Were the Marines weak?
Perhaps.
Whitebeard alone had forced the Marines to go all out. He had even destroyed the Grand Fortress that had stood at Marine Headquarters for centuries, and Akainu had nearly died on the battlefield. Seen that way, perhaps the Marines really were weak.
But was that the truth?
A closer look at the contradiction revealed the answer: the Marines weren't too weak. Whitebeard was too strong!
If the Marines had faced any of the other three Yonko in the Paramount War instead of Whitebeard, the outcome might have looked very different. Their opponent had been the World's Strongest, while Aokiji and Kizaru had spent much of the battle holding back, and Garp and Sengoku had barely fought. That was why people had come to believe the Marines were useless.
The four Yonko hadn't given themselves that title. It reflected how countless people viewed the four unstoppable powers of the New World. Yet even among them, Whitebeard had remained the strongest—and he was an old man in declining health who needed IV drips and a respirator just to keep himself going!
If Whitebeard hadn't been that strong, would Charlotte Linlin have let him stand as her equal in the New World, blocking her path to becoming the next One Piece? Of the current Yonko, she might have been the only one who still held that dream in its purest form!
Yet she hadn't dared Motion!
No matter how badly she craved sweets or how much she coveted Fish-Man Island, she could only seize it after Whitebeard died. If she had moved against him, Totto Land would have ceased to exist! She wouldn't even have been able to take revenge!
That was Whitebeard!
The World's Strongest!
Not even the other Yonko could measure up to Whitebeard! Oda had