posted 08-16-2002 03:52 PM               

Second, I have dredged up one more oblique, inconclusive but nonetheless intriguing statement about the Mongols in Austria: that in December of 1241, they crossed into Austria and sacked Gran, before turning around. This is from Hugh Kennedy's Mongols, Huns, and Vikings from the history of war series edited by Keegan.

posted 08-17-2002 04:28 AM               

"Third, I have stumbled across an explanation of what the Mongols were doing throughout the summer of 1241. The answer goes back to something we have all talked about: their horses. The campaign that swept across Poland and into Hungary was a spring campaign, which is the time of year when grass is growing and horses that have had a lean winter can recover."

This is a pertinent argument which I have considered before. The Mongol army must have needed a rest after their campaign, but did that rest have to be 8 months long? Given the Hungarian resistance it wasn't much of a rest anyway because the Mongols were busy "pacifying" the land. Moreover, if the amount of available grazing was so inadequate, why didn't the Mongols retreat straight back to the steppe instead of wasting time and ruining their horses in the decidedly horse-unfriendly Balkans?

Another point - while the Mongols were traditionally in favor of winter campaigning, they did not stick to it exclusively. The attack on Eastern Europe only began in late winter, but the real fighting took place in spring (April in particular).

I'm not familiar with Hugh Kennedy's work, but if your citation is correct, Mr. Kennedy confuses some very basic geography. Gran (Hungarian Esztergom) lies on the Danube in northern Hungary, not far from Budapest. It also catches my suspicion that three so radically different peoples are discussed in the same book.

posted 08-17-2002 08:15 AM               

quote:

---

There seem to have been some skirmishing, but the Mongols abandoned the idea of pushing into Austria after a few minor probing attacks.

---

posted 08-17-2002 03:04 PM               

I agree Prof. Kennedy's title is odd, but what he is doing is analyzing the dynamics of nomadic warfare vs. settled peoples. The Vikings, of course, were not nomads as such, but from the point of view of their victims, the problem was basically the same - raiders (or invaders, if the numbers are too large) appear over the horizon without warning, strike, and move on faster than local defenses can cope with. The book's approach is situational rather than geographical or chronological, but not necessarily invalid because of it.

posted 08-18-2002 03:12 AM               

From what he told me, there was essentially a stalemate after the Mongol victory at Mohi. Emperor Frederick II was aware of the threat and did his best to gather troops. All feuds were stopped and a reconciliaction with the pope followed. Duke of Austria amassed a substantial army with more reinforcements being on the way. At that time, the Mongols seem to have contemplated an invasion of Austria and mounted a few small probing raids, but none of these was particularly successful. Mind you - this is strictly off the record for I haven't seen those documents myself, but I entirely trust my colleague's expertise. Anyway, I'll make sure to keep you updated.

Felix - It was not my intention to discredit Mr. Kennedy nor to dismiss his approach, but such appaling knowledge of geography is bound to awake the cynic in me...

"In consideration of the two questions you pose in your 2nd paragraph, I would suggest that the local resistance in Hungary would indeed serve to prolong the period which the Mongols would need to recuperate - hence delay their next move. That would also fit into the time-table for a winter campaign."

Curiously, the entire 1241 blitz did not fit the classic Mongol timetable. Even though the operation was extremely well planned, it began surprisingly late - in February rather than December.

However, the grand issue is, the Mongols could have ignored the local resistance if they wanted to. The remaining strongholds were too tough a nut to crack for them, but they only controlled a small part of Hungary and could not prevent their passage to Austria or Italy.

If Batu hadn't lost so many men and if the Holy Roman Empire was such a weak entity defended by militarily inferior forces as some would have us believe the Mongols could have spent a few months in Hungary, waiting for the horses to recover (before depleting the locally available grazing, that is) and then launch one more offensive to the west. Their horses clearly still had some strength left by the winter of 1241 when they traversed the Balkans.

Of course, this is a rather moot point altogether because Batu's aim was apparently the conquest of Hungary, with perhaps further expansion in mind, using the Hungarian plain as a staging area. However, the Mongols failed in their immediate goals and were even less capable of any further push.

