Just suppose a remnant of the Mongol Empire gathers a large invasion force in the 14th century. Europe has been hit by the Black Death and there’s nowhere to go but better-a decade after the plague, the Mongol invasion is launched.
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Quote:The Black Death peaked in 1347 to 1351. Here's what the map of Europe and the surrounding area looked like immediately afterwards:
(Click to enlarge; Source: http://geacron.com/home-en/)
So, if it's the Golden Horde doing the conquering, where do they go from here? Bear in mind that they also got hit with the Black Death - but, they got it a few years earlier, so let's suppose that this is a decade or two later, and they've rebuilt while Europe is still recovering.
Do they go south, running into Europe via Anatolia? If they do this, they'll have to get through Constantinople, which isn't exactly going to be easy for them.
Do they go west, through Poland and/or Hungary? Note that Poland was relatively unaffected by the Black Death, so they'd be fighting the Poles at full strength here. I suspect Poland would still lose - but would also inflict enough casualties on the Mongols to make future conquests difficult.
Do they go north, through Scandinavia? This seems like an awfully long way around, through harsh terrain - and then, they'd have to somehow cross between Sweden and Denmark. It's probably not worth the effort.
And the other thing is, would the Golden Horde would need to keep hold of its existing land? Timur the Lame is about to arrive on the scene - and, if they're not careful, he's going to gobble it up.
(Or, being nomads, they might just pack up and leave this land to someone else anyway !)
Quote:I was reading a Quora thread about whether the Mongols could have conquered Western Europe. There were two lengthy responses, which were pretty negative about their chances:
https://www.quora.com/Did-the-Mongols-ha...s-invasion
They're pretty long and detailed, but they had two main points:
Still, maybe they gather a large enough force to break Poland - and then, maybe Hungary's so weakened by the Black Death that they don't have enough troops to arm their castles properly, and the Mongols can win there. From there, they'll probably attack the HRE states - and, even if they can't invade, they can certainly pillage the crap out of the place. Perhaps some of the HRE states would end up becoming Mongol tributaries/vassals, in order to get them to stop the raiding. And perhaps something similar would happen further south, in places like Serbia.
- As we all know, the core of the Mongol armies consisted of light horse archers. These made for an almighty force; however, in order to maintain them, the Mongols required lots and lots of open pasture (in contrast to the cavalry of western Europe, whose horses generally lived in stables). The required pastures existed in the Steppes - and, therefore, the Mongols and other horse lords utterly dominated there. It also existed in Hungary and Poland - and, therefore, if the Mongols were to successfully invade those countries, they'd have little trouble holding them. However, in France and the HRE, it was a very different story. While you'll find plenty of open countryside there today, in the Middle Ages they were covered in thick, dense forest, in which Mongol horse archers would have been completely mired. The thing is, even the most powerful weapon is of no use if it's not logistically possible to deploy it - and, in western Europe, it wouldn't have been. The Mongols are going to need more than "horse nomad battle tactics" if they want to conquer France - and they'll need something else entirely if they want to hold it.
- Even conquering Poland and Hungary isn't going to be easy at this point in history. The Golden Horde invaded Hungary in 1241, and utterly crushed their targets. However, when they invaded again in 1285, they were repelled fairly easily. They then invaded Poland in 1287, with much the same results as in Hungary two years earlier. The thing is, when the Mongols first invaded Hungary in 1241, their targets mostly just had wooden castles. However, over the following years, Hungary introduced more heavy knights (which you had favoured over the Mongols in this thread!), and constructed a large number of heavily-fortified stone castles, specifically designed to keep a Mongol invasion force at bay. If the Mongols invaded, the Hungarians would simply retreat into their castles, forcing the Mongols to switch to siege tactics. Now, the Mongols did show in China that the were good at siege warfare - but, by this point, there were so many castles in Europe that the Mongols would need to do it over and over and over. It certainly wouldn't be anything like their rapid expansion across the Steppes in the early 1200s!
Quote:So, after this first wave, I'm guessing the map would look something like this. The core Mongol territories are marked in red, while vassals and tributaries are marked in blue:
(Click to enlarge)
They've vacated the eastern parts of their realm - but, what to they gain in return? As noted above, I've given the Mongols Hungary and Poland: if they can't at least take those, then we really don't have a timeline . I've also given them the southern portions of Lithuania, which they'd presumably take on their way to Poland. Then, I've given them Wallachia and Bulgaria: it's probably easier for the Mongols to go through there than to go directly through Hungary, and have to cross the Carpathian mountains!
They have several new vassals and tributaries too (in addition to the Russian principalities, which they had anyway). I'm guessing they don't invade Croatia (it wouldn't be easy for them), and allow the Hungarian ruler to keep it in exchange for tribute. They manage to exert similar leverage over Serbia. Then, they take control of a few pieces of the HRE: I have no idea which ones, so I've just given them some random blobs .
Quote:For the sake of argument, perhaps the Mongols in Hungary (and the other southern parts of the realm) convert to Catholicism, while those further north (for example, in Poland) stay with Islam? I expect that would have the following effects:
So, this takes us up to around 1380. By then, this is what the alternate map looks like. Red represents the southern Mongol realm; maroon represents their vassals and tributaries; blue represents the remnants of the breakaway northern realm; and white represents an independent Muscovy (which I'm guessing will eventually join with Novgorod and form Russia):
- The Northern (Polish) Mongol realm probably doesn't get any further. There's too much tension between the Muslim Mongol rulers and the Christian Polish population - and so, this realm is always having to put down peasants' revolts. Very few of the Poles convert to Islam - although more people further east do (for example, in Lithuania, which wasn't yet Christianised at this point in OTL). Maybe they can hold on to some of these lands, but I can see Poland either becoming independent or joining the 'Hungarian' realm (see below). The Russian princes probably break away too at this point, since the 'Northern' Mongol realm is too weak to hold onto them.
- The Southern (Hungarian) Mongol realm, on the other hand, is in a great position. Once they've converted to Catholicism, and won the loyalty of the Hungarian population, they'll be ruling over a vast chunk of eastern Europe, with great stone castles in the west (defended by heavy knights), and open pastures in the east (with nomadic horse lords running around). I expect they'll become more adept at European-style warfare, and eventually give up on their nomadic lifestyle altogether (and build new castles and cities in what is now Ukraine) - but, they'll probably retain a large and almighty cavalry, with both light and heavy units. My guess is that they don't expand any further west (there's not really any room for that) - but, they do push southwards a bit, and then they whack the Ottomans as soon as they try to expand into Europe.
(Click to enlarge)
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Moonface (in 'Woman runs 49 red lights in ex's car')' Wrote: If only she had ran another 20 lights.
Moonface (in 'Woman runs 49 red lights in ex's car')' Wrote: If only she had ran another 20 lights.
Moonface (in 'Woman runs 49 red lights in ex's car')' Wrote: If only she had ran another 20 lights.
(07-05-2018, 03:35 PM)JHG Wrote: Just suppose a remnant of the Mongol Empire gathers a large invasion force in the 14th century. Europe has been hit by the Black Death and there’s nowhere to go but better-a decade after the plague, the Mongol invasion is launched.