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We discovered the value of genetic diversity many years later, almost too late to rescue the formerly "trash" - now endangered - squawfish from extinc- tion. To solve that problem we had to halt further water development. And now, Dale Pontius and Robert Wigington tell us, the flaw in our multiple plans to deal with endangered fish species is that they lack coordination. They say that we have failed to rec- oncile planning for the recovery of the bony tail and razorback suckers in the lower basin, the endangered species recovery program for squawfish in the San Juan, and the programs to recover squawfish, bonytail, and humpbacks in the upper basin. They argue, logi- cally, for a range-wide recovery program and point out that it should relate to other non-endangered species as well. And, at risk of adding unnecessary complica- tion, I'm tempted to ask, "What about the endangered totuaba down in the delta? Jim Dyer stresses the importance of basin-wide plan- ning so that we can better understand and cope with the costs of energy, labor, and environmental mitiga- tion. He makes the case that true efficiency will elude us until we are willing to look more holistically at all these issues with a long-term vision. Our failure to look broadly at solving problems is shown in the realm of Indian water rights issues as well. We have quantified the rights of some tribes, thinking that perhaps we have "solved" the problem. Of course we did not, since the tribes were left without means of using any "wet water." Paper rights have pro- vided little more than theoretical satisfaction. Furthermore, the quantifications that were made were based on erroneous and inadequate claims of irrigable acreage that were made by the federal government on the tribes' behalf. And over a dozen tribes have not even had their rights quantified. 12 MAKING COMMITMENTS WITHOUT ENOUGH INtORMATlON ! Tht second theme through the history of the Colorado Riv~r Basin is a serious dearth of reliable information. The most notorious example was the compact itself, which allocated the consumptive use of the river on the ass~mption that there was 16 to 17 million acre feet a year available. In fact, we now know that the long-term , average flow is only about 13.5 million acre feet - an errJr of 1.5 to 3.5 million acre feet per year. ! The story of the Colorado River is often told as if the dis~overy of a salinity problem was a surprise. If we , hadi asked, we surely could have anticipated the salinity pro?lem. Ancient Sumeria, Mesopotamia, and other civilizations of the arid world had experience the perils I of i~rigation and drainage and salt build-up. But we pro4eeded with development, casting a blind eye tow~rds such consequences. Frotp John Wesley Powell's early warnings about the limits of aridity, the need for cooperative institutions, for l~nd tenure that reflected the capacity to produce, , we Have ignored science and warnings to shape our ! hUman institutions to reflect physical reality whenever the W'arnings conflicted with our goals. Carothers and ! Houfe write of how science was used in the develop- ment of the Colorado River to remove obstacles to development decisions that had already been made. Scie'ltists were asked specific questions and to solve parti~ular problems, but not to predict the short and longfterm consequences of development decisions alreahy made. I ! I Evenias we accept the need to consider and accommo- I date the interrelationship of natural resources, we I mov~ ahead with sometimes shaky factual bases.