1st Veneto War, a Dark period follows
On May 3 1448, less than a month after the annexion of Candar, our age-old enemy, Venice, whom had beared a grudge against us since we seized their commercial assets in our lands, decided to strike back at us. Thus, Venice, and their allies: Bosnia, Mantua, Milan and Naples waged war on us. We called in our allies for this war, whom quickly moved in and responded our call to arms.
Their first move were quickly executed. Bosnia moved into Kosovo, driving back our weakened army deployed there while Venice moved in to besiege Smyrna. We started deploying our troops against them, mustering new armies to use against those catholic dogs. Great news would be brought to us shortly following the beginning of the wars: The heathen and heretics in Adana, Macedonia and Cataract had finally been converted to the One True Faith, and our infrastructure technology had improved enough to allow us to construct Refineries.
We began to plan our attacks: Our massive fleet went to Delta, picking up an army located in Egypt, and then moved on to the Bay of Tobruk, where we engaged the navy of Mantua and defeating them easily. We loaded another army in our navy, and set sail for Crete. On land, we sent two armies to engage the armies of Venice in Smyrna and Bosnia in Kosovo, defeating each of them in turn. We unloaded both armies in Crete at the same time: A disastrous defeat ensued, resulting in the near destruction of both armies on the beach and attrition during the retreat. Roughly 12000 soldiers out of the initial 30000 managed to escape the island alive, retreating safely to our boats, and began licking their wounds for the planned conquest of Crete. This would prove to be much tougher than initially expected, however the Ottoman patience and the willingness of its Sultans to sacrifice countless thousands for the conquest of a few acres is legendary.
In the meantime on the Continent, our army moved into Bosnia, engaging our enemy there and defeating them. In may 1449, we again unloaded our troops in Crete, attempting to secure control of the island. Once again, our armies were repulsed, though they suceeded in inflicting some casualties to the defenders... that was a start. Once the troops got back into our navy, we retreated to Alexandria, to prepare for another onslaught. The Venetians would not be allowed to hold us back from our destiny, we would do everything to take control of the Mediterannean Sea. In September, we sent an army to invade Ionia, defeating the Venetian army there, and starting the siege. Next month, Bosnia was captured and annexed as a part of our growing empire. This annexation would be enough to convince Milan to make peace with us, though Napoli and Mantua remained decided enemies. The annexation of Bosnia would however get us another enemy, one we could care less about: The state of Wurtemberg, which was too far from us to pose any kind of threat anyway. After defeating Bosnia, our army there moved back into Kosovo, where local rebels had seized the province.
May 1450 started with a rebellion in Bosnia, just as we were busy quelling one in Kosovo. It was also at this time that Ionia fell into our hand, and where we made another attempt to seize Crete. We failed, once again, to defeat the garrison there, however we had no intentions of giving up on our plan yet. October: We fought the Venetians in Crete again, being repulsed again by their veteran army. We moved back to Alexandria, preparing the next stage of our offensive on Crete, while defeating an invasion army by Venice in Kosovo.
We took back Kosovo, and as we did, Naples declared war on the Papal States, dragging the whole alliance behind him in this foolish conflict, which would prove a great benefit to us, as Venise would be force to tie its ressource fighting in Italia instead of fighting us.
It is too bad that our grand Monarch would not live to see the conclusion of the war. In February of 1450, Murad II died, replaced on the throne by Mehmed II Fatih, whose first act was to seize the command of our army in Kosovo and move into Dalmatia, defeating the Venetian there, and besieging the province. In the meantime, our fleet in the south would not lose its time. Picking up a reinforced army in Alexandria, and moving to pick another in the Gulf of Tobruk, it moved into position in the Cretan Sea to prepare another invasion of the island. At this time, Bavaria also entered a conflict against Venice and its allies, in outrage of its war against the Pope, quickly followed in successive months by other powers, such as Savoy and Genoa.
However Venice was determined not to leave us the control of the island. As we were preparing to unload, its fleet moved into the Cretan Sea and engaged ours there. Their combativity was admirable, as they defeated our navy and drove it back all the way into Morea. At this time, we would be seizing Dalmatia however. We would move onto Crete again, only to be driven back by the navy there once again. However, the Venetian made a stupid mistake: Expecting us not to continue our offensive on Crete until we achieved total victory. They not only moved their navy away from the sea surrounding the island, they also took the army defending it, presumably to move it back into Italy where the Venetian alliance was suffering hardships. And so it was that in May 1452, our troops would march into the island virtually unnopposed, with the only the fortress standing in their path.
By the end of the year, we had opened a Fine Arts Academy in Thrace, if only to prove that the Ottoman Empire was not only concerned by war. Strangely, in the following months, we would be plagued by rebels fighting for their religion: In Ionia, Dobrudja, Albania and other areas. We fought several battles against them, and the Venetian fleet, winning everytime, until in January of 1454 we finally captured Crete. In Thrace, we founded the Enderun, instituting a military college that would be the pride of the Ottoman military for years to come. This year would be characterised mostly by a number of successful if minor naval battles against Venice, allowing us to weaken their overall navy by picking on isolated parts of its fleet. In 1455, we loaded a massive army into our fleet, sailed all the way to Venice unopposed, and began to besiege their capital after a very, very bloody battle. Our Sultan instituted Great Military Reforms, bolstering our army again, setting the foundations for our future conquests. We won several battles in Veneto, however we could not hold indefinitely, and as an army of over 30000 mens marched again on Venice, our troops were driven back, the siege of the capital broken. The Venetian were not an easy prey, unlike many of our previous opponents. We loaded 2 armies in Ionia, sailed to Venice, picked up our derelict and fleeing army there, and moved back. Our armies were reorganised, and we attacked Corfu this time.
It would appear that the mistakes were not learnt from, however, as our first assault was a failure, and so was our grand combined assault the month after. We moved back, licked our wounds, assembled massive armies, and decided to plot a new strategy for the conquest of Corfu. One of our general came up with a brilliant idea, and we would see it tested out. At beginning of the month of December, our 1st army disembarked on Corfu, occupying the troops there for a while, though they were beginning to be hard pressed. As they were about to be driven out of the island again, the Imperial Army, and the Army of Syria both disembarked... on the opposite side of the island. The defenders, who were winning, found themselves trapped between three armies on the move, and were utherly destroyed, leaving no survivor. In May 1458, the province of Corfu was finally in our hand. The following years were marked by a succession of revolts crushed, naval battles against Venice, and the completion of 3 Refineries, to bolster our growing economy.
In 1463, the Mameluks declared independence from us, and our ally declared war on Algiers, we defeated the Mameluks in Alexandria, converted Kosovo, and moved to conquer back the Mameluks-held lands. We also sent an army to fight against Algiers. We captured Alexandria, captured Kabylia. Our ruler codified the Atam-Dedem Kanunu, providing a set of laws for our Empire to follow. We continued our offensive against Algiers, which was powerless to defend itself against us, while we continued crushing rebels on the home front. This war had to end soon....
The year was 1466, we had seized Al Djazir and Aures as well, however Tunisia made peace with them, and we were forced to move back.
NOTE: There are some blurry areas here, I'm trying to figure out what were the peace treaties with Venice and the Mameluks, reading the logs at this point is getting confusing. I believe I annexed back the Mameluks and took Ionia and Dalmatia from Venice, but I'm really not quite sure. I'll try to look again later, and post a clarification as soon as I figure out.