"Of course, once their horses were recovered, they didn't hesitate to move into the horse-unfriendly Balkans on their way back to the steppe."

posted 08-18-2002 04:08 PM               

The calculations that have been propounded here by myself, BrockH, and Tomaz (and Sinor in his article) suggest that the Mongols would have had great difficulties in operating in Europe.

What puzzles me is how the Mongols operated in China. The only steppe country in China is north of the Yellow River (Blunden and Elvin Cultural Atlas of China. Some of the North China Plain is flat and has been cultivated for a long time, so horsemen should have had no great trouble there. The southern 2/3 of the country is mountains, forests (until cleared), rice paddies, swamps, etc. It is not "horse-friendly". China has considerably less arable land than the U.S., for example, although overall size is roughly comparable. The Chinese always had trouble fielding cavalry forces to match the steppe nomads, because they couldn't match the nomads horses for number or quality - i.e. China as a whole is not "horse-friendly" (even the emperor as absolute ruler couldn't get enough horses of adequate quality). There are frequent references to the need to purchase horses from whatever steppe tribes were friendly at the time.

So, how did the Mongols conquer China? We know it took large forces - China (even in its fragmented political state) is a large place, and had a huge population. This means there were large numbers of Mongol ponies.

posted 08-19-2002 08:20 AM               

1) Did the Mongols actually conquor all of China, i.e the un-horse-friendly bits or did the Chinese capitulate before the fighting got south? I have know idea so am just asking.

2) Monol logistics. I wonder if there were'nt two areas to consider - the raiding forces and the rear support area. How close were they really?? I have alway wondered how close the extra mounts, horsebreeding (?), armuor and weapon smithing, repair, etc. was. Perhaps if this existed as a rear echelon it was further to the east, maybe by the time the main force got into estern Hungary the support echelon was stuck to far to the East and there was not enough grazing land, etc. to bring it up. Thus even if the main element could potentialy go forward into Austria their line of support would be too long because the rear echelon couldn't move forward. Maybe there were other problems with the rear echelon that we are unaware of??

posted 08-19-2002 10:11 AM               

You've concentrated on China; I agree with most of your points, but would like to raise a few related issues. China was neither heavily militarized nor covered with a concentration of fortifications anywhere near comparable to medieval Europe. Still, its conquest was a feat which took decades and many campaigns on a huge scale. It was far from anything like a quick victory.

To dwell some more on Shawn's comment, I believe the key to the ultimate fall of China was its geographical position. China may not have been ideal for horses, but the relative proximity to the steppe made it possible for the Mongols to easily retire back to safety at the end of the campaign. Reinforcements could also arrive much faster. In any case, it was the eastern orientation which seems to have suited the Mongols best.

On the other hand, the distance between Mongolia and Western Europe is much longer. The real steppe ends on the Dnester in Western Ukraine. The Hungarian plain, without doubt the best springboard for an invasion of Europe for nomadic horsemen, is not a direct continuation of the steppe. It's separated from it by the Carpathian mountain chain.

Russia was newly conquered territory by 1241 it was far from safe. The already inadequate number of Mongol warriors was scattered over a wide area. Any full-scale invasion of Europe must have been risky business from Batu's perspective. Even once Hungary had fallen the situation did not improve in any way. The Mongols found themselves on the Hungarian plain, which in itself could almost certainly not provide sufficient grazing for an extended period. They had suffered heavy losses and were unable to subdue the remaining strongholds. In addition, the Germans began mustering troops in close proximity. To make things worse, there was no easy route to the safety of the steppe, either a tiresome climb over the heavily wooded Carpathian mountains or a long detour through the equally difficult, but at least weakly defended Balkans. What is the most logical decision? By all means a retreat. And this is precisely what Batu did.

"The problem makes my wonder if the logistical analysis is entirely sound. All the calculations I have seen are based on 19th/20th c. figures of horse consumption, etc. I wonder if those figures would be modified, (not for the size and breed of horse, which has been taken into consideration), but on the ruthlessness of the horsemen."

Absolutely spot on. It would be a grave error to assume that the requirements of a modern (or 19th c.) European soldier are representative for the entire Earth throughout the history of mankind.

