Both of those narratives fail the complexity of what actually happened.

What actually happened was that the United States government, driven by settler pressure, reduced the nimíipuu reservation without the consent of the bands most affected, then attempted to enforce that reduction by military power, and in doing so created a crisis that produced violence on all sides and ended in the permanent displacement of people from their ancestral homelands.

The leaders who tried to navigate this crisis — White Bird, Joseph, Looking Glass, Ollokot, Toohoolhoolzote, and the council that guided decisions at each stage — were not perfect men making perfect decisions.

They were men trying to protect their communities in conditions that their experience and their traditions had not prepared them for, against an adversary with resources they could not match, under time pressure that did not allow for careful deliberation.