The Battle of Baghdad 1258 - The Mongol Invasion
I've recently been reading up on the effects expansionism has had on the Middle East and while going over the Battle of Baghdad it brought back to light the wanton destruction the region had been sujected to. It seems the destruction caused to the area denied it centuries of prosperity.
At the time of the invasion Baghdad had only recently seen its peak. It had a population of approximately one million residents, and an army that was 60,000 strong and, although the caliph was only a figurehead, controlled by Mamluk or Turkic warlords, Baghdad was still a rich and cultured city, pivotal to the Islamic world.
Here are some records of the wanton destruction that occured:
- The Grand Library of Baghdad containing countless precious historical documents and books on subjects ranging from medicine to astronomy, was destroyed. Survivors said that the waters of the Tigris ran black with ink from the enormous quantities of books flung into the river.
- Citizens attempted to flee, but were intercepted by Mongol soldiers who killed with abandon. Martin Sicker writes that close to 90,000 people may have died (Sicker 2000, p. 111). Other estimates go much higher. Wassaf claims the loss of life was several hundred thousand. Ian Frazier of The New Yorker says estimates of the death toll have ranged from 200,000 to a million.
- The Mongols looted and then destroyed mosques, palaces, libraries, and hospitals. Grand buildings that had been the work of generations were burned to the ground.
- The caliph was captured and forced to watch as his citizens were murdered and his treasury plundered. According to most accounts, the caliph was killed by trampling. The Mongols rolled the caliph up in a rug, and rode their horses over him, as they believed that the earth was offended if touched by royal blood. All but one of his sons were killed, and the sole surviving son was sent to Mongolia.
- Hulagu had to move his camp upwind of the city, due to the stench of decay from the ruined city.
- Furthermore, historians, such as Frazier, believe that the Mongol invasion destroyed much of the irrigation infrastructure that had sustained Mesopotamia for many millennia. Canals were cut as a military tactic and never repaired. So many people died or fled that neither the labor nor the organization were sufficient to maintain the canal system. It broke down or silted up. This theory was advanced by historian Svatopluk Soucek.
Frazier states how "Baghdad was a depopulated, ruined city for several centuries and only gradually recovered some of its former glory." Indeed, some 'victory' this was by the Mongols. My consideration is what if the West had been 'depopulated' as such. Is it reasonable to suggest that Iraq would and could have become a far more prosperous land? Iraq in 1258 was very different from present day Iraq. Its agriculture was supported by canal networks thousands of years old. Baghdad was one of the most brilliant intellectual centers in the world. The Mongol destruction of Baghdad was a psychological blow from which Islam never recovered. Already Islam was turning inward, becoming more suspicious of conflicts between faith and reason and more conservative. With the sack of Baghdad, the intellectual flowering of Islam was snuffed out. Imagine the Athens of Pericles and Aristotle obliterated by a nuclear weapon begins to suggest the enormity of the blow.
Subsequently under the Tirumids, while Central Asia blossomed under his reign, other places such as Baghdad, Damascus, Delhi and other Arab, Persian, Indian and Turkic cities were sacked and destroyed, and countless slaughtered. While Timur still retains a positive image in Central Asia, he is also vilified by many in Arab, Persian and Indian societies as are the Mongols.
Two questions that interest me that I would like the board to comment on.
1) The implications for modern day Iraq if sackings of the Baghdad region did not occur?
and,
2) What if the Mongols had not overstreched themselves to such a degree, if they had persevered to set up governemnts and impose civil order through bureaucracy, and subsequently if the Mamluks had not beaten the Mongols back in Syria and the - what fate would have befallen the West?
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China is only recovering today. The Mongols brought nothing to the Middle-East and Central Asia execpt death. 80% of central asia died and 40 to 50 % of the population of the middle east.
Their conquests cost 60 000 000 lives as much as WW2 but this was 800 years ago. This is a major reason why Asian Civilazations started to decay while European civilzation started to rise. If the Genghis Khan was stranged at birth A LOT more people would be alive today.
Also we would be much more advanced, maybe we would have achieved the feat of going to the moon 100 years ago cos well the mongols did nearly destroy the leading civilzations of the time. Would be like if today aliens came and destroyed USA and its silicon valley and Europe with its Oxford Uni. We lose centruies of progress but maybe the internet can save it but back then there was no internet. 
Originally Posted by 6644kp
I appreciate that fact. 