For instance, a modern Western footsoldier is said to require roughly a 3.500 kcal daily diet to remain in fighting shape on a campaign. On the other hand, we know that an average Vietcong guerilla would continuously run on little more than a handful of rice every now and then and still be able to fight at the end of the day (not to mention pushing a bicycle with perhaps 100kg of war material). Many more examples from any earlier periods could be cited. People and even horses - especially the sturdy Mongolian ponies - can be pushed to unbelievable limits if necessary.

Statistics obviously cannot be trusted beyond a certain point. However, I still think the basic point stands - Hungary just couldn't compare to the vastness of the steppe in respect to grazing. Any grand invasion of Western Eruope would have demanded perhaps as much as several hundred thousand warriors and millions of horses. I greatly doubt a force of such proportions could operate from Hungary.

posted 08-19-2002 10:51 PM               

The Mongols had to conquer the whole of China. The campaigns south of the Yangtze river involved a huge riverine effort, as that river and its tributaries form a major defensive barrier unless the attacker has naval (river) superiority. As I recall, the Mongols actually launched one campaign into Burma, resulting in an elephant vs. Mongol confrontation (alas, I have no details about this). Burma, of course, is not ideal horse country.

To: Tomaz

posted 08-20-2002 09:57 PM               

How much is a horse worth?

From the point of view of a 19th c. quartermaster (like logistics officers of all times) the wastage of animals was not totally unavoidable, but was important to minimize. Of course, if one is working with a budget, and so much is alloted for horses, each mount lost by an unfeeling rider is a thorn in your side. Now, a nomad with a herd of horses to his name might(?) feel differently. Herds are regularly culled, and even a good horse is replaceable. I was led to think about this while reading a medieval mystery novel by Michael Jecks A Moorland Hanging in which one of the heroes befriends farmer's dog, to the astonishment of the owner. Dogs were working animals, and affection was not an issue with working animals.

posted 08-22-2002 10:22 AM               

What if the Mongol's 4th + horse were not with him in Hungary but were in Ukraine?? wish we knew more about the Mongol rear area/logisitics. Thanks for the note on the China invasion. Any good sources if I ever wish to read up more on this fascinating area??

Tomaz,

I finally read the article. Quite good in general. But, I am guessing that you disagree with one of his main points that the Mongols "retreat" was largely part of a long term plan. I must admit that I agree with you on this. One thing in his article that was hard to believe, maybe it just needs more work though, is this long term planning with strict schedule. He says it is the only way to control Mongol armies and then he says in other places that messengers were the way to control separated armies. So I guess we can put Mongol C3I on the list with Mongol logistics as things we need to know more about.

Shawn

posted 08-23-2002 04:39 AM               

Shawn - That's indeed one of the things that bothered me about the article in question. Most scholars simply assume that medieval Europe was inherently militarily inferior to just about any foreign adversaries, be it the Mongols, Saracens or Byzantines. Ergo, whatever the Mongols did is supposedly a sign of their superior skills or strategy. I find that bad scholarship and downright silly at times.

What really raised my eyebrow was Sinor's statement about the Mongol "evacuation of Hungary" which he calls "another example of splendid military planning". I cannot resist drawing parallels to Dunkirk and Saigon. Is there ever anything splendid about an evacuation (which is just another word for retreat anyway)? Not that it matters, for wars are not won by evacuations as Chruchill had put it well enough.

I think the Mongol logistics and planning do deserve a detailed study, but I'm most wary of claims of any truly extraordinary capabilities of the Mongol C3I. After all, they were at the same or slightly lower technological level than their greatest antagonists. At their height the Mongols had reasonably effective communications, but I'm not at all sure how efficiently their system of messengers ran in Eastern Europe prior to the 1241 invasion.

posted 08-25-2002 05:44 AM               

You forgot both Kutuzov's and Stalin's brilliant evacuation of Western Russia leading directly to their victories over Napoleon and Hitler

I agree that the idea of retreat as brilliant plan is as bad as the really tired idea you still hear of of death of the khan saving Europe. My money is on logistical limitations.

