The soldier-fanatics from Salusa Secundus who catapulted to power over the Landsraad in the Battle of Corrin (88 B.G). The commander of the Sardaukar and his family became the Imperial House Corrino, named after the planet Corrin, near which the decisive battle took place. The grim ecological and social conditions of Salusa Secundus forged the military prowess of the Sardaukar, who were master swordsmen and deadly unarmed combatants, comparable respectively to Ginaz tenth-level fencers and Bene Gesserit adepts. The ruthless natural selection of Salusa Secundus bred the Sardaukar who came to dominate first their planet and later the inhabited worlds of the Imperium.
Salusa Secundus suffers from both a rigorous climate and marginal natural resources. The temperature range– between -45C and 60C–and the infertility of the soil favor a jungle ecology, whose gigantic plant growth make efficient use of what nutrients are available, returning little to the soil as waste. Hence, after the immense difficulty of clearing the ground, the soil was poor and soon depleted. Only the hardiest crops survived the scorching summers. The ganja, a partially domesticated form of buffalo, supplied meat and skins. The chief ore was iron, in limited quantities. At the time of the Battle of Corrin, the population of the planet probably did not exceed five million.
Despite the small population, the tribes of Salusa Secundus waged perpetual war over iron lodes and the scanty pasture land. Smelters and foundries were special prizes because they provided the weapons needed for war. A tribe that controlled enough pasture for its herds and a reliable source of iron was self sufficient.
Such a tribe was the Sardau, who by ruthless martial ability had carved out a large domain. The Sardau provde a paradigm by which the later success of the Sardaukar can be understood and appreciated. The rituals of the Sardau–trial by combat, endurance tests, and raids on neighboring tribes–mirrored the eternal war of the larger planetary society, constantly favoring the strong.
Trial by combat began at six, when children were given a knife and daily instruction in its use. Sparring matches, in which the drawing of blood was encouraged, developed reflexes, technique, and timing, and also eliminated those susceptible to infection. Those who by accident or precocious ferocity killed an opponent received special attention, but in general, killing was not condoned: late developers were allowed time to reach their full potential. The Sardau believed that after puberty inherent ability would show itself, and then formal death combat was required in a match between single opponents of fairly equal skill. Those who killed their opponents in the ring passed the first major step of initiation.
The production of warriors was always the final aim: although fights to the death were permitted among adolescents, they were usually forbidden among adults. Clearly, tribal rather than personal priorities produced this taboo: the tribe benefitted if the unfit were murdered at an early age, but the tribe suffered if the best soldier killed the second-best soldier.
These pitiless tests never pitted boys against girls: conflicts between the sexes were forbidden at any age. Girls who survived past puberty faced no more initiation trials. Thereafter, the strongest and most intelligent became wives, the less capable became concubines.
Many Sardau children did not live to age twelve because of the hardships of Salusa Secundus, murderous raids by neighboring tribes or the endurance tests the Sardau alone seem to have practiced. Twice a year between eight and twelve, each child faced survival tests. In mid-summer and mid-winter, the child was taken empty-handed into the wastes and left. No time limit was set, no rescue party sent out; the child either returned or died. In the first year after puberty, males were sent on the most difficult survival test–to Skull Reach, the region of Salusa Secundus with the greatest extremes of temperature. But well over ninety percent of those sent to Skull reach returned, reflecting the hardiness of the young Sardau.
The survivors became full warriors, who could join raids for plunder. By then they had learned swordsmanship, ganja-riding, unarmed combat, and rudimentary tactics. Their skills were honed during adolescence against other tribes, but since those tribes raised their young almost as rigorously as the Sardau, the mortality rate among the youths was not inconsiderable.
That Sardau children reached adulthood in appreciable numbers was due to the astonishing fecundity not only of the Sardau but most of the tribes on Salusa Secundus. Females who had reached puberty faced their own test: successive pregnancies. The Sardau birth rate was such that infants and children outnumbered adults almost five to one. The initiation rituals weeded out the weak, leaving the strong to maintain a stable tribal population.
Females bred as soon as they were physically capable, but sex for males was a reward for performance in battle. Those who excelled in leadership and prowess were given second-rate women as concubines, but a young man could afford a wife from among the best women only if he could pay an enormous bride-price from his spoils of war. Thus, leadership of the Sardau fell to the most able commanders. As the Sardau grew in strength they increased in population, ultimately achieving a planetary empire.
