Battlefield Earth

The picture went off. The mine spotlight did not come on. Sir Robert's voice battered them from the dark.

“Think of the oppression of Psychlo! Think of how it altered every part of the lives of nations! Think of what its tyra

“You owe this man,” the mine spotlight hit Jo

The emissaries were not accustomed to fear. They felt afraid.

Sir Robert bored on. He had discarded Jo

The complete sequence of the Tolnep moon came on. They had viewed bits of this before. But they had not seen the whole finish of that moon, for it had been taken after the fight with

Schleim.

Before them, the moon began to crumble and pucker in. The great ship that had tried to escape was eaten up before their eyes once more. And then the views from the Tolnep mountaintop came on.

Jo

The scenes of the piece of scrap iron falling in had a part in it Jo

That moon was now a ball, not just of gas, but of uncountable quintillions of megavolts of electricity. The separation of atoms had generated enormous charge, but there being no oxygen and no second pole to cause flow, the intense cold of space had frozen the resulting electricity. Jo

The emissaries had seen a planet roar into the heat of a sun.

Now they were seeing a moon vanish and then congeal into a cold, deadly, frigid mass of destruction.

Sir Robert's voice went into them like shock waves. "He can do that to your home planet at will"

Had he hit them with a stun gun he could not have produced a more frozen effect.

," cried Sir Robert, "there is nothing you can do to stop it!"

Jo

The mine spotlight hit Jo

Sir Robert shouted at them, “He is going to put twenty-eight firing platforms in twenty-eight separate places– none of them on this planet. Your home planet coordinates are going to be set. Those twenty-eight platforms are going to fire, all twenty-eight of them, if any one of you turns hostile!”

This was not what Jo

“All you have to do,” Sir Robert bellowed at them, “is get one small inch out of line, and all your home planets will become exactly like that moon!”

They were in paralyzed shock.

“You,” cried Sir Robert, “all of you are going to sign a treaty, a treaty that forbids war with us and war between yourselves. If you don't, your home planets, all of them, will disintegrate just like that moon, and you and all your people will go with them!” He pointed again at Jo

Every emissary came out of his seat, screaming with rage.

Colonel Ivan and the troopers tensed. The din almost caved in one's ears.

Sir Robert glared at them, feeling triumphant.

Jo

A final cry from Browl expressed the sentiments of them all. “This is a declaration of

Jo

“It is not a declaration of war,” he said. “It is a declaration of peace!"

“I know that your economics are geared to war. I know that you consider the best way to get rid of excess population, which you feel you all have, is to engage in war.

“But in wars, one or another of the combatants is going to lose. Each one feels that it could not be he. But there is an even chance it will be.

“So, in declaring peace, we are only protecting you from each other.”

Fowljopan suddenly shouted, “When we get home we can send vast armadas against you! Even if you slay all of us, those fleets will still come and destroy you. And as for you, you have laid yourself open to assassination!”

Sir Robert was suddenly in front of Jo

“Also, he has doubles. They look exactly like him; you ca

“It is up to you to protect Earth and to protect him. The lives of you, your rulers, and your people depend upon it.

“And as to your fleets coming and destroying us, they might well do so. But if you don't get home, they won't know. They would attack here and have no base or people or rulers to return to. Think about that!”

“You are threatening emissaries!” shouted Browl.

“He is protecting emissaries!” snapped Sir Robert. “With your war industries tooling up to go full blast, there is more than one in this room who will be representing a government conquered by another!

“You should look at a principle known as force manure. It means that an unexpected and uncontrollable event has suddenly entered upon the universes. A superior force!

“This man and what he can do is an event of force manure. It changes the way things were. It determines how the future will be.

“I am a man of war. You are diplomats! You have it in your power as of this moment to exert an influence on this force manure. If you do not avail yourselves of it, you are not diplomats but fools and suicidal fools at that!”

“How can we control this?” said a small lord at the back.

Jo

They were listening.

“Before the platforms fired,” said Jo

He saw he had some interest.

“The platforms could operate as an arm of such a conference as this,” he said.

He could see them sorting it out. He could see that at least some of them were edging toward the idea that this might give them, as individuals, a new power in their governments. It was in their ma

“It’s still an awesome threat,” said one.

“It solves nothing in our economies,” said another. “On the contrary, it will produce chaos.”

Jo