On C3I, etc. Well, in the lands they held their post system was admired by all observers from Rubruck (sic), Plano di Carpini and the Polos. How it worked towards the front between armies on the move is another question. It seems to have worked well since their co-ordination, like in the assault on Budapest in the article, was usually pretty impressive stuff. But, efficient communication between armies does not equal a grand strategic plan. Maybe the point is that it was not much better than in the West.

After all, while the Westerners get beat up for their crusades performance - for example the problems in communication between the two columns in Anatolia on the 1st Crusade, the fact is they too got amazing things done. After all, in that example the right hand column arrived in time to save the left and catch the Seljuks completely unawares.

Most of the Crusades, though ultimately failures showed incredible logistical planning. They hung on to isolated brigeheads for ages without getting starved out. In the 5th Crusade (Damietta) they held what was effectively a small bridgehead on another continent for around two years with the aveareg time per soldier or kight t under one year (thus over 200% turnaround of manpower) - they were never really caught without manpower or food - incredible really!

And that was an army made up of dozens of nations under chaotic leaerhip at best. No wonder the Mongols with strict lines of command did ok.

posted 08-25-2002 11:20 PM               

I agree the technological level of the Mongols and their enemies were about the same; but effective C3I depends on training and discipline and utilization of resources as much as technology. The Mongol postal system is not an example of superior technology (or even horses, necessarily), but of organization. The same is true of the Inca postal system of Peru, all done by runners. Supposedly, the Inca in Cuzco could express a wish for fresh seafish at dawn, and have the fish delivered from the coast by sundown. The Mongol battlefield system of visual signals surprised their foes, but also indicates a high level of organization, as compared to sending messengers. The willingness of subordinates to obey those commands is another sign of superior battlefield control, as opposed to arguments about who gets the right flank post, who attacks first, who has to sit in reserve.

posted 08-27-2002 03:47 AM               

To specify, what I mean is that the entire old arguement - i.e. the West was about to get its Euro-butt kicked and we would all be speaking Mongol now if only the Khan had not died, lucky us - appears very outdated and simplistic nowadays (like any monocasual argument) The major problems with logistics and fortified regions and even possibly technological differences (i.e. the possibility of encountering large numbers of crossbowmen) as discussed my many, especially Tomaz, show that this view was nonsense. (In my opinion at least.)

Not to say that internal Mongol politics didn't play some roll in their movements - it obviously did, in particular in begining campaigns.

posted 08-27-2002 08:52 AM               

quote:

---

To specify, what I mean is that the entire old arguement - i.e. the West was about to get its Euro-butt kicked and we would all be speaking Mongol now if only the Khan had not died, lucky us - appears very outdated and simplistic nowadays (like any monocasual argument) The major problems with logistics and fortified regions and even possibly technological differences (i.e. the possibility of encountering large numbers of crossbowmen) as discussed my many, especially Tomaz, show that this view was nonsense. (In my opinion at least.)

---

That the viewpoint is flawed or simplistic does not make it nonsense. But I see your point, and I agree with it: it seems certain that the Mongol force which invaded in 1240 couldn't have conquered Western Europe. But couldn't the Mongols, as an empire, have at the very least seriously f'ed up Europe had they been so inclined?

The 'Khan dying' theory isn't ultimately saying that the Mongols in Hungary could have wiped European civilization off the face of the planet, but that the entire Mongol empire, had they set their eyes on Europe as their next region of conquest, could have very possibly done what they did to China. The death of the Khan, however, put an end to Mongol expansion. The driving force that was propelling the Mongols from one conquest to the next dissipated with that event, and Europe was spared a very tough fight for its independence.

Personally I think a more aggresive Mongol campaign in Europe would have actually helped European civilization and sped up the rennaisance by a couple centuries -- since nothing creates progress like a good desperate war. But naturally that's only conjecture.

What isn't conjecture is what the Mongols did to medieval European armies on a field of battle: i.e. dismantle them. At least, that's why the sources I've read tell me.

posted 08-31-2002 04:47 AM               

Shawn - Great points, by the way!

