and

set up in the past, and eventually the factories will be turning out weapons superior to anything the Overgovernment has. And then the weapons will come to the present—to this present, Dowland. Within a year from now, Terra will have become a heavily armed world—overnight. There’ll be no more talk then of forcing us to remain under Overgovernment rule. Or of making Terra another Open Planet. . . .”
Theoretically, Dowland could see that such a plan might work. With the time to do it in, and the resources of a world at the Freeholders’ disposal . . . and there would be nothing to keep them from taking back spaceships and mining the asteroids. For .