First contact

Often we wonder, how would our first contact with the aliens look like.

Would they send a landing party with a message of peace and cooperation?
Maybe they will conquer our world and enslave the entire population.
Perhaps we would just meet their robots, drones and AI.

Possibilities are endless, and most of them have been explored by various UFO enthusiasts, sci-fi novels, TV series and movies.

But lets for fun change the roles. Let us imagine our current society is a technologically advanced species exploring a world inhabited by a intelligent species on a lesser stage of development than ours.

Scenarios for this encouner are also limitless, but I will give my prediction how would it end up.

We come in peace

We are all aware that we as a species are not capable of a interstellar voyage, so for the purpose of this thought experiment lets imagine that a stable wormhole is discovered near the Moon.

World powers have come together and sent a couple of unmanned missions through the wormhole and the results are amazing. An inhabitable planet, very similar to Earth is just outside the other side of the wormhole. First sensor data show that the planet is not only inhabitable but is also rich with various mineral deposits and ores. On a wave of world's curiosity UN decided to fund a joint manned mission. Crew consists of 12 astronauts representing the major Earth powers. Their main task is to land on the surface and gather as much intel as possible. Shortly after the landing the astronauts have realized that the world is thriving, and full of life. On top of that, they soon found that among the indigenious flora and fauna there is also a sentient species in a neolithical stage of development. Lets call them "Drugi"

I would like to pause here. Main reason for this pause is that at this point much would depend on the behaviour of the "Drugi", but also on their apperance. Our response to them would really depend on how we perceive them. Our impressions of them are more important than the facts themselves. For examples if they look more like predators than herbivores, general public would perceive them as aggressive, so our behaviour towards them would be more suspicious. Opinion of the general public will guide our actions as an intruding species.

We would probably want to mine all their ore, colonize their planet or at least portions of it. Establish industrial zones and trade routes. Profit is what makes our planet turn so it is highly likely that the profit would motivate all our actions in the New world. Only thing for me that is a variable is how far are we willing to go, what moral price are we willing to pay?

Lets be honest, at this point the fate of the New world is no longer in the hands of "Drugi", it is in our hands. In my opinion we would probably simultaneously send
both mining companies and humanitarian missions.(of course "Drugi" need help, it is a miracle how they managed to survive here without us ). Humanitarians would educate "Drugi" how great we are, how they will also benefit from our presence, and that this all is an interspecies comradery project. Bla, bla... Point is that we would lie to them trying to soften them up while the rest of the humans are slowly but surely taking over the world and reshaping it into Earth.(we don't like things that are too strange, I think the same would go for the alien planets also)

Then at some point "Drugi" would realize that they are being shown magic tricks with left hand while our right hand is stealing their planet from them. They would start to protest and reject our intrusion. (What is enough is enough).
Now this for me would be a major breaking point, and it would completely depend on the division of newly found wealth between the Earth countries, but also would depend on the public opinion.

If some countries want more wealth, human history has taught us that technologically superior race will, with no problem, kill or enslave the indigeneous population just to achieve their greedy goals. Only trick now is to persuade the public that "Drugi" are the villains that want to kill all humans, and are trying hard to sabotage our new colonies. - Good PR can make this happen, after all "Drugi" don't have human rights, they are not humans.

Maybe there is a chance that public would reject abundance of gifts from the other planet for the sake of compasion and understanding. For me this is highly unlikely, but it is an option nonetheless. But the public is the only lifeline for the poor "Drugi".
Goverments would alter their policy on a new world only if they are facing an angry voting body who would choose someone else on the following elections.

If you have some other views on this topic please leave a comment, in any case thanks for reading

---

Image sources:

Pic 1
[Pic 2](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_contact_(science_fiction)