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The Seanchan are not a military culture. That's why they are so good at it. Cannoli Send a noteboard - 19/10/2016 12:21:36 AM


The Seanchan come to mind.
The only Seanchan we really see are directly involved in the conquest or part of the national security apparatus. The advanced degree of organization actually suggests they are a largely non-military society, in which the military is merely a technical specialty, not a major fact of life, around which everything else revolves, such as in a feudal society (like Westeros in aSoI&F), or a archetypal barbarian culture, or pastoral nomads or peoples like the Aiel & Borderlanders. For those people, warfare and military threats are a way of life, and even if the majority of people don't directly fight, the focus of their society revolves around fighting. No matter how big the project of the Consolidation or the planning for the Return, the way the Seanchan do it, and the bureaucracy involved, suggests this is not a society that thinks with its weapons. Rather it takes a civilian approach to warfare, treating it like a business or a job. Warrior cultures have warriors who happen to be good at logistics or developing weapons or whatnot. The Seanchan go the other way. We have no idea how they treat civilian woman, because we have never seen a single one, only soldiers, nobles and slaves. Which are pretty much the only types of men we see either, which in turn is probably responsible for so many fans focusing only on those aspects of their society and writing it off.
Cannoli
"Sometimes unhinged, sometimes unfair, always entertaining"
- The Crownless

“Tolerance is the virtue of the man without convictions.” GK Chesteron
Deus Vult!
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The Seanchan are not a military culture. That's why they are so good at it. - 19/10/2016 12:21:36 AM 842 Views
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Re: Noticed something odd - 11/11/2016 12:54:24 AM 981 Views
Possibly, - 11/11/2016 08:45:15 PM 1112 Views

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