Mameluks reunite the peoples of the Prophet

[unmerged(11105)]

I've played EU for several months now, about time for an AAR... Don't expect too much of a story line, I'm more concerned with strategy.

I haven't played Mameluks before, but I've noticed how the Turkey AI often annexes them by 1520s. This isn't far from real history: Turkish troops captured Damascus in 1516, and after defeating Mameluk forces at Al-Raydaniyya near Cairo in 1517 the Mameluk Empire ceased to exist.

EU options: Very Hard/ Normal, missions OFF. patch 1.10, IGC.

Grand Objective: re-unite Muslim world under Mameluk rule. This includes not only the Sunni and Shiite countries as at 1492, but all the provinces that were once part of the Arab-Islamic empire, that by 850 stretched from the Atlantic to the Indus. Some of these provinces eg in southern Spain, were in Christian control by 1492.

Self-imposed restrictions (to bring some historical accuracy, and prevent this from being a Yoghurt style BB conquer the world crusade):
1. Mameluks will only form alliances with Sunni and Shiite countries. There will be NO alliances with any Christian countries.
2. Religous tolerance sliders will always be max for Sunni and Shiite, and always minimum possible for any Christian religions. If this gives problems with rebellions in Aleppo and Lebanon....so be it.

In the next post I will set out the opening situation for Marmeluks, and set some limited objectives for the first 30 years of game play. The initial objective will be to avoid being overrun by Turkey!

 

[unmerged(10894)]

Hey Vandem, Long time no see. Mamelukes can be easy if you not the AI plays. Just station armies in Cairo and wait 4 the attrition(sp?) to kick in.

 

[unmerged(7347)]

Nice one vandem and particulary intresting that you wont form alliances with christians. I have played the Mams a couple of times and I have to admitt that the Turks are tuff to beat. They got the manpower, the will and the generals to give you pain... On the otherhand, when I allied with Venice and other nations in Turkeys back, tings turned around quikly to the Mams favour, but with out this option it will be interesting reading this AAR

I also like your deal, never allowing christians live peacefully inside your borders... put that crescent moon high in the sky!

 

[unmerged(9191)]

Intresting or quick...hmmm

HE NEEDS GENERAL BoB.

But in all seiousness you have to ally with Persia AND Iraq asap...crimea if possible would be anohter great ally for you.

Another tip would be wait till Poland DoW's them. They usually get in 5 year wars in a tiny little region and you can simply take whatever lands you want

 

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Bocaj: the idea of stationing armies in Cairo and using attrition as a weapon is very good, as you will see in the next post.
Imperial Army: I am using IGC, so there is no Iraq.


1492 Opening Situation

Mameluks open in the IGC with one major problem - Turkey. IIRC Turkey have shields on a number of Mameluk provinces, large armies, and a couple of strong field commanders.

The Marmeluk leader Al Kansur is also a leader in battle (5/1/4), and the starting army is a useful 43k incl 10 cannon. Navy however is nil. Income is 13d/month, stability +2. Tech levels are all low (1). We are surrounded by minor Sunni countries, these will give us the opportunity to grow by military annexation. One of these Sunni states, The Hedjaz, is our vassal.


Strategic objectives 1492 - 1512

1. join in defensive alliance against Turkey, preferably with Persia
2. use armies in defensive role in expected wars vs Turkey. If defeated by Turkey we need to minimise loss of provinces
3. build land tech levels and army strength to prepare for future wars vs Turkey in 1520s-30s
4. militarily annex one Sunni state


The game starts with all income going into land tech, and we wait for our first diplomat to begin wooing the Persians...

 

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Reign of Al Kunsur - part I, 1492 - 1495

July 1492 ... we were still waiting for the first diplomat to become available, and then bad news arrived! Turkey has declared war. We have no allies yet, so there isn't much to do but wait for the Turkish onslaught. Al Kansur gathers troops near Cairo.

