- "O Seas of Caladan, O people of Duke Leto - Citadel of Leto fallen, Fallen forever..."
- ―from "Songs of Muad'Dib" by the Princess Irulan[src]
The Siege of Arrakeen, also known as the Battle of Arrakeen (the latter also referring to the battle of two years later), was an event which took place in Arrakeen on the planet Arrakis in March 10191 AG.
In Other Media[]
Though the book states that the Sardaukar were disguised as Harkonnen troops, this detail is omitted from the 1984 and 2021 films, and they instead appear openly.
Dune (2021)[]
The stage was set for battle after Dr Wellington Yueh, the physician for House Atreides, betrayed his overlords and sabotaged the Atreides defences, including jamming their comms and lowering the protective shield wall barrier. Yueh's sabotage was discovered and Gurney Halleck, the Atreides Warmaster, was informed in the barracks, who quickly set to awakening and rallying the sleeping Atreides soldiers. Gathering at the spaceport, Gurney and his men looked up in horror as a Heighliner sat in orbit disgorging hundreds of Harkonnen spacecraft. Gurney ordered all aircraft off the ground and led the troops across the spaceport's flat plains to defend Arrakeen.
Massive Harkonnen gunships began bombarding Arrakeen, destroying many structures with overwhelming missile strikes. The Harkonnens also deployed remote bombs that penetrated the shields of the Atreides spacecraft and then detonated, causing massive destruction in the already chaotic spaceport. Some Atreides soldiers manned anti-air guns and began to fire at the bombs and approaching Harkonnen ships. Running through the wreckage and burning ships, Gurney's troops were blocked by a crashing transport that killed a number of men, but then saw in the sky hundreds of Harkonnen troop carriers rapidly descending to the surface. Realising their trapped state and the advantage of attacking the enemy mid-deployment, Gurney marched forward with the Atreides army, confronting and killing two Harkonnen troopers and then ordering his men into a furious charge against the landing Harkonnen hordes.
Elsewhere in the city, more Harkonnen troops continued to pour in. On one set of stairs, a small group of about thirty Atreides soldiers formed a phalanx of pikes and swords, and held off a massive enemy force attempting to break through. The Harkonnens, suffering awful losses, suddenly backed away, but the Atreides were too late to realise that a squad of lethal Sardaukar warriors had landed behind them, and were all quickly killed.
Meanwhile, Yueh, who had paralysed Duke Leto with a needle gun, explained his actions. He revealed the Harkonnens had his wife Wanna captive and were endlessly torturing her, pushing him to betray the Atreides and offer the Duke in exchange for his wife's freedom. He then told Leto that he would kill a man for him, replacing one of his teeth with a fake one loaded with poison. If Leto chose his moment right, he could kill the Baron, but would also breathe his last breath. During this, Paul Atreides and Lady Jessica were captured by Harkonnen soldiers and imprisoned aboard an ornithopter. Atreides Swordmaster Duncan Idaho attempted to find the Duke's heir in the palace, impressively killing four Sardaukar in the process, but quickly discovered that Paul had been taken. By this point in the battle, the Atreides forces had mostly been wiped out, with Glossu Rabban Harkonnen personally beheading captured Atreides officers near the burning palm trees. However, Gurney fared better in the fighting, managing to break through the Harkonnen lines with several troops and ultimately escape Arrakeen.
Duncan made his way towards a Harkonnen landing site, swiftly killing a few enemies and intimidating the remaning ones to back off. He took the controls of a nearby ornithopter and bombed at least half a dozen troop carriers before being struck by a missle, crippling the 'thopter's shields. A Harkonnen gunship floating over the city spotted Duncan and began chasing him with a massive laser beam, slicing through the city structures until he ultimately managed to evade it and escape.
Paul and Jessica, still aboard the ornithopter, were kept prisoner by three Harkonnen troopers. Jessica, being a skilled user of the Voice, was gagged, forcing the inexperienced Paul to attempt to use the ability. After one failure, Paul succeeded and forced a Harkonnen to remove his mother's gag, with Jessica quickly ordering him to kill a deaf trooper. Jessica then freed herself and killed the other two Harkonnens, taking a moment to lecture Paul about his use of the Voice. The two were unable to use the ornithopter however, as the Harkonnen control station crippled the ship after receiving no friendly response over radio. Thanks to Yueh's providing of a fremkit, the two were able to survive the harsh desert conditions of Arrakis.
Back in Arrakeen, Duke Leto had been brought to a dining room for an audience with Baron Vladimir Harkonnen himself. Still paralysed, the Duke was stripped naked and placed at the other end of a long table, while the Baron engorged himself on food. Piter De Vries then arrived with Dr Yueh, who requested the Baron honour their agreement and free his wife. The Baron activated his spinal gravity implant and floated towards the doctor, assuring him he would set Wanna free and he could join her, but only in death. He hoisted Yueh up and swiftly sliced his head off with a carving knife. Approaching Leto, the Baron relished the end of their centuries-long fued, telling the Duke about the deaths of his son, his concubine, and the permanent end of his bloodline. Leto whispered something under his breath, causing the ever-cautious Baron to activate his personalised shield. Leaning closer, Duke Leto defiantly utterd his last words: "Here I am, here I remain". He crunched down on the fake tooth and exhaled, releasing a cloud of poison into the Baron's face and filling the room, claiming the lives of Piter and several other Harkonnens. Tragically, Leto's sacrifice was ultimately worthless, as the Baron managed to survive the poison, albeit requiring intense life support systems to stay alive.
By the battle's end, House Atreides had been utterly destroyed, with the only known survivors being Paul and Jessica, Duncan, Gurney and his troops, Lieutenant Lanville and an unknown number of soldiers taken prisoner on Giedi Prime.
See also[]
- Battle of Arrakeen (10193 AG)