The year 1200 A.D. was the end of what Genghis Khan called "The sleep of the horsemen" but to the rest of the world it may as well have been called the 'time of destruction' or the 'years of terror'. The Uzbek tribes were the first to feel the awakened might of the Mongol tribes. In a surprisingly diplomaticly shrewd manner, Temujin claimed the leadership of the Uzbek tribes for his son Ogedai. When the Uzbehk's refused to make Ogedai their king, the Great Khan's reaction was nothing short then an immediate declaration of war.
The multitude of experienced mongol generals were all utilized in this brief war. Ogedai won battles in the north, followed by the ever faithful Qasar. It is said, that Ogedai displayed much mercy, wishing to be viewed highly by his subjects to be. In contrast, Temujin himself crushed the armies mobilized against him in Karaganda and Koket, slaughtering thousands as he rode. The skilled mongol generals Jochi and Belgutai who followed the Great Khans main force were said to have been speechless when they witnessed the carnage left in Temujins wake. At summer's end all of the Uzbehk lands were either burning or captured by the rampaging mongols. With the harsh winter east of the Urals fast approaching, the unorganized and mostly nomadic peoples of the Uzbehk lands accepted Ogedai as their King and Genghis Khan quickly assimilated their lands into his growing domain.
What Temujin did during the years of 1203-1205 is not entirely known. However, it is clear that he traveled to the eastern realm of his "Mongolian Empire" and is said to have spat over the border with the Jing, before returning to his ancestral homeland. In the heart of Mongolia he let his people know that the wars had only just begun and prepared for his next campaign. With the united mongol tribes behind him, Genghis Khan told his people that they were choosen by god and he was the rightful master of not only "the peoples of the felt tent" but the whole world.
It was August in the year 1206 A.D. when the Qara-Khitai provided the excuse Temujin was waiting for when they annexed their sometimes allies the Khazak tribes. Under the flimsy pretense of taking rulership over what was his, Genghis Khan commensed an invasion of the Khazak lands and northern Qara-Khitai. Jochi and Belgutai initiated the invasion, scoring victories over the trained Khitai armies in Tenghis and Turgai. Unprepared for the mongol horsemen, the Khitai found themselves overwhelmed before formidable resistance could really be offered. Ogedai rode hard into Orsk and began an attack on the villages and local garrison, while the fearsome forces of the khan won battles in Irgiz and Karsak in his ride south, with repeated victories in october and november.
The mongol armies spared few who resisted them, burning farmlands, stealing cattle, and slaughtering children. In cold february and march of 1207, Tenghiz and Orsk fell. In late march, Jochi organized more of his battle hungry kinsmen and annihilated the Khitai army that gathered in Kyzylkum. With the victory, the mongol armies pushed farther south, unable to be stopped by the Khitai warriors. In april Turgai fell with minimum casualties and the General Kochu arrived from the east with orders from the Great Khan himself. They were simply to take all the lands of the Khitai king. Kochu proved himself to be more than a mere messenger when he joined combat with enemy forces in Khiva. Together with Belgutai they forced the khitai troops into full fledged retreat towards the Aral sea.
As the months passed more and more cities fell to the sword of the Mongol invaders. In october, in an effort to demenstrate that this war would only get worse, Kyzylkum was razed to the ground, its inhabitants either killed outright or taken into slavery. As 1208 began and then continued, the attacks grow more violent, cities in Sabran province were put to the torch by Ogedai, Tadjikistan fell to numerous raids and Kochu gathered for himself and his men more slaves, and Jochi led a charge of five thousand mongol warriors through the streets of the Khitai capital of Balasaghun, even though Yeliq Zulkhu had already fled to Tian shan province, where he was soon presued by Ogedai Khan. Burning the city of Kashga to the ground in may of 1209, all of Qara-Khitai was more or less under mongol dominion. In a humiliating peace that august, the once formidable empire of the Khitai was stripped of Tian shan, Tadjikistan, Uzbek, Khiva, Kyzylkum, Karsak, Turgai, Tenghiz, Aralsk, Orsk, and Irgiz.
When word traveled back to the east informing the Great Khan of the success and riches his son had won for Mongolia, it is said that Genghis Khan merely laughed and with some amusement and derision said he would show a boy how it is really done.
The collapse of the Qara-Khitai (yellow) empire to the Mongol horde, 1209. Of their original sixteen provinces, they were left with barely five.. two of which were small western border colonies.