1st Turk-Marmeluk war 1492-95, the great escape

1492
* Turkish troops under Hadim Sadin take Aleppo and Damascus (Syria).

1493
*Turkish advance continues, Acre (Judea) and Jerusalem (Samaria) fall.
*1st battle of Cairo. Hadim Sadin's Turkish army is reduced from 35k to 26k by attrition crossing the Sinai, and is met by Al Kansur near Cairo with 50k Marmeluk troops. Al Kansur wins a mighty victory.
* 2nd battle of Cairo. 2nd Turkish army led by Hadim Ali crosses Sinai with 35k troops and engages Al Kansur's army of 53k troops. The Marmeluk morale wilts, and the remaining 36k flee, leaving Cairo under seige.
* Cairo falls to Hadim Ali, but his 14k army is annihilated by Al Kansur's Marmeluk 36k army near Assuan (Nile).
* We refuse generous peace offer from Turkey (-Aleppo, -Syria), and lose -1 stability.

1494
* Beirut (Lebanon) falls to Turkey. Now 6 provinces + 1 colony are under Turkish control. Our monthly income has dropped by 40% to only 8d/month!
* Al Kansur beseiges Cairo, and defeats several relief Turkish armies.

1495
* Cairo is retaken by our troops.
* Turkey make another generous peace offer, -Judea - 25d. We accept gratefully, with 5 provinces + 1 colony under their control this is a bargain!

[This was a lucky escape. I haven't seen the AI ever make a peace offer this generous (but then again I don't often loose 6 provinces to an AI enemy)]

With a peace agreement with Turkey in place there is now an opportunity to use our military strength against a minor Sunni state ... more of this in the next post ...

 

[Lord E]

Great start keep it comming

 

[Warhead990]

Yeah, make sure you take capture Dehli too, you know, for the glory of Cairo.

But I like the style of it so far. Now go back in there and annex some small countries in true Mameluke style, then strike at the ottomans once North Africas under your belt.

Just my 2 cents though

 

[unmerged(7347)]

Nice going and make sure of that the holy cities is under your controll

 

[unmerged(10894)]

Sinai's a good attrition plan, aye. Keep it up.

 

[unmerged(10069)]

Never played the Mams myself, but seeing how they usually fare under AI regime I imagine this one will be tough! Cool restrictions you put on yourself, vandem! Will you try to go to war and capture christian provinces or will you just try to unite the Moslem world?

 

[unmerged(11105)]

Originally posted by Perrygreat
Will you try to go to war and capture christian provinces or will you just try to unite the Moslem world?

No Christian dogs under Mameluk rule if I can help it.

For anybody interested in a different view of Middle Eastern history try Bernard Lewis' "The Muslim Discovery of Europe", Norton, 1982.

 

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Reign of Al Kansur part II, 1495 - 1520

With a peace agreement with Turkey in place there is now an opportunity to use our military strength against a minor Sunni state ... the Hasfid Empire is the obvious target - they are not in an alliance with any other country. If we annex we will worsen our relations with other Sunni countries, but for us this may be a useful bonus in our campaign to reunite all Moslem provinces under Mameluk rule.


Mameluk - Hafsid war, 1495-98. The start of Mameluk expansion

1496
* Al Kansur + 25k beseige Tripolitania
1497
*Tripolitania falls, Tunis beseiged
* Al Kansur suffers from ill health, relinquishes role of army commander. Army now commanded by Adrar (1/0/1)
[this is how I explain the random event "Al Kansur dies" - this removes the military leader Al Kansur from the game, but the monarch Al Kansur remains. I assume this is a bug in the EU1 event engine, the "death" event should have removed both entries from the save game file. I have seen this problem before while playing IGC. I assume that the EU2 event engine fixes this]
1498
* Tunis falls, Hafsid Empire annexed. Mameluks gain Hafsid fleet of 2 warships and 15 galleys.


