Quote Originally Posted by ZombieFriedNuts
Why didn’t Alexander the Great go west?
I have seen a map of his empire and it seems to be a bit sporadic.
It is long, thin and it has gaps in places where it looks like he just ignored them, for example Bithynia and Epirus and there’s a long thin strip near Saka. And to go back to my earlier question Why didn’t he go west, or did he just die before he had the chance and why is it mostly desert.
The map I looked at
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...edonEmpire.jpg
I'd say that it's not like he could make any other choice. He went to war with Persia, which was, at the time, by far the greatest threat to both Macedon and all other Hellenes. Once he commited himself to battle he could not stop until either he controlled it, or was crushed by it. Going half-way would only result in his enemies coming back again.

And once he was at the Indus ... who would refuse a chance to try and take the untold riches said to be found in that land, given that he was, well, there already.

As for going west ... well, he was young. He had conquered a pretty big empire, there is no doubt that he had some borad plans and every intention to go west (and, in my opinion, probably would have conquered that as well), but, you know, death kinda gets in the way of any plans you make.