I was wondering...

[The Wizard]

Wizard

I am afraid your admiration of the Mongols is distorting your view towards them. You do admit that they were irredeemably cruel and savage, yet you think that’s justified because …they were nomads and lived in harsh condition?????

Perhaps you missed my comment... I said it was not justified in the least by it, but it at least explains their attitude to warfare. Mongols weren't those to torture and maim... they 'limited' (with lack of a better word) themselves to killing and sacking 'alone' (again, with lack of better wording), and usually from a distance.

Yes, and Hitler wasn’t really responsible for the holocaust, because he had a traumatic child age.

Er... I do not understand where this comment comes from... if you insinuate that I excuse Hitler because I said his lust for killing was because of his sick and twisted mind, then you either entirely missed my point or you are just plain very wrong. My point was that reading a book on the Mongols does not make one want to go on mass-murderings all on its own.

Also, you might attribute the fall of the East to the plague, which was quite worse in Europe, btw and not all East experienced the plague anyway – China didn’t. India didn’t. Why did they stay behind?

Why was the plague 'quite worse' in Europe? Did I not mention that the European reaction to the disease cost more lives on the short term but let the Europeans recover faster on the long term, and the other way around for Asia? Then, looking at the statistics alone, it was worse in Europe, but that is not the whole story, as I explained above.

China wasn't exactly staying behind in any way at the date of the Mongols. The Ming and Qing dynasties were extremely powerful forces, but the latter failed because of bad leadership, child emperors, court intrigue ruling politics, and because it had isolated itself from the world and was therefore backwards and ignorant of the threat that the Western powers posed. And all that only happened in the end of the 18th century, because before that China under the Qing dynasty could easily rank itself amongst the most powerful nations in the world -- it even conquered Mongolia! No, the Mongols had nothing to do with the Mongol conquests.

And in my opinion, the Mongols had absolutely nothing to do with the weakening of India. All they did to India was a raid led by Chingis, which wasn't half as destructive as the defeat of the Khwarizm-shah Empire. India became very powerful and very prosperous two centuries later, when a Timurid, Babur, descended from the Hindu Kush into the Indus valley and eventually conquered all of the Indian peninsula, and founded the Mughal dynasty. The Mughal empire was also one of the most powerful and advanced civilizations on the world, until the 18th century (a century where European fortunes rose greatly and the fortunes of the rest of the world seem to have fallen greatly -- it was in this period that the Middle East also lost much of its power... think of the Ottomans, Persia, etc.) when a massive defeat of the Mughals at the hands of the 'Napoleon of the East', Nadir Shah of Persia, caused the sacking of Delhi, after which the Persians left with the Peacock Throne, a huge amount of Mughal treasure including the Koh-i-Noor diamond, and a massive amount more of treasure. It is estimated that Nadir Shah's army doubled in size just by the camp followers needed to carry all this loot (elephants, camels, etc.).

To me it seems you overestimate the destruction caused by the Mongols, and it isn't the first time we've disagreed over that point of the Mongols. A while back we had another argument in a thread about how to defeat the Mongols. There I also pointed out that every region conquered by the Mongols and then incorporated into their empire saw a period of economical rebirth and prosperity. Regions that were not incorporated into the empire for various regions, such as Hungary, Poland, and India, were left hurting for a while. Perhaps that is the explanation of some people's belief that the Mongols only brought bad things?

I find your reaction theory rather unfounded as well. I think that’s wrong as well. A couple other posters have illustrated how the Mongols destroyed the infrastructure and the fact that they depopulated Asia is not my speculation but a well-established historical fact.

Why do you think it's wrong? I'd like some arguments for this, for I am interested in why you chose to disbelieve it, for I don't think the rest you say in the quote has anything to do with my arguments for a good casus belli for Chingis concerning the Khwarizmians.

And, regarding that rest of the quote, I would like to know why you believe that a medieval army was able to cause such widespread destruction and depopulation as the Mongols apparently did according to you. I find that very hard to believe. They didn't have carpet bombers, they didn't have WMD's, they didn't have million-man armies and neither did they have armored divisions (tanks etc.). How could they have brought Asia such decline with only sword and bow and muscle power? And how could it have stayed bad for more than 800 years solely as a result of the Mongol conquests? You'd think the Mongols and their successors in the area would've done something to make the regions strong, looking at the duration of the Mongol khanates remaining after the death of Qubilai Khan (which were still mainly ruled by Mongols or at least people who had Mongol blood), and the efforts of such rulers as the Safavids and Mughals. No, on such a long term the Mongols had very little effect, and what effect their was, was positive in the end.



~Wiz