I guess an argument that could be made on Fremen being able to solo multiple planets is how with Herbert's eugenics fascination, the Fremen by all accounts were the apex of humanity from years of harsh Darwinian experiences. They survived planetwide pograms and genocides on several planets for settling down on a rather unforgiving place.
Ok but how does that have anything to do with space battles? Fremen have no advantage in space warfare, no spaceship manufacturing capabilities, no ability to create nuclear weapons at scale and generally should have lost immediately to a gigantic imperial navy when they abandoned their home base and spread themselves thin in a logistics nightmare across the galaxy
Which is, again, where the rest of the books start to lose me. I started to realize all of the first book took place planetside because Herbert is incapable of writing Sci-Fi or taking all of his universe seriously. He just handwaves over things that should be major parts of the plot.
What space battles? What logistics nightmares? Paul usurps the imperial throne from Shaddam IV. The empire, its holdings, the monopolistic agreement with the spacing guild as well as control over significant CHOAM shares are all his by the end of Dune as universal monarch.
If the Palestinians took Biden hostage and then proclaimed themselves leaders of America, do you think that would do anything when they decide to all get into captured helicopters and fly to America to kill everyone in the USA? That's the level of absurdity he expects me to believe.
If the Palestinians had the sole global supply of gasoline or whatever and were able to blackmail everyone else on earth into accepting their legitimacy or else they will crash the global economy and cause billions of deaths, yes.
That's aside from the fact that Paul is operating within the imperial structure. Shaddam IV abdicates, and Paul is instated on the throne. This is done by the rules of their feudal structure.
This is all explained textually by the spice monopoly / Spacing Guild / feudal empire relationship.
The Fremen monopoly of spice gives them and Paul considerable economic and diplomatic power, however what doesn't follow is that it allows his troops to go unopposed across the galaxy killing billions of people. Again, I could believe that Palestine gets recognized as a state and considerable economic power if it seized the sole gas fields on Earth - what doesn't follow is them just going to other countries, even ones like the US and Russia and China, and killing their entire populations and nobody else doing anything about it despite the Fremen being outnumbered like 1000:1
The only people going anywhere across the galaxy are the ones that are being carried on Spacing Guild ships, who follow the spice. Any information is carried on guild ships. Any goods are transported on Guild ships. As far as these feudal holdings are concerned, they are waiting for the next Guild ship to arrive with goods, messages, dignitaries, etc.
The Jihad is the Muad'dib Jihad. One of the major themes of the story is that the Atreides have sullied and stolen the noble struggle of the Fremen, which (textually, tragically) will leave the Fremen as nothing more than a cultural affect, an interesting museum piece where they recreate the Fremen culture behind a pane of glass with plastic crysknives. Stilgar is supposed to personify the way Paul has turned a noble and resilient people into sycophants caught up in the religious ecstasy of his cult. I would say one of the most collar-tugging part of the narrative is the only reason the Fremen follow Paul in the first place is because of a (again textual) millenia-spanning Jewish conspiracy.
The Fremen perpetrated the Jihad, with Paul (the evil Soviet Harkonnen) almost powerless to stop it, leaving him as just a figurehead. It’s like how European colonizers feared the colonized would lash out and unleash a reign of terror where they kill every white woman and child.
The stand-ins for global capitalism support his ascension. He also gains monopoly control on the resource required for their entire economic and political structure to sustain itself.
Paul had the spacing guild by the equivalent of the balls. They're an unaligned ancap bunch of spiced out weirdos, and though I'm sure they have a good surplus of the stuff on hand, he does control the planet that makes it and aside from their own use of it, it's the most valuable commodity in the galaxy, so it's pretty realistic Paul would have pretty sturdy control over who could move where in space and when
I guess an argument that could be made on Fremen being able to solo multiple planets is how with Herbert's eugenics fascination, the Fremen by all accounts were the apex of humanity from years of harsh Darwinian experiences. They survived planetwide pograms and genocides on several planets for settling down on a rather unforgiving place.