The Sardau lost their tribal identity but became a nation as they absorbed conquered peoples. The conquered were fortunate to survive: the early custom required annihilation of the enemy–man, woman, and child–but in time the Sardau perceived a practical use for captives and gradually accepted them into their ranks. (Here was the seed of the later Imperial treatment of prisoners of war, who were sent to penal colonies on Salusa Secundus.) Thus both Sardau and non-Sardau could earn admission to the Sardaukar, which was created when one family gained ascendancy in the budding nation.
The name of the family is not known, but it was fruitful and its members were vigorous and capable. The head of the family held the title of Burseg, a term later incorporated into the House Corrino military lexicon. One of these Bursegs formed the Sardaukar, at least partly in response to the influx of strangers into the society. The absorption of non-Sardau with binding tests of their loyaly would avert the growth of an enemy faction. Sardaukar discipline was ferocious, allowing no questioning or doubting of higher officers on the battlefield. Non-Sardau were given plenty of opportunities to prove themselves, for example, by carrying out a suicidal attack without hesitation. Nevertheless, many tribes submitted to the Sardau: inclusion in the Sardaukar was the best guarantee of survival against them.
Although battlefield obedience was demanded, independence and initiative were preserved through a custom called The Circle. Following each action, the commanding officer faced a stringent critique from his fellow officers. Anyone–even the most junior–who could convince the circle of leaders that he could have won the objective faster, cheaper, or to better strategic advantage was chosen battle-leader for the next action. The Circle replaced the trial by combat with a trial by achievement, and was designed to vault the unpredictably-appearing military genius over senior, but less capable, commanders.
Sardaukar military superiority derived from natural savagery, intense training, a sense of themselves as the elect (promoted by their religion), and an ingrained, almost mystical esprit de corps. The Sardaukar was elite–quick witted,tough,ruthless, and fanatically devoted to their commanders. This was the force the unfortunate Magarians hired as mercenaries during the campaigns of expansion following the Butlerian Jihad. The fate of House Megara is well known.
After the conquest of Megara, the Sardaukar grasped the chance to leave Salusa Secundus with an energy equaled only by the most fanatical Butlerians. Using captured ships, the Sardaukar seized a wide sector in the vicinity of Megara. So slow was space travel after the Jihad, however, that the Sardaukar “meteor strike” gave the Landsraad time to prepare somewhat for the threat rolling toward them. The Battle of Corrin then was a tactical victory but a strategic stalemate for the Sardaukar. It cowed the Great Houses and thereby prevented other immediate confrontation. But the Landsraad's message was clear: negotiate or fight. The Sardaukar might win an extended war but their empire would be a graveyard.
The Burseg saw the wisdom of compromise, and with the Treaty of Corrin became the first Padishah emperor, Sheuset Costin I. During the first years of his reign, expansionist campaigns consolidated his power and channeled the battle lust of his soldiers. Some recalcitrant Landsraad Houses refused to sign the treaty; some independent planetary rulers denied they were bound by it. If either kind of holdout could not be persuaded to accept the new order, he invariably had to deal with the Sardaukar, the lion unleashed by the Emperor.
House Jansine refused to sign and prepared itself for siege. Jansine, a planet with thriving agriculture and light industry, was ready for a long defense. Expecting the meteor strike from the skies that had marked earlier Sardaukar campaigns, the people of Jansine suffered instead the “meteor shower,” the infiltration of small numbers of troops across the face of the planet. The new tactic won the Order of Victory for its inventor, Wel Forald, as his strategically placed guerilla teams paralyzed communications and transportation, stormed military barracks, assassinated or captured high military and political leaders, all within a few days. The final assault on a demoralized and isolated Jansine capital left no defenders alive.
The foolishness of waiting for the Sardaukar was not lost on those Houses who joined the Lishash Confederation in the rebellion of 385-388. Several centuries after the foundation of CHOAM, certain houses took exception both to Padishah supremacy and to a proposed division of shares increasing the emperor's votes on the CHOAM board from twenty percent to twenty-one percent. In this the Lishasha saw creeping monopoly, and defied it. Other houses sharing the view became allied.
