It complicates it.

The relationship between the Tonkawa and the Comanche was itself a history of conflict, displacement, and violence that predated the American period.

The Tonkawa’s assistance to Mackenzie was not the assistance of people who had no stake in the outcome; it was the assistance of people who understood the Comanche threat from their own historical experience.

Acknowledging this complexity is part of taking seriously the instruction not to flatten all Native participants into one generic bloc.

The Southern Plains in 1874 was populated by peoples with different interests, different histories, and different calculations about how to navigate a rapidly changing world.