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The original was posted on /r/40klore by /u/DirtLarry on 2023-10-06 18:11:39.

One of my best friends is a professor of history, with an emphasis on Latin America, including the Spanish conquistadors, and I recently got him to start reading the Horus Heresy.

He enjoyed Horus Rising, and he told me he doesn’t really care about space marines, primarchs or Warp/Chaos mumbo jumbo but he loved the sci-fi setting and the drama of the Great Crusade in particular.

According to him Abnett wrote intelligently and realistically about the strategies and inherent problems in a technologically superior empire subduing and conquering an entire people. My friend said he would love to read more about the Great Crusade.

Are there any other books that talk about the nitty gritty work of bringing a people to compliance? It seems that most of the stories I’ve come across are just straightforward accounts of planets being massacred due to tragic misunderstandings or the insanity/zeal/whims of certain primarchs. Are there any exceptions to this general trend? Not looking for happy endings - quite the opposite, in fact (that’s why I like grimdark in the first place!)- but nuance would be appreciated.

And I guess my question isn’t limited only to the Great Crusade and pre-Heresy times. Are there good books about any similar compliance campaigns that take place after the Heresy?