Cherryfunk - "The 'Khan dying' theory isn't ultimately saying that the Mongols in Hungary could have wiped European civilization off the face of the planet, but that the entire Mongol empire, had they set their eyes on Europe as their next region of conquest, could have very possibly done what they did to China. The death of the Khan, however, put an end to Mongol expansion. The driving force that was propelling the Mongols from one conquest to the next dissipated with that event, and Europe was spared a very tough fight for its independence."

posted 09-03-2002 05:06 AM               

Part 1:
-------
For what it’s worth, let me give you the benefit of my opinion.

[center][c=gold]MONGOL INTENTIONS TOWARDS THE WEST[/c][/center]

When Batu Khan and his 150,000 horsemen set off on their great ride into the West in 1235, they clearly had annexation in their mind. The Mongolian empire was a universalising enterprise. Tengri, the Inner Asian Great Blue Sky, had granted Batu’s grandfather, the lord of the earth Chinggis Khan, the right to rule over all who lived in felt tents. The expansionist Chinggisid ideology had already welded together a confederation of Uralo-Altaic peoples, and its divine mandate had spread beyond the steppe. The Inner Asian empire of the Pax Mongolica was rapidly winning control of the continental caravan routes from China to Persia. And we know that the Mongols were resolved to conquer the Christian West because in his account of the quriltai which decided on the invasion, Juwayni says that the khans `deliberated together concerning the extirpation and subjugation of all the remaining rebels (tughat).” M. M. Qazwini (ed.) Ata Malik Juwayni, Ta’rikh-i Jahan Gusha, vol. 1, pp. 268-9. The khans considered any nation outside their rule to be a rebel state.

[center]

[c=gold]TACTICAL ANALYSIS[/c][/center]

For their part we all know that the Papacy and the Holy Roman Empire could allow no mere Tatar apocalypse to intrude on their own struggles for power, and if Batu hadn’t turned back in 1242 he wouldn’t have had to overcome a coordinated pan-European defence. Ultimately his principal opponents would have been ...

[center][c=gold]POPE INNOCENT IV, THE VICAR OF CHRIST[/c]

... and the three great Kings of the West:

[c=gold]FREDERICK II OF THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE[/c]

[c=gold]LOUIS IX OF FRANCE[/c]

[c=gold]HENRY III OF ENGLAND[/c]

[/center]

Each was capable with his allies of fielding a host that was numerically equal or superior to the enemy’s, but arguably tactically outmatched. The Franks of the West after all fought like the Poles, whom Kaidu and Baidar had swept aside at Liegnitz.

[center] [/center]

The favourite countermeasure often talked about on this forum, the fearsome English longbow, was still a rarity in continental warfare in this period, and wouldn’t have been employed in quantity until the 1290s, and the mounted English arcarii capable of the type of rapid movement seen in the Hundred Years’ War didn’t appear until the French campaigns of Edward III in the 1350s, after the increase in the horse population with the universal adoption of the horse collar in English agriculture. In 1242 Henry III was still relying on his Gascon crossbowmen.

[center][/center]

posted 09-03-2002 05:09 AM               

Nonetheless, had Batu stuck his finger into their honey-pot in 1242, the Christians would have looked with grief at the defilement wrought by his passage. Then they would have swarmed. Surprising though it may seem at first in the light of his preceding victories, the remaining Mongol forces would have been hard-pressed even to hang onto Hungary. Subsequent events would seem to confirm this. After the succession to the khakhanate was settled, and with the chivalry of eastern Europe massacred in the field, why did the Tatars on the Kipchak steppe never again try to include the bountiful Hungarian plain in their empire? Three surpassing reasons:

1. The length of Mongolian communications was excessive if campaigns were to be sustained in Europe. At least in theory horse archers could live off the land, but siege trains with all their oxen, draught horses, carts, and baggage wagons couldn’t. If we lay aside logistics for a moment, the tactical analysis supports the idea that, as the undisputed masters of Asiatic warfare, the Mongol ordu could have won an impressive string of pitched battles in Europe. But it’s what would have happened next that would have been decisive. Christendom wasn’t China or Persia or Arabia, where entire kingdoms could fall with the stroke of a sword or the thrust of a lance.

