Another What If: Ottoman Europe

[aronnax]

So its either the Ottoman Empire will suceed and take Central Europe


Shot at 2007-07-17

and will either hold it or lose it like this in a Save Europe! Campaign allied with Safavid:


Shot at 2007-07-17

Blue-Purple : Area lost
Red Arrows : French Advance
Pink Arrows : Spanish Advance
Purple Arrows : Persian Advance
Orange Arrows : Polish Advance
Blue Arrows : Russian Advance

Meh, anything is possible

 

[TheLastOne36]

Quote:
Originally Posted by Thorbal View Post
Hum... well... Wikipedia ( *cough* too lazy to search anywhere else right now at 4 AM ) says ( regarding the whole battle )
* 30,000-man Polish forces
* 18,500 Austrian troops led by Charles V, Duke of Lorraine,
* 19,000 Franconian, Swabian and Bavarian troops led by Prince Georg Friedrich of Waldeck,
* 9,000 Saxon troops led by John George III, Elector of Saxony.
if we take that to be true, then the force's biggest contributor were the Poles, though they weren't the overwhelming majority of the forces, only making up about thirty five percent of it.

but thtas still alota Poles.

remember that force isn't only including sobieski's relief force.

The Austrians were defending so you can take 18000 off.

@arronax, nice maps, but you should've made our arrows red...

 

[ohcrapitsnico]

Well one thing is for sure, and that is the Poles provided the Ottomans with the most resistance.

There was also a point in time where the Ottomans could have conquered Persia, They defeated Ismail at the battle of chaldiran in battle of cannons and guns vs catapults and swords. Allying with their enemies, the uzbek khanates of khiva, samarkand and bukhara, I have no doubt they would overwhelm the weak and demoralized Safavids. Of course doing this means they lose focus in europe.

 

[cybrxkhan]

There was also a point in time where the Ottomans could have conquered Persia, They defeated Ismail at the battle of chaldiran in battle of cannons and guns vs catapults and swords. Allying with their enemies, the uzbek khanates of khiva, samarkand and bukhara, I have no doubt they would overwhelm the weak and demoralized Safavids. Of course doing this means they lose focus in europe.

but doing so would make them open to the Timurd renmants, which wouldn't have been that hard to dfeat, so let us assume the Timurids were deafeated... this means the Mughals definitely would have a big problem on their hands, and even the isolating Chinese may notice.

in an Ottoman vs. Mughal scenario, both civilizations had pretty good military technology, and both employed the use of field artillery, though the Mughals also had elephants.

if the Ottomans ever reached the Chinese, well... the Chinese still was a century ahead of Europe, and their military was still quite strong and powerful, employing all kinds of gunpowder weapons, and due to the fact that the borders of China were far away from the Ottoman HQ at Constantinople (not Istanbul yet), the Ottomans probabbly wouldn't have attempted anything on the Chinese.

 

[TheLastOne36]

And The Ottoman Empire controlled alot of Africa, A conquest could've easily brought Africa to the Ottomans feet.

 

[cybrxkhan]

And The Ottoman Empire controlled alot of Africa, A conquest could've easily brought Africa to the Ottomans feet.

i think they still should have had certain difficulty crossing the Sahara. a chance of them going at West Africa (aka Songhai and Freinds) is possible, but beyond there, meaning into Central and Eastern Africa, at such a far distance from their actual core area, and without (unlike the Europeans) a colonizing ocean-faring navy, i think it would have been unlikely.

 

[TheLastOne36]

Easy.

Sail to the Swahili lands,

Conquer, Settle, Make a base to help further conquests, Go to Zululand, Conquer, Settle, Make a base to help further conquests, Etc. until they capture all of africa.

But that's the easy point of view...

of course it's going to be alot harder then that.

 

[ohcrapitsnico]

The mughals were timurids. In the iran/uzbekistan/afghanistan general are in the !6th century, the safavids were in persia, mughals in eastern afghanistan and pakistan, with the various uzbek khanates in the north and small states of afghans and balochs.

Another turning point was the battle of diu, If the alliance were able to defeat the portugueuse(sp) I'm sure the Ottomans would expand and gain power and naval dominance in the Indian and would be able to repulse any further portuguese attempts at colonization.

