Operation Haystack is a short science fiction space opera first published in 1959, a few years before Dune. The story is classic Frank Herbert and exhibit many of the themes from Dune; matriarchal societies, clandestine overthrow plots, distaste for politics, human colonies expanding through the vastness of space, and genetic manipulation through breeding in humans. In the fictional setting, a galactic feminist conspiracy, weaved by a network of alpha women, threatens to take over the galactic government with the ultimate aim of establishing a cosmic matriarchy where females hold primary power, predominate in roles of political leadership, moral authority, social privilege and control of property.