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The Sauron Strategies: One War to Win Them All, Except... - Page 3

© Michael Martinez

Becoming the Necromancer of Dol Guldur (the new name the Elves gave to Amon Lanc), Sauron built up a cadre of evil servants who spread through the forest. Greenwood the Great became so terrifying that Men renamed it Mirkwood. And as Orcs, Trolls, Wargs, Spiders, and other creatures gathered around Dol Guldur, Sauron renewed contact with some of the eastern peoples who had once served him. Inducing some of the Easterlings to migrate to southern Mirkwood, Sauron set into motion a wave of mirgations which rolled into Eriador. The Hobbits, having dwelt in the Vales of Anduin for many centuries, grew fearful as the influx of Easterlings threatened their neighbors, and began departing for safer lands in the west. Around the year 1300, Sauron sent the Lord of the Nazgul north to establish the realm of Angmar. Angmar served two purposes. First, it was a remote base of operations which worked against Arnor's people in close proximity. Sauron did not have to worry about establishing and protecting long supply lines. Secondly, Angmar would seem like just another enemy land to Elves and Dunedain. An implacable single enemy state would draw too much attention. But if hostile realms rose up in several places, no one could be sure of exactly what was happening. Had Sauron returned, or were some of his former servants simply becoming more ambitious and powerful? Inspiring doubt and delay in his enemies purchased time for Sauron to grow stronger. But though Angmar could take advantage of the divisions which had arisen in Arnor (which the Dunedain had divided into three smaller realms in 863), Dol Guldur itself became isolated from the east. About the time Sauron must have been contemplating what he could do to the northern kingdoms, Minalcar settled Gondor's differences with the Northmen and Easterlings by attacking the lands near southern Mirkwood, lands to which Gondor had long laid claim, but which had become home to many Easterlings and some treacherous Northmen. Minalcar destroyed or drove the Easterlings well beyond the Sea of Rhun, and he allied himself with the kingdom of Rhovanion, east of Mirkwood, then ruled by Vidugavia. Minalcar's failure to attack Dol Guldur is curious. Quite possibly, Sauron was using the Easterlings as a screen, and the Necromancer of Dol Guldur may have struck Minalcar as being little or no threat to Gondor. Still, Sauron had to wait for the Easterlings to recover their numbers. But it may also be that he felt a new kind of Easterling culture needed to be developed. In later centuries, Tolkien tells us, there would be wars among the Easterlings. Sauron's control over the eastern peoples may not have been complete, or else he felt that the best warriors would be those who survived dreadful feuds and wars.

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