[center][/center]

In the West the extinction of a ruling dynasty had long ceased to spell the end of a state, and the fate of the free peoples was not bound to the life of their kings. To prevent the social order from capsizing under the barbarian surge in the Dark Ages, feudalism had refitted the European ship of state with a hull of watertight compartments. The political leadership of Italy, France and Germany was diffuse, and the governing institutions were resilient. With local rulers still overshadowing the centralised states, and the power of organised religion providing the shared sense of identity, when decapitated, the institutionalised leadership simply sprouted a new head, like a hydra. (An early instance of thinking globally but acting locally.)

Batu’s descent on Europe in 1241 amounted to a portyák, the kind of operation, albeit on a grander scale, which the finest horsemen in Europe, the Hungarians, regularly conducted into Turkish territory, and what the contemporary English called a chevauchee: a massed armed raid. This was an Edwardian strategy Henry V would abandon two centuries later when he realised the key to permanent conquest in France was not annihilating Valois armies in the field, but by laying siege to their strongholds and cities.

In 1285 the Kipchak Tatars returned to Europe and occupied Transylvania. As before they were unsupported by Chinese or Persian artillery. In 1286 the Mongol Prince Nogai advanced against Cracow and Tole-Buka attacked Sandomir. But the Poles showed they had learnt by their sobering experience at Liegnitz half a century earlier. This time the garrisons weren’t tempted to engage the horse archers in the field. They clung to their walls and both cities held out against the Tatar assaults. So the Poles faced the same evil and they defeated it, and the defences of civilisation failed to crumble. The Mongols once again withdrew, first to Volynia, and then to the longitudinal belt of steppes north of the Black Sea: the empty expanses of European Scythia. And they never came back.

[center][c=GOLD]THE MONGOLS AT GATES OF LIEGNITZ[/c]

[/center]

So even assuming Batu had crushed the leagued Italian, German and French armies on the plains of Italy, and struck off the heads of Gregory IX, Frederick II, Louis IX, and Conrad the Crusader, and then proceeded to rape and pillage the city of Rome, everybody else would have retreated behind the unassailable walls of their castles and cities, raising the drawbridges and lowering the portcullises to await the judgement of fate. Kolovrat will tell you that no nation on earth has as many fortresses as Italy, and we all know from Barbarossa how many castles Germany boasts. In the early 13th century the Count of Provence controlled 40 castles, and the King of France had over 100, including 45 in Normandy. The Duke of Burgundy owned 70. In 1216 King Henry III had inherited from his father 93 royal castles in England, and had secured 10 more in Guyenne by 1220, while for their part the English barons held 179.

[center][c=GOLD]THE CONCIERGE, PARIS[/c]

[/center]

Of course, in his wisdom the great Chinggis Khan had understood that mounted archers were not enough to defeat sedentary societies, and his successors ensured that all metalworkers, carpenters and gunpowder makers in northern China were registered as p’ao-shou catapult operators. We know that Batu had brought a train of minghan engineers, since he was able to field seven ho p’ao catapults to hurl firebombs against the unfortunate Hungarians at the Sajo bridge, teaching them a deadly lesson in the tactical use of artillery. But events showed that these weren’t heavy enough to breach the high stone walls of the Hungarian castles, which Batu had to skirt. Gunpowder wasn’t used during the Mongol campaigns in Russia and Europe, and the primitive projectile technology then in use wouldn’t have made much of an impression. On a later campaign it would take Hülegü three years to transport a thousand crews of Chinese artillerymen and their siege equipment two and a half thousand miles from the steppes of western Mongolia in 1253 to Khurasan in 1256, and another two years before they could topple the walls of Baghdad a thousand miles farther west.

[center][c=GOLD]HÜLEGÜ DESTROYS ALAMUT (1256)[/c]

[/center]

The lands of Western Europe were even more remote, over four thousand miles from Mongolia as the crow flies, and boasted an array of fortifications even more formidable than those of Persia or Mesopotamia. Even had the Kipchak khanate had access to Chinese and Persian artillery (which it never did), the logistical problems of transporting and supplying a sufficient train would have been still more immense, and since no such attempt was ever made, even in the face of hostilities, such a stupendous leaguer would appear to have been quite beyond the khanate’s strategic capabilities.

posted 09-03-2002 05:11 AM               

[center][c=GOLD]ÖGÖDEI[/c]

[/center]

Batu had already quarrelled with Büri, the grandson of Chaghatai. A breach had opened up between him and Güyüg, Ögödei’s son and likely heir. Batu would be in a better position to safeguard his own interests from Güyüg settled in the Kipchak steppe than if he were to continue fighting in distant Europe. It was not until 1246 that Güyüg was installed, and he reigned only for two years. Ironically Khakhan Güyüg’s threats to Pope Innocent IV, delivered by Carpini in 1247, were empty words because his accession had made Batu’s own political position vulnerable to the point that he could not think of moving against the West.

