Because the people accept Nephi as a prophet, the Gadiantons must discredit that claim, particularly given the crowd’s degree of sympathy for him. The easiest way to do that is to discount Nephi’s prophecy against the Nephite nation.
The Gadiantons’ claim that they were “powerful” and their cities “great” seems thin in light of the fact that the Nephites had been driven out of Zarahemla to their northernmost land, Bountiful, only eleven years earlier. They conveniently ignore this shaky military past to concentrate on the prosperous present. They had risen to power on an economic boom, and optimism is much more common than pessimism (or even realism) during such times. They are probably assuming that political and military power had increased commensurate with their wealth.
Gadiantons do not realize that the same forces that were making them wealthier would lead to their downfall. The desire for wealth was pushing the Nephites into wars for tribute—the Gadianton “stealings and plunderings.” This intercity warfare and domination would result in shifting alliances throughout the region. Dominated cities would realign themselves with more powerful city-states to remove the burden of tribute—or better yet, reverse the direction. The historical spiral of intensifying warfare in Mesoamerica is beginning in earnest and will turn against these prosperous Gadiantons. In terms of Mesoamerican evidence during this time period, there appears to be an increase in warfare that leads to a mini-collapse and depopulation between A.D. 150 and 250. Archaeologist Lynne V. Foster notes: “War between Maya cities competing to control resources may have caused the hiatus, and there is some evidence for this hypothesis. Stelae depict trophy heads, signs of warfare, and at the close of the Preclassic Period, sites such as Cuello depict rulers in war regalia. The archaeological records suggest warfare as well: The palace at Chiapa de Corzo was deliberately destroyed, and when the site revived, it was occupied by people using different ceramics.” Chiapa de Corzo is a site on the Grijalva River, firmly in what this text accepts as Nephite territory. It is not implausible that the Nephite period of peace that is recorded following the Messiah’s visit was aided by this general hiatus that reduced the population and therefore reduced the outside pressures of militarism for a time.