In the summer of 416 B. C., the Athenians sent an expedition to bring the island of Melos forcibly within the Empire. Thucydides recorded the general course of the negotiation. "The Melian Dialogue" has been discussed from various aspects, but there are two points of view which have been considered self-evident by most critics. (1) The taking of Melos was, in itself, a rash and meaningless incident, which did not have any great influence on the consequence of the war. (2) Thucydides treats the attack on Melos as a glaring example of unjustifiable and scandalous aggression. These two points of view are, however, based on false preconceptions or prejudices which are derived from the ethical interpretation of Dionysius. One must pay attention to the political situation of those days. The occupation of Melos, "for which Nicias had always argued" was both necessary and urgent if the Athenian Empire was to secure command of the sea. After the failure of Alcibiades' Peloponnesian strategy, Nicias aimed at the taking of Melos as one of his brilliant "indirect approaches" to domestic and foreign affairs. Alcibiades, for his part, supported the massacre of the Melians and took advantage of it to promote the Sicily campaign. Thucydides was well aware of the importance of the Melian incident as a demonstration of the nature of imperialism. All the Athenian assertions in the Dialogue are backed up by his tragic vision of human nature, which like the archaic metaphysics of Anaximander contends that all beings exist in the grand circle of becoming and perishing according to the time-order. Thucydides found out in the course of the war what the ancient Hindu would have called "Karma".
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