Khan Ahmad II was born after the great war, so when the city of Astrakhan gives in to his siege, it’s the first time he visits the city. Thirtyfive years have passed since Golden Horde lost the city to Shirvan. The years passed have not been good to the city, trade seems to have declined and the size of the city has not grown. The largest difference is that all nomads are gone, they have either moved up north to Burtasia or settled in the city.
The work to integrate the new provinces begin and it’s a strange time. Everyone old enough to remember the times before the great war is happy to once again belong to the Golden Horde and pays respect to Khan Ahmad II, the grandson of the great Khan Sayyid Ahmad I. But the majority of the population was born after the great war and have grown up in Shirvan. Khan Ahmad II decides to raise six mingghans in the new provinces and leaves the integration work in the hands of the drill officiers. The Khan feels uneasy in the city of Astrakhan and after he has made the arrangements for our traders to return he leaves.
At the same time, in 1515, Crimea decides to attack Moldavia, which is joined by Teutonic Order. Crimea takes the early initative and occupy Moldavia’s single province, but the war is turned upside down when Crimea is attacked by Poland (has inherited Lithuania). Khorasan, Qara Koyunlu, Nogai and Sibir come to Crimea’s rescue and a large war begins. Enormous armies march through our lands and throw themselves at a fast diminishing Polish army that gun them down with muskets. Once again the war is turned upside down when Bohemia attacks Poland. Soon after, Poland sign a peace treaty with Crimea and gets Voronezh. Meanwhile, Teutonic Order has shipped an army down to the Black Sea and now occupy several provinces. Also, Genoa takes advantage of the chaos and attack Crimea. After a short and very costly war Genoa can claim Kouban in a peace deal. In a final twist of the war, Teutonic Order decides to attack Poland instead and signs a peace deal with Crimea that forces them to release the province Tula to the new country of Ryazan. A very favorable peace deal for Crimea. At least it does seem so at the time.
In 1525, Poland is in turmoil and Voronezh and Kursk defect to Ryazan. The new country is allied with Sibir and soon Crimea, done rebuilding their army, decides to guarantee the independence of Ryazan. Two days later, a mongol messenger from the distant country of Golden Horde reaches Sultan Ivan of Ryazan with a declaration of war.
Khan Ahmad II's tactics are the same as in the war with Shirvan, and actually the same as in the great war, to fight the decisive battles on your own ground. Only when you have beaten all the main armies of your enemies will you venture into their land. One important ascpect is of course to use the terrain in your favour, but Khan Ahmad II now feels so sure he will win any battle that his first priority is to make sure there is a battle. So when the first Crimea army (4/2) marches to Sarai, the Khan lets them enter the province first and then attacks them with his full army (8/4) and demolish them. Ryazan was moving an army (4/3) towards Sarai, but now turns around in Lugansk and moves back to Voronezh. The Khan attacks with his entire army and reaches them just before they cross the border. This is a move that violates the tactics, but rather fight them know than after they have linked up with reinforcements. This is a far more costly battle for us. It is a convincingly victory, but most of our army have to return to Sarai in order to rest, while 4 mingghans of cavalry intercepts the retreating Ryazan army in Voronezh and finish them off.
Then the winter comes and the war takes a rest. Crimea is raising new troops in every province and we assume Ryazan does the same. The scouts haven't seen any troops from Sibir yet, but it is a long march down here. When the winter is over, we can't see any big Crimea army, but we know they must have at least 7-8 units waiting. We guess they are waiting for the new units to finish. The Khan decides to move in on their territory and start to siege Lugansk. The scouts then discover a small Ryazan army (2/2) in Voronezh and our cavalry goes after them. The cavalry finish them off and discover that Ryazan now is out of soldiers. We offer them a white peace and they accept. At the same moment, a Crimean army (5/2) appears and moves on the sieging army (1/2) in Lugansk. We have the rest of our army in Voronezh and Sarai and to not scare the Crimean army away we let them first attack our siege army before the rest of the army storm in and totally demolish them.
In the next phase of the war the major part of the army besiege Crimean provinces and fights off stray units. The rest of the army fights off small Sibir armies that trickles down through Kazan with only 2 or 3 units per army. It takes several years to control the entire Crimea and when the Khan finally storms the city of Bessarbia, the war has taken him to the borders of Hungary and Ottoman empire. In the peace negotiations, we claim the provinces of Bogutjar, Lugansk and Kaffa.
The war ends 1531. The return of Bogutjar into the empire of Golden Horde is the final revenge for the defeat in the great war of 1478-1482. Khan Ahmad II has restored the honours to his father Baraq I and his grandfather Sayyid Ahmad I. To claim Lugansk was an easy decision, since it's a border province to Sarai and will benefit from our national focus. However, to also claim Kaffa is more of a gamble. It is totally cut off from the main land and we have no ships at all. It is such a prize though that we could not leave it. It is a rich province and it has a Center of Trade. Studying the map, there is only one solution to the problem.