The LC announced its formation with surpise attacks on Sardaukar forts and outposts within what was now claimed as Confederation territory. Preparations for the strike had been made long since, strategy rehearsed, infantry trained and coordinated, fleets of assault ships stealthily readied. The initial say Sozzals engages enemies! outcome was successful.
LC forces achieved most of their primary objectives, but with high losses: the besieged Sardaukar launched sorties to bleed and tie down the attackers. Nevertheless, LC forces somehow managed to take a handful of Sardaukar officers alive, a feat unheard of, and one that would not occur again until the Arrakian Revolution. When the LC staff offered their captives as hostages, the Regent Henli replied, “Let them drink blood.” This cryptic answer was taken two ways by the captive Sardaukar. A few tore out their throats with their fingernails, but most died attacking their captors bare-handed.
Henli gathered a great fleet of Landsraad armies spearheaded by Sardaukar shock troops. The Sardaukar were to recapture the forts and outposts, the Landsraad troops to invade the LC planets.
Henli made a bloody example of those planets. He adopted a policy of ruthless assaults followed by the razing of the captured territory. The Sardaukar retook their own bastions without encumbering themselves with prisoners. They then attacked the planets of Lishash and its allies from widely separated directions. The speed and ferocity of these combined thrusts routed the LC armies. Lishash was the first planet to fall. Its major cities were burned, its rulers publicly executed, its citizens indiscriminately put to the sword. The Lishash colonies suffered the same fate.
The LC allies sued for mercy, at first without success. One by one they were trampled. Then Landsraad General Tomigh, sickened by the carnage he witnessed as his units mopped up in the track of the Lion, objected to the Regent.
"I speak for the Joint Landsraad Command," Tomigh said. "Your point has been made. As for us, we are soldiers, not executioners." "This sounds like a threat," Henli said. "Not even an implied one. Have you enforced Corrino authority, or have you not? If the rebellion is over, are you not violating the spirit, if not the letter of the Great Convention by maintaining the fighting?" "By God, Sir Tomigh," Henli shouted, "you'll either fight or hang!" "By God, Sir Regent, I'll neither fight nor hang!"
And with that the Tomigh returned to the Landsraad Council and disbanded the Landsraad forces. True to the quick-witted nature of the Sardaukar, Henli did not try to enforce his orders. Many observers believe he welcomed Tomigh's protest: caught between the Landsraad and the Lion, he had to satisfy both. Without the Landsraad units, he could end hostilities and blame the concession on the Landsraad. Tomigh was satisfied, the Sardaukar were satisified, and Corrino supremacy was upheld without more massacre. Thus Lishash was scoured, but many of its allies survived to see another year.
After the LC rebellion, armed revolt occured only among civilizations much farther from the Imperium's center, and was carried out mainly by those who never knew of the grand feudal order rather than by those who did not wish to partake of it. The Landsraad itself generally welcomed the Sardaukar because the Imperial troops allowed the Great Houses to expand without disturbance from their rivals. Warfare among Landsraad members was strictly regulated by the Convention, and the regulations were enforced by the Sardaukar. So they expanded, at the expense of peripheral planets that sometimes did not know of the Imperium until told of it by an invasion force from a Great House.
Similar expansion by the Corrinos became the relief-valve for the Sardaukar. It brought them economic benefits, kept the Sardaukar combat-ready, and sated the military desire for action on conquest instead of intrique. Now that the Imperium was stable, the Lion needed to be given a leash beyond it.
The campaigns of expansion tested the soldier-fanatics against a variety of adversaries, terrains, weapons, and tactics. As Sardaukar conquests added victory after victory to the list, the myth of invincibility was created. Concurrently, the duration and scope of Padishah predominance caused the Imperium to be widely perceived as the natural order. Pharaonic rulers would naturally be supported by military supermen. As a result, the indominability of Sardaukar arms impressed itself on the Imperium until even dissidents shared and sustained the Sardaukar's belief in themselves. Fact reinforced myth, and vice versa.
As the centuries passed, the lowly origin of the Sardaukar as a cattle-herding tribe on an infertile gungle planet was forgotten. Salusa Secundus became notorious as the prison planet of the emperors, not as the world from which they had escaped at the first opportunity.