Free The Word for World is Forest by Ursula K. Le Guin

come back in three and a half or four years to “New Tahiti,” and find a thriving Terran colony, and no more Creechie Problem. None at all. Pity about the plague, we took all precautions required bythe Code, but it must have been some kind of mutation, they had no natural resistance, but we did manage to save a group of them by transporting them to the New Falkland Isles in the southern hemisphere and they’re doing fine there, all sixty-two of them. . . .
    The conference did not last much longer. When it ended he stood up and leaned across the table to Lepennon. “You must tell the League to do something to save the forests, the forest people,” he said almost inaudibly, his throat constricted, “you must, please, you must.”
    The Hainishman met his eyes; his gaze was reserved, kindly, and deep as a well. He said nothing.

FOUR
     
    It was unbelievable. They’d all gone insane. This damned alien world had sent them all right round the bend, into byebye dreamland, along with the creechies. He still wouldn’t believe what he’d seen at that ‘conference’ and the briefing after it, if he saw it all over again on film. A Starfleet ship’s commander bootlicking two humanoids. Engineers and techs cooing and ooing over a fancy radio presented to them by a Hairy Cetian with a lot of sneering and boasting, as if ICD’s hadn’t been predicted by Terran science years ago! The humanoids had stolen theidea, implemented it, and called it an ‘ansible’ so nobody would realize it was just an ICD. But the worst part of it had been the conference, with that psycho Lyubov raving and crying, and Colonel Dongh letting him do it, letting him insult Davidson and HQ staff and the whole Colony; and all the time the two aliens sitting and grinning, the little gray ape and the big white fairy, sneering at humans.
    It had been pretty bad. It hadn’t got any better since the
Shackleton
left. He didn’t mind being sent down to New Java Camp under Major Muhamed. The Colonel had to discipline him; old Ding Dong might actually be very happy about that fire-raid he’d pulled in reprisal on Smith Island, but the raid had been a breach of discipline and he had to reprimand Davidson. All right, rules of the game. But what wasn’t in the rules was this stuff coming over that overgrown TV set they called the ansible—their new little tin god at HQ.
    Orders from the Bureau of Colonial Administration in Karachi:
Restrict Terran-Athshean contact to occasions arranged by Athsheans
. In other words you couldn’t go into a creechie warren and round up a work-force any more.
Employment of volunteer labor is not advised; employment of forced labor is forbidden
. More of same. How the hell were they supposed to get the work done? Did Earth want this wood or didn’t it? They were still sending therobot cargo ships to New Tahiti, weren’t they, four a year, each carrying about 30 million new-dollars worth of prime lumber back to Mother Earth. Sure the Development people wanted those millions. They were businessmen. These messages weren’t coming from them, any fool could see that.
    The colonial status of World 41
—why didn’t they call it New Tahiti any more?—is
under consideration. Until decision is reached colonists should observe extreme caution in all dealings with native inhabitants. . . . The use of weapons of any kind except small side-arms carried in self-defense is absolutely forbidden
—just as on Earth, except that there a man couldn’t even carry side-arms any more. But what the hell was the use coming twenty-seven lightyears to a frontier world and then get told no guns, no firejelly, no bugbombs, no, no, just sit like nice little boys and let the creechies come spit in your faces and sing songs at you and then stick a knife in your guts and burn down your camp, but don’t you hurt the cute little green fellers, no sir!
    A policy of avoidance is strongly advised; a policy of aggression or retaliation is strictly