[center][c=GOLD]GÜYÜG[/c]

[/center]

On Güyüg’s death Batu became Möngke’s kingmaker.

[center][c=GOLD]MÖNGKE[/c]

[/center]

William of Rubruck quoted the Khakhan: “Just as the sun spreads its rays in all directions, so my power and the power of Batu is spread everywhere.” But this boast could not disguise the fact that, through strategic over-extension and greater commitments in the East, the nomad threat to Christendom no longer came from the herdsmen of Mongolia, but only from Batu’s Kipchak khanate (Golden Horde), whose boundaries extended over the Upper Volga, the territory of the former Volga Bolgar state, Siberia to the Urals, the northern Caucasus, Bulgaria (for a time), the Crimea and Khwarizm in Central Asia. Its core was the Pontic and Caspian steppe.

[center] [/center]

After the initial attack of 1241 there was a series of political crises within the Mongolian Empire which made it impossible to concentrate in Kipchak territory an invasion force capable of threatening Europe. The wealth of the Kipchak rested on the international trade of the caravan routes. Silk and spices to the Mediterranean and Europe passed through Sarai and the other Mongol cities on the lower Volga, while the fur trade was diverted to the Caspian. As C. J. Halperin points out in `Russia in the Mongol Empire in comparative perspective’, in Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies, 43/1 (1983), p 250-1: `Horde foreign policy focused overwhelmingly upon acquisition of the rich pastures and caravan routes of Azerbaijan ... Russia itself was peripheral to the Horde, not only geographically but also politically and economically.’ With scarcely six million people Russia could contribute only a modest amount of manpower and taxes to the Azerbaijan campaigns.

[center] [/center]

Batu’s Muslim brother Berke became the Kipchak Khan in 1257 and imposed on the khanate a strategic reorientation. Berke disapproved of Hülegü’s murder of the ‘Abbasid Caliph of Baghdad. In 1262 this contributed to the outbreak of the first of a long series of wars between the khanate of Kipchak and the Ilkhanate. The Kipchak khans wished to possess themselves of north-western Persia and the Caucasus occupied by the Ilkhans. Berke created an alliance between his Kipchak khanate and the Mamluks of Egypt. Turkish replaced Mongolian on coins as early as the reign of Tödei-Möngke (1280-1287), and after 1260 the Ilkhans of Persia began to see Christian rulers, notably Philip the Fair of France and Edward Longshanks of England, as potential allies against the Mamluks and the allied khanate of Kipchak.

posted 09-03-2002 05:26 AM               

[center] [/center]

Even if Ögödei hadn’t died, it’s doubtful whether Batu could have continued much further west, and if not then the conquest of the continent would surely always have been beyond his power. And the modern scholarly consensus established by Professor D. Sinor in `Horse and Pasture in Inner Asian History’, Oriens Extremus, 19 (1972) and Rudi Paul Lindner of the University of Michigan in `Nomadism, horses and Huns’, Past and Present, 92 (1981), is that the meagre pasture of Europe was never going to be sufficient to support a nomad invasion force of sufficient strength to cast an ominous shadow over Christian civilisation.

The key to Mongolian victory was speed, range and mobility. Without these the ordu would have been bogged down, encircled and obliterated by weight of numbers of the scope which only settled agriculture could support. The Mongols’ unparalleled success in steppe warfare required a string of remounts, often as many as eighteen. Horse-power required pasture, superabundant in the great pastoral belts of Mongolia, China, Russia and the Middle East, but almost non-existent in the dark forests and arable lands of Europe. While the tough Mongol horse of the thirteenth century was between thirteen and fourteen hands high, rather larger than the twelve hands of the wild Przhevalsky, and requiring a heavier dietary intake, as a pony it still would have cropped grass more closely and exhausted the habitat at a faster rate than its heavier European counterpart.

