue.

Since then, Earth’s temper has changed. The fact that during the war New Europe followed Eleutheria’s example and broke away, doesn’t seem to have affected the confidence in human destiny which most people today assert. We disavow imperialism, we admit its absurdity on an interstellar scale—but every poll taken for the past generation has found a majority saying that our species must never again allow itself to be domineered by an alien.

Our species? Or our Federation? There is a difference.

(Scenes: The vigorous growth of Eleutheria, in population, industry, and territory; the ill effects on the Naqsan communities and their hinterlands; the next confrontation exploding into the next undeclared war, when the humans overrun the continent of G’yaaru, expel nonhumans, and fortify it.)

PRESIDENT GUPTA:—Our children shall not live in fear. The land mass of Sigurdssonia is vital to our security, therefore to the preservation of peace throughout this globe. We will settle it with our citizens……

(Joy tumultuous in Shanghai Welfare. Gigantic on a wallscreen, the image of a politician pledges solidarity with the gallant Eleutherians. He is himself wealthy, but he needs these votes.)

OLAYA:—replay my interview of last year with Admiral Alessandro Vitelli, Chief of Staff of the Peace Control Authority.…

VITELLI:—no doubt about it. None whatsoever. The Naqsan League is behind these latest moves. And I don’t mean they’re supplying arms and training to the Tsheyakkans. That’s no secret, same as we’re frankly assisting the Eleutherians. No, I mean that behind the scenes the League is encouraging revanchism. You wouldn’t get the sort of talk you hear on Mundomar otherwise. Naqsans don’t go in for reckless demagoguery the way many humans do. They tend to keep quiet until they’re ready to state facts and take action. Let’s not hide behind wishfulness. The Tsheyakkans—through them. all the Naqsans—want more than to regain Sigurdssonia. They want to drive humans completely off that planet.

OLAYA: Do you think Earth should allow this to happen, Admiral?

VITELLI: Please. My service doesn’t make or advocate policy, it executes the will of Parliament… Speaking as an individual, I do feel a human presence in that part of space is essential to the balance of power…

OLAYA:—speech by His Excellency Tollog-a-Ektrush, Ambassador General of the League of Naqsa to the World Federation, just before he was recalled…

[A blubbery-looking mass, bilious yellow spotted green and wetly shining in its nudity, short fluke-footed legs, membranes up to the knobbly elbows, head suggestive of a catfish, fills the screen. The hologram does not convey the odor, but audio brings the mushy voice, irritatingly hard for human ears to follow, into millions of rooms.]

TOLLOG:—historic w’riendshiw wetween ouw two weowles. True, we hawe owwen ween commercial riwals, wut is that not healt’hy, not stimulating? Ewerywody gains wy trade: more inwortantly, wy the inswiration uw ideas, arts, wilosowwies, t’houghts, dreams. I wish wery much to make you know, humans, how we uw Naqsa admire you, how gratewul we are wor ail we hawe teamed w’rom you and the many owwortunities your enter’rises hawe created wor ewery sentient race, how we wish wor a w’rotherhood uw the swirit. And yet, hawe you not learned somet’hing w’rom us, hawe we not made you some return? What can either weowie gain w’rom war, and what can they. not lose?

Yes, we do suwwort our kin on Tsheyakka against naked conquest. I cannot weliewe that Eart’h, Eart’h that we lowe, will really condone, let alone assist, the deswoliation and wereawement uw harmless weings in their homes…

Eart’h has an owligation to those it has imwowerished? Eart’h is morally wound to see they win to a decent liwe and a land uw their own where they can grow as they will? No doubt. No doubt. They hawe ween long denied. Wut why at our exwense? It was newwer US who denied them!…

OLAYA: The third outbreak of large-scale hostilities on Mundomar precipitated a crisis which did not seem to be resolvable. After their initial success, the Eleutherians could make little further progress, and the Tsheyakkans showed no disposition to accept defeat once more. Peacemaking commissions from outside were in effect ignored, not very politely, by both factions. The fear became great that one or the other would acquire major weapons, or might already have them, and would introduce them into the stalemated struggle which was bleeding everyone empty…

(Scenes: Parades, demonstrations, chanting crowds around all Earth, crying for the rescue of Eleutheria.)

(Terrestrial and Naqsan naval units ordered to that sector. Reports of lethal incidents. Views of broken ships, dead crews, hospitalized live casualties in their agony: many of them prisoners, treated as well as alien physicians are able while they await exchange.)

(Summary of diplomatic efforts that failed.)

(The Parliamentary session that commits Earth to the survival of Eleutheria.)

(More incidents. The ambassador of the League delivers his crucial note.)

(The Parliamentary session that tells the Navy to fight.)

CHAIRMAN AL-GHAZI:—No, of course we don’t plan an attack on Naqsa itself, unless Earth is attacked, which I hardly expect, That would be an act of war. Worse, it would be morally monstrous and, may I add, militarily idiotic, in view of planetary defense capabilities. No, to the extent that we remain in control of events, this will be an operation on Mundomar and in space, for the sole purpose of inducing our opponents to agree to a fair peace…

OLAYA: The vote was by no means unanimous. Spokesmen for several countries argued against our involvement, and continue to argue for our withdrawal. A minority of private individuals and organizations urges the same.

(Rain in an almost empty street. A few sad pickets before an Admiralty office. Their signs carry slogans like BRING BACK BROTHERHOOD and HAVE NAQSANS NO RIGHTS? Occasional passersby in vehicles pause to heckle.)

OLAYA:—special guest, Gunnar Heim, former Minister of Space and Naval Affairs for New Europe. Three decades ago on Earth, as everyone will remember, Captain Heim took a lonely lead in calling for resistance to Alerion aggression, and eventually initiated action on behalf of France which caused the entire Federation to move. Later he was in the forefront of declaring and consolidating the status of New Europe as a sovereign planet, and was a major figure in its government for years before he returned to private life, though never to obscurity. Here on a visit, Captain Heim has graciously consented to appear…

[The man, white-haired but still erect and bulky, wearing an old service tunic open at the neck, sprawls in an armchair opposite the moderator and leisurely puffs his pipe.]

OLAYA:—you don’t think the present situation is like the one you had to meet?

HEIM: Absolutely not. Alerion wanted mankind—and the Naqsans, for that matter, every other starfaring race, but we were the most prominent and, therefore, first on the list—Alerion wanted us out of space. In fact, I believe Alerion wanted us dead.

OLAYA: Why?

HEIM: Call it ideology. We don’t seem to be the only species cursed with that. The point is, Alerion’s objections were unlimited, therefore Alerion was a mortal threat. We had to apply force to bring its rulers to their senses.

OLAYA: And you don’t feel this is true of Naqsa?