Chapter XVIII – Ming Restored
Mahmud III called for a Grand Council meeting on New Years Day, 1815. They discussed Turkey's next move for world domination. Among the possible targets were Nogai, Mongolia and the Turkish Khaganate. Military advisor Said Oruc, who was an excellent quartermaster, made a plea to attack Mongolia. Nobody objected and so the issue was settled. That Mongolia had no allies were pleasing news. Since diplomatic power was low, the casus belli was not overseas expansion but Holy War.
Furthermore, the Grand Council advised Mahmud to send colonists to Abitbi and Ojiba – two provinces in Colonial Canada.
A pretender wanted to overthrow King Taiding V of Mongolia and he had made quite some progress before the declaration of war but then the Turkish army arrived and the pretender was killed.
The Grand Council had also urged Mahmud to call for war against Kostroma and her ally Lithuania. Mahmud valued the input from his advisors and so a Jihad was declared on them too. The Teutons took care of Lithuania all by themselves. They really wanted that territory – at least so it seemed.
At the battle of Furdan the entire Mongolian army was killed. They had assaulted the fort of a province that had been occupied by that Mongolian pretender and therefore were low on moral when General Tayyar and his forces attacked them.
Turkey partially relied on mercenaries in order to safe manpower which was still not fully recovered. Mercenaries, however, were very cruel and the war against Kostroma had shown some exceptionally vile behavior in occupied provinces. The mercenaries were unsatisfied with their wages which is why they robbed the civilian population, executed people in public and installed a reign of terror. Extortion by means of terror and tortude had become commonplace and Turkish mercenaries were feared for around the world because the stories of their cruelties spread beyond the borders of the war. Sultan Mahmud had did not really care about them being cruel. He quoted a Latin saying: “Bellum se ipsum alet!” meaning The war feeds itself. Mahmud allowed the mercenaries to take what they want from the occupied provinces.
In a separate peace treaty Lithuania ceded four provinces including the valuable trade port Riga to the Teutons, leaving them with just their capital city Vilnius. A week later, in February of 1817, Kostroma was forced to cede all but one of its provinces to Turkey and her vassal Perm. Five provinces each went to Turkey and Perm.
The war with the Mongols was going well and 82% War Score had been reached allowing Turkey to annex a lot of territory but because the wise sultan did not want to overextend his realm he waited another two years before negotiations for a peace treaty began.
In the mean time, he declared war on the neighboring Turkish Khaganate and her vassal Golden Horde as well as her allies Nogai and Chagatai.
Even though the Golden Horde was quite large, the four powers had together a tiny army of just 49.000 men. Turkey and her subject had more than 1.300.000 infantry men. An unequal war.
The Teutons faced internal conflicts beginnin in December of 1817. These lasted for many years and caused next to famines and plagues also rebellions. Some even tried to assisanted the Teutonic Hochmeister Paul I.
At the battle of Almaty, 60.000 Malabari soldiers annihiliated the entire army of Turkish Khaganate and her allies/subject. This made the remaining war quite easy. All that was left to do was carpet sieging their provinces and waiting for overextension to get down.
In August of 1818, Mahmud was preparing his armies to invade Russia. The two countries had a truce that was going to expire in late October. Many battalions were stationed along the Turkish-Russian and Permian-Russian border. In November the war was declared.
Malabar was integrated in February of 1819. Unfortunately, they had failed to core all their provinces which increased Turkey's overextension by another 70% and therefore postponed the signing of the peace treaty with the Mongols. Furthermore the integrations of Sweden and Shan were canceled in 1820 because of exactly the same problem.
Turkey was involved in too many wars and so when the truces with Bengal and Shun expired wars were not declared on them, allowing them to form a military coalition against Turkey.
In September of 1820, five years after the declaration of war, Turkey finally signed a peace treaty with Mongolia. This increased Turkey's overextension once again but decreased the size of Mongolia by a lot.
