In 415 BC, Athens was about to make the most dangerous decision in its history and one man stood up to stop it. Nicias was everything Alcibiades was not: cautious, honest, deeply experienced, and genuinely good. He could see the catastrophe coming more clearly than anyone in the assembly. And he had one last idea for how to prevent it.

This is the story of his famous speech against the Sicilian Expedition, and the stunning, unintended consequence it produced. We put you in the room for the moment it all turned, then break down one of history's great rhetorical ironies: how a man who was right about everything still lost and what his failure teaches us about persuasion, fear, and reading a crowd. Featuring the speech in full (Thucydides, Book 6), with analysis drawing on Donald Kagan.

Why is being right so often not enough?

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