Ok but how does that have anything to do with space battles? Fremen have no advantage in space warfare, no spaceship manufacturing capabilities, no ability to create nuclear weapons at scale and generally should have lost immediately to a gigantic imperial navy when they abandoned their home base and spread themselves thin in a logistics nightmare across the galaxy
As far as I recall, this is all handled by Frank Herbert never explaining literally anything at all about their space battles
Which is, again, where the rest of the books start to lose me. I started to realize all of the first book took place planetside because Herbert is incapable of writing Sci-Fi or taking all of his universe seriously. He just handwaves over things that should be major parts of the plot.
They have a monopoly on spice, nobody but Paul's forces can travel through space en-masse.
The other great houses have large spice reserves, enough to fight a war of survival in the short-term
What space battles? What logistics nightmares? Paul usurps the imperial throne from Shaddam IV. The empire, its holdings, the monopolistic agreement with the spacing guild as well as control over significant CHOAM shares are all his by the end of Dune as universal monarch.
If the Palestinians took Biden hostage and then proclaimed themselves leaders of America, do you think that would do anything when they decide to all get into captured helicopters and fly to America to kill everyone in the USA? That's the level of absurdity he expects me to believe.
If the Palestinians had the sole global supply of gasoline or whatever and were able to blackmail everyone else on earth into accepting their legitimacy or else they will crash the global economy and cause billions of deaths, yes.
That's aside from the fact that Paul is operating within the imperial structure. Shaddam IV abdicates, and Paul is instated on the throne. This is done by the rules of their feudal structure.
This is all explained textually by the spice monopoly / Spacing Guild / feudal empire relationship.
The Fremen monopoly of spice gives them and Paul considerable economic and diplomatic power, however what doesn't follow is that it allows his troops to go unopposed across the galaxy killing billions of people. Again, I could believe that Palestine gets recognized as a state and considerable economic power if it seized the sole gas fields on Earth - what doesn't follow is them just going to other countries, even ones like the US and Russia and China, and killing their entire populations and nobody else doing anything about it despite the Fremen being outnumbered like 1000:1
The only people going anywhere across the galaxy are the ones that are being carried on Spacing Guild ships, who follow the spice. Any information is carried on guild ships. Any goods are transported on Guild ships. As far as these feudal holdings are concerned, they are waiting for the next Guild ship to arrive with goods, messages, dignitaries, etc.
The Jihad is the Muad'dib Jihad. One of the major themes of the story is that the Atreides have sullied and stolen the noble struggle of the Fremen, which (textually, tragically) will leave the Fremen as nothing more than a cultural affect, an interesting museum piece where they recreate the Fremen culture behind a pane of glass with plastic crysknives. Stilgar is supposed to personify the way Paul has turned a noble and resilient people into sycophants caught up in the religious ecstasy of his cult. I would say one of the most collar-tugging part of the narrative is the only reason the Fremen follow Paul in the first place is because of a (again textual) millenia-spanning Jewish conspiracy.
The Fremen perpetrated the Jihad, with Paul (the evil Soviet Harkonnen) almost powerless to stop it, leaving him as just a figurehead. It’s like how European colonizers feared the colonized would lash out and unleash a reign of terror where they kill every white woman and child.
It's the Holy Roman Empire in space. Not modern day geopolitics in space.
The stand-ins for global capitalism support his ascension. He also gains monopoly control on the resource required for their entire economic and political structure to sustain itself.
If eugenicists were smart they wouldn't be eugenicists
And hence how in multiple books some rando would show up and have some near-magic wild-talent. Some grand breeding program, eh?
Paul had the spacing guild by the equivalent of the balls. They're an unaligned ancap bunch of spiced out weirdos, and though I'm sure they have a good surplus of the stuff on hand, he does control the planet that makes it and aside from their own use of it, it's the most valuable commodity in the galaxy, so it's pretty realistic Paul would have pretty sturdy control over who could move where in space and when
Space Battles? Nah, I just assumed they were drop-shipped in and started hacking populations apart with knives.
Seems pretty inefficient when there exists nukes and slow-bombs that can wipe out entire regions from space without having to land a single troop
Do you see why it starts to get really silly to believe that guys with knives killed 100 billion people in an advanced space empire?
Don't nukes have no effect on shields?
I have to imagine shields do not stop nukes. The entire social order is built upon the Great Convention, the galaxy-wide No First Use policy.