Mahmud died in April of 1821 and his sister Zeyneb became sultana of Turkey. Her son Mehmed became her heir. Zeyneb quickly ended the war with the Russians. The treaty stated that Russia ceded Mezen and Arkhangelsk to Perm; Staraya and Inkeri to Teutons; Ustuzhna, Ladoga, Bezhetsk, Torzok, Uglich and Onega to Sweden; Upper Oka, Elets and Obdorks to Turkey.
Zeyneb also ended the war with the Turkish Khagnate. Turkey annexed all cores belonging to Chagatai – some of them were held by the Golden Horde. Armenia, Kashmir, Kazak and Khiva were released as independent nations. Nogai was annexed by Perm. Turkey used the Chagatai cores to release them as vassal.
Turkey began integrating her vassal Ming. This seemed safe without causing overextension problems. It was estimated that it was going to take ten years. To continue increasing Ming's size, an anti-coalition war was declared on Bengal and Shun.
Two years into the war, 100% War Score was reached after all of Bengal had been occupied for a while but Turkey wanted to occupy more of Shun before making peace. The goal was to reconquer all cores which rightfully belonged to Ming. Once again the realm's manpower pool was depleted. More than 400.000 recruits were needed just to fully reinforce the armies and more than 2.100.000 men were needed to recover the manpower pool. Most of the casualties came form assaulting provincial fortifications.
In September of 1824, Turkey made peace with the coalition. Shun returned twenty three provinces to Ming, ceded four provinces to Shan and three to Turkey. Furthermore, Bengal ceded two provinces to Turkey. Finally Ming had been restored to its former glory!
Two months later, Turkey declared war on Kostroma and her ally Lithuania. The Russians refused to join the war even though they were the Defender of the Orthodox faith. The war was over by January. Lithuania was annexed by the Teutons, Kostroma by Turkey.
Turkey began integrating her vassal Teutons after signing the peace treaty. They had grown as large as they could.
Because Turkey had a truce with every independent country, the next two years were used regenerate manpower and to let the vassals core their provinces. Perm was suffering from negative stability. The reason for it remained unknown to Zeyneb but it caused some serious rebellions in Perm that had to be put down by force. Furthermore the vassalization of Meissen was ended. They were following a heathen faith and had refused to convert.
A few colonies were established in North America. Every uncolonized province had to be colonized eventually.
Zeyneb also gave orders to integrate Dai Viet into the realm.
In September of 1827, the truce with Russia had expired and in Novemebr war was declared. The goal was to annex them. They had been such an annoyance for too many years. It was going to take some time though to win the sieges of these lvl 9 forts.
The following year Mongolia became the target of another war. Zeyneb had called for a Jihad against them.
Amazing news arrived from Mongolia: The country was bankrupt! Bankruptcy decreased moral of all forts making it super easy to assault them.
A third simultaneous war was declared on Kashmir in March of 1829. Kashmir had only recently been liberated by Turkish forces but Chagatai had laid claim on their territory. Kashmir lost one of its two provinces to Chagatai. Armenia was also annexed by Chagatai.
Peace was made with Mongolia which ceded sixteen provinces to Turkey and one to Chagatai, leaving them with just three provinces. The war with Russia was going ok well but progress was made only slowly given that all these forts were very hard to take. Especially Kashin seemed impossible to conquer. Not only did that province hav a lvl 9 fort, it also had a march making every siege phase over 90 days long. However, 26% war score had already been reached and the fighting continued...
Diplomatic map of the world in 1830
A few comments:
Less than 35 years to go! The final showdown is near.
Those Russian forts are so hard to conquer... They don't contribute anything to the game. It just makes sieges very, very long but it doesn't really help the Russians in any way.
I'd say my chances for a succesful WC are 95% by now. Something really werird would have to happen to stop me from completing it.
Not sure exactly if I will complete it next chapter or the following. We will soon find out