Peace 1498 - 1520

After this minor expansion our immediate strategy is to prepare for the next DoW from Turkey. As Persia is allied to several Christian countries including England, we make an alliance with Algiers and Oman in 1498. Hopefully our new neighbour Algiers will send troops to assist us against the Turk.

In 1498 our land tech is raised to level 3, the same as Turkey. Investment is switched to stability. By 1500 stability has been raised from +1 to +3, and investment is switched back to land tech.

There is an unexpectedly long period of peace, as we are waiting until we have an historic military leader before resuming our military campaigns against minor Sunni states, and Turkey seems to be reluctant to DoW against either us or its (Christian) Balkan neighbours. During this peace period our army is often involved is quelling rebel in our Christian provinces of Aleppo and Lebanon. In one outbreak we even manage to loose 10k cavalry before defeating the rebel scum!

In 1515 we notice that the Persia/Eng/etc alliance is broken, we immediately break the Marm/Algiers/Oman alliance (stability falls to +2), send a 100d gift to improve relations with Persia to +67, and then gratefully accept the Persian offer to join a Persia/Crimea alliance. This should be an excellent defensive alliance against the Turk.

In 1520 Al Kansur dies, and we have a new monarch: Turman. In the next post I'll review the Mameluk results during Al Kansur's reign against objectives and restrictions...

 

[unmerged(8545)]

If your goal is to re-unite the islamic world, your task may be more daunting then you imagined.

Islamic kingdoms existed on Sumatra and Java in the 15th/16th centuries, through Arab and Indian traders, though local tribes often still resisted the new religion.
So don't forget to conquer the Dutch/Portugese settlements in Indonesia....

 

[unmerged(11105)]

good point. perhaps I should say that the objective is to reunite the Arab Moslem world.

...and now back to the AAR...

Review of Al Kansur's rule 1492-1520

There were 4 immediate objectives for this period

1. join in defensive alliance against Turkey, preferably with Persia
2. use armies in defensive role in expected wars vs Turkey. If defeated by Turkey we need to minimise loss of provinces
3. build land tech levels and army strength to prepare for future wars vs Turkey in 1520s-30s
4. militarily annex one Sunni state

and we acheived them all!
* We now have an alliance with Persia.
* There was one war vs Turkey, where only one province was surrendered after Turkish troops rampaged through the Middle East
* land tech levels are now equal to Turkey
* Hasfid Empire (2 provinces) was annexed

and we kept within our restrictions of not allying with Christian countries, and minimising religous tolerance for Christian religions.



Reign of Turman 1520-?

Our new monarch Turman (5/3/3) is also a leader in battle (3/3/3/1). The seige bonus will be useful for military annexations - there are some minor Sunni countries that will fall under the Shiite sword soon.

Objectives for first 20 years of Turman's reign are
1. use alliance with Persia as a defensive shield against likely Turkish DoWs. Only use Mameluk troops against Turkey after Persian troops are defeated. Try for status quo in peace settlements vs Turkey.
2. use Mameluk troops under Turman to sack and annex minor Sunni countries.
3. maintain investment in land tech, to keep at same levels as Turkey, any balance to go to infrastucture to prepare for promotin of bailiffs/ chief judges.

The first act of Turman is a DoW vs Aden (weakest Sunni state, no current allies). More on this in the next post...

 

[Lord E]

Sounds like great goals keep going this way

 

[unmerged(10894)]

Yep, good stuff.

 

[unmerged(11105)]

Reign of Turman part 1, 1520-1531

War vs Aden 1520 -1523
After a major battle in Yemen in 1520, this was a slow campaign of seiges across the inhospitable Arabian peninsular, with a 4k Mameluk cavalry forces moving ahead of the seige army to scatter any newly consripted enemy troops. A 8k + 17 cannon seige army under Turman conquered the third and final fortess in 1523, and Aden was annexed. A useful bonus was the ex-Aden navy of 4 warshiops and 2 transports, so we now have two small navies without ever building a ship!