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The Alföld — the great Hungarian plain — was the largest unbroken pasture on the continent of Europe, in fact the only one of any extent. It was therefore the main target of Batu’s invasion. Prior to urbanisation in the twentieth century, it contained some 16,371 square miles of pasture, barely sufficient to sustain 150,000 wiry steppe horses. So even had the herders restricted themselves to ten remounts, the Alföld couldn’t even have sustained two tüman: only 15,000 nomads against an active Western military reservoir of millions.

[center][c=GOLD]THE ALFÖLD[/c]

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By Asiatic standards, then, the Alföld was a postage stamp, about four percent of what’s available in the territory of the Mongolian People’s Republic, which boasts some 409,275 square miles of pasture capable in theory of supporting as many as 3,750,000 steppe horses. Even after centuries of overgrazing, degradation and desertification, Mongolia today still supports 3.1 million horses, making it the country with the highest number of horses per capita in the world.

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posted 09-03-2002 05:28 AM               

The Alföld’s carrying capacity for 150,000 steppe horses is also less than half of that for the pasture of Syria and Mesopotamia, recorded as having supported 325,000 steppe horses during the Mongols’ campaign of destruction in the Middle East in 1299. To compensate for the arid conditions as they swept south from the rich pastures of Azerbaijan and the Mughan steppe, the Mongol cavalry were ordered to restrict themselves to five remounts, compromising their speed and mobility even in that open country.

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In theory, by accepting that five-horse limit, which still enabled 65,000 Mongols to spread their terror through the deserts of the Middle East, Batu Khan could have maintained on a permanent basis in Europe only three tüman or 30,000 troops, half the number that he had brought with him on his initial foray into Poland and Hungary, and only a fifth of the number with which he had crossed the Volga and overcome Russia, an empty steppe country with a pastoral economy suitable for nomadic warfare, and with only a tenth of the population and military potential of the West.

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Three tüman (slowed by the five-remounts limit) would also have been less than a tenth of the military strength Khubilai Khan in Khanbalik would later require for his concentric attack against the Southern Sung only seven hundred miles from his capital, and whose conquest would take the Great Khanate a generation of continuous fighting and fortuitous internal strife within the Sung imperial court. And Khubilai would have all the resources and all the engineering and signalling expertise directly on hand in northern China. In 1275 Chia Ssu-tao’s great army defending Yangchow mustered 130,000 men under arms, indicating that late Sung military strength was comparable to that of 13th-century France, where in theory between 285,000 and 380,000 men could have been raised for the defence of the Capetian, Plantagenet, Burgundian and Provencal territories. Logistical restrictions dictated that of these a full third, about 100,000, should have been deployable outside of France, on crusade in Italy to meet the Mongol advance, with the remainder as garrison, while between them the Italian states in the operational theatre would have raised between 135,000 and 180,000 troops for their defence.

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But in Italy the Mongols would have had more to worry about than numerical inferiority as they shambled into battle on skeleton horses starved of feed. While the whole of China, north and south, with seventy million people, had a comparable population to Europe, with perhaps sixty million, and had been similarly politically divided at the time of invasion, there was insufficient unbroken pasture beyond the Carpathians to sustain even a single ordu. Anybody who’s wandered through the Italian countryside in the summer can tell you that there’s no grazing to be had, which is why earlier pastoral nomads like the Huns and Magyars seem to have left their horses behind and invaded on foot. Once dismounted, bow-legged nomads who had spent their entire lives in the saddle could barely have walked a few hundred yards without resting, let alone out-marched the local levies of professional infantry.

To support its vast population on pre-industrial farming technology in a landscape covered with mixed broadleaf and coniferous forest, the civilisation of mediaeval Europe had developed on the basis of an agricultural rather than a pastoral economy. Oats had a notoriously low yield. Consequently there was no possibility that the West could have supported the sudden introduction of hundreds of thousands of new grazing animals from the steppes that a nomadic invasion would have required.