 

[ohcrapitsnico]

Easy.

Sail to the Swahili lands,

Conquer, Settle, Make a base to help further conquests, Go to Zululand, Conquer, Settle, Make a base to help further conquests, Etc. until they capture all of africa.

But that's the easy point of view...

of course it's going to be alot harder then that.

The east african city states at the time were very weak and all muslim, I'm sure they would easily fall to the Ottomans although they would have to deal with the portuguese coming north from mozambique and india.

 

[cybrxkhan]

Easy.

Sail to the Swahili lands,

Conquer, Settle, Make a base to help further conquests, Go to Zululand, Conquer, Settle, Make a base to help further conquests, Etc. until they capture all of africa.

But that's the easy point of view...

of course it's going to be alot harder then that.

in theory it is possible, but from what i know, the Ottomans, although they did have a powerful navy, it wasn't the ocean-faring type like the Europeans, and therefore, that is why the Europeans sailed all around the world. however, i think if the Ottomans invested in building ocean-faring type ships, then a conquest or domination of Africa, at least the more well-developed areas, would be plausible and pissibule.

The mughals were timurids. In the iran/uzbekistan/afghanistan general are in the !6th century, the safavids were in persia, mughals in eastern afghanistan and pakistan, with the various uzbek khanates in the north and small states of afghans and balochs.

but the Mughals were a special kind of Timurids, that went to India and made it pizazzy.

 

[TheLastOne36]

portuguese coming north from mozambique and india.

Which would be to busy defending europe.

 

[cybrxkhan]

portuguese coming north from mozambique and india.

the Portugese, although they sent ships to the Indian seas, i don't think it was that big enough to pose a threat to a well-developed empire like the Ottomans, though maybe to a small city-state, yes.

 

[ohcrapitsnico]

The Portuguese after the battle of diu gained naval supremacy in the indian and gained colonies in mozambique and on the indian coast. The Ottomans would have defeated the Portuguese had they put enough effort into enlarging and upgrading their indian fleets, as the outnumbered portuguese fleet easily overwhelmed even the experienced ottoman/gurjarati/mamluk egyptian fleet because of technogically superior ships. After their defeat the Ottomans didn't bother to attempt at expansion in the Indian and the Portuguese had a monopoly on trade. Its quite unfortunate to think that the Ottomans could have stopped european imperialism in southern asia had they put a little effort into it.

 

[innonimatu]

For any ancient empire (and by ancient I mean pre-Industrial Revolution) keeping control of faraway regions for more that a few decades was always extremely difficult. There was no way the Ottomans could have captured and held India. Even if they had managed to march an army into India and overthrow the Murghal empire the local ottoman governors would either rebel and become independent or fall to other local princedoms. That had happened before to the Mongol Empire and the Caliphate.

In fact Ottoman expansion was always limited by the territory its armies could cover in campaigns lasting at the most six months. The sultan wouldn't allow the creation of large standing armies outside his direct control, for obvious reasons, so in every big campaign the army had to march from Constantinople, and return within a few months. Doing things otherwise would lead to the unraveling of the power structure of the empire and its collapse.

The Ottomans would have defeated the Portuguese had they put enough effort into enlarging and upgrading their indian fleets, as the outnumbered portuguese fleet easily overwhelmed even the experienced ottoman/gurjarati/mamluk egyptian fleet because of technogically superior ships.

I doubt that. The ottomans made quite a big effort at Diu, even using with venetian assistance, and not only failed there but also failed to defend or retake some key coastal fortresses in the Indian Ocean later. The resources of the Ottoman Empire simply were not enough for fights in Europe, the Mediterranean and the Indian Ocean. It made more sense for the Ottoman empire to fight its imperial wars on the Balkans.

 

[cybrxkhan]

For any ancient empire (and by ancient I mean pre-Industrial Revolution) keeping control of faraway regions for more that a few decades was always extremely difficult. There was no way the Ottomans could have captured and held India. Even if they had managed to march an army into India and overthrow the Murghal empire the local ottoman governors would either rebel and become independent or fall to other local princedoms. That had happened before to the Mongol Empire and the Caliphate.

still, i think that would change the course of Indian history, because now they have no Taj Mahal as a national monument.