Relations with other Sunni nations suffer from the Aden annexation, but there is still no aggression from Turkey. We decide to take advantage of Turkey's non-aggression and Turman's army continues its Arabian campaign after a DoW vs Oman...

1st Mameluk - Sunni war, 1523-1526

1523
* Turman's army beseiges and takes Salalah (Dofar)

1524
* Sawriqah (Masirah) also falls to Mameluk troops
* Turkey (+ allies Wallachia and Algiers) DoW vs Mameluks. We now face a war on three fronts! Our ally Persia supports us, but we are faced with a decision to either continue the annexation attempt vs Oman, or withdraw troops to meet the Turkish challenge.
* We offer a white peace vs Oman, accepted. Turman's army starts withdrawl.
* several major Turkish-Persian battles in Syria, Persians defeated

1525
* Damascus (Syria) falls to Turkey, but Turman + 10k army + 25 cannon retake Acre (Judea).

1526
* Turman leads 15k army through Northern Persia in a futile attempt to beseige Anatolian provinces, while Suleyman I's troops and another large Turkish army retake Acre, and take Beirut (Lebanon) and Aleppo. Algierian troops take Tunis.
* Turkey offers peace -21d - Syria, we gratefully accept, as there are now 4 Mameluk provinces under Turkish/Algerian control.


peace, 1526-1531

We build troops and invest in land tech, preparing for another war vs Turkey - next time we will have troops ready and waiting in the Middle East. We suffered in the 1st Mameluk-Sunni war by
1. having our battle leader in Oman when Turkey invaded, and
2. not having enough troops available to fight a pitched battle against the leading Turkish army.

In 1531 the five year peace with Turkey ended, and the Turks DoWed again. This time we were waiting, more next post...

 

[unmerged(9191)]

Tough break there. But you gotta escape when you can and wait for your next chance. Too bad you had to get a white peace with Oman though....I think you could've atleast gotten some money.

 

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Reign of Turman, part 2, 1531-1540

The six month war, 1531-32

after 5 years of peace the Turks attacked us again, but this time Turman + 17k troops + 31 cannon were waiting in Aleppo, and immediately moved north to besiege Alexandretta (Adana). Two other Mameluk armies of 16k mixed infantry/cavalry moved into Judea and Syria to defeat newly consripted Turkish armies, and in 1532 Alexandretta fell to Turman. Even though Suleyman I was marching south across Anatolia with a 40k army, the Turkish diplomats offered a peace, giving up Adana. We accepted gratefully. A short war is a good war, given the current economic and manpower disparity we have against Turkey. Our Persian allies were still busy raising troops as we signed with the Turk...

With a freshly signed peace treaty with Turkey, our gaze turned once again to our smaller Sunni neighbours. Oman had escaped earlier in Turman's reign, but not so this time.

Mameluk-Oman war, 1534-37

Our campaign tactics we similar to those used successfully against Aden. After winning an initial pitched battle, Turman led successive seiges against enemy fortresses, while a 4k cavalry force patrolled the northern provinces in Oman, defeating any newly conscripted enemy troops. The only difference in the campaigns was the need for a navy. Oman contolled the island of Zanzibar, off the East African coast. We built a navy of 9 ships (7/0/2) to convoy a 10k seige army. Our navy was unchallenged as it sailed south down the African coast, and Zanzibar was the last province to fall in 1537.

Only after we annexed Oman did we realise that we had avoided meeting (and certain defeat by) Oman's 34 ship navy. Why this hadn't been used to protect the seas around Zanzibar we will never know. We gratefully accepted these ships into the Mameluk colours. This now makes it 3 navies from annexation, zero from construction.

After the annexation of Oman we again invested heavily in land tech and new armies, waiting for the next outbreak of Marmeluk-Turkish hostilities. The next decade would see almost continuous war, and the start of a period of Turkish expansion (some of it at our expense!)... more in the next post.