What Sirius understood of the resolutions, the agreements, the verbal formulations, was not the same as the understandings of Canopus. This was not evident then. It did not even begin to be evident for a very long time. It is not seen now, except by a small number of us Sirians.

By now it will have become clear, I think, that this report of mine is an attempt at a re-interpretation of history, from a certain point of view.

An unpopular point of view, even now: until recently, impossible.

Until recently, I have been among those who would have made it impossible: this I must say now, and clearly: I am not claiming that I am one who has been preserving an individual (and seditious!) view of history in secrecy, because of an oppressive conformity in the official way of looking at things. Far from it. If there is, if there has been, a minority of individuals who have in fact maintained a view different from the official one, then these will have considered me as a bastion of orthodoxy. This is not an apology I am making. We all see truths when we can see them. When we do, it is always a temptation to consider those who have not yet seen them as quite intrinsically and obdurately stupid.

In throwing in my lot with this minority—if it exists—I am doing so in the expectation of strong criticism—but not, I hope, of worse.

I shall deal once with what I consider to be the root of the problem: that long-ago war between Canopus and Sirius.

It ended in a Truce… the anniversary of which occasion we still celebrate. The beastliness and horror have been formalised in tales of heroic exploits that we teach our young. The fact is that Canopus won this war, and, at the moment when they might reasonably have been expected to humiliate us and to exact tribute and retribution, they summoned our thoroughly defeated leaders, returned to us our Colonised Planets, which they were in position to retain for themselves, informed us that we must stay behind our boundaries, offered us co-operation and friendship, and announced that this agreement would be described as a Truce, so that we not suffer ignominy in the eyes of our fellow states and empires.