![]() ![]() By the end of the First World War in 1918, Muslims in the Mediterranean region found themselves overseen by Europeans in newly created states established by the League of Nations from former Ottoman territories. The Ottomans never recovered from these defeats, and for the next 200 years their empire slowly imploded. Most importantly, John Sobieski, the King of Poland, who’d become famous fighting the Ottomans in Ukraine, promised to lead an army to relieve the city. The dukes of Bavaria, Saxony and Lorraine signed on. He obtained money and moral support from Pope Innocent XI and set up a coalition of the willing to defend Vienna. Leopold, meanwhile, wasn’t waiting passively for the sword to fall. (Sounds familiar, doesn’t it?) In the spring of 1683, the sultan journeyed to Belgrade to review his army and declare holy war against the infidels. The sultan was persuaded a third campaign against Vienna would succeed because the French, who were jealous of the growing power of the Hapsburgs, promised not to interfere. He pointed out that efforts to conquer more of Hungary had been stymied by the Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I, the King of Hungary and hereditary ruler of the Hapsburg domains of Austria and Bohemia. ![]() ![]() In 1681, Kara Mustafa Pasha, Grand Vizier to Ottoman Sultan Mehmed IV, convinced the sultan to scrap a peace treaty between the empire and the Hapsburg rulers of Austria. Which is why they tried again 150 years later. The door to Germany and the European heartland would have been wide open to Islam if they’d succeeded. Then in 1529, and again in 1566, the Ottomans tried unsuccessfully to take Vienna. In 1526, with Bulgaria already under Muslim control, Sultan Suleiman added Hungary to his list of conquests. They made it their own capital.Īfter that a campaign to conquer the rest of Europe was all but inevitable. Finally, in 1453, the Turks gained the greatest prize of all - the Byzantine capital of Constantinople, now Istanbul. Athens, Bosnia and the Crimea soon fell into their hands. They defeated the Serbs at the Battle of Kosovo in 1389. They grabbed Thessalonica from the Venetians in 1387. In 1354, the Ottomans took advantage of civil war in the Byzantine Empire to seize the peninsula of Gallipoli on the European side of the Dardanelles, the long narrow strait that divides the Balkans from Asia Minor. The Ottomans entered Europe in the 14th century, imposing their rule on the Eastern Mediterranean and the Balkans. A people is already upon you, loving death as you love life.” If you refuse to do either, you have only yourself to blame. In the first Muslim foray into Christian Iraq, the Battle of Chains in 634, the Arab general Khalid ibn al Walid, offered the population an ultimatum: “Accept the faith (of Islam) and you are safe otherwise pay tribute. The basic idea was submit or die, or, if they were lucky, accept second-class status in Muslim societies. They began a campaign of conquest against the Byzantine Empire, the successor to the Roman Empire, and the Persians’ Sassanid Empire. After Mohammed’s death, his successors, including Abu Bakr, the first caliph and Mohammed’s father-in-law, pursued the Prophet’s idea that Islam must rule the world. He had been the ruler of a small sliver of land known as the Hijaz in what is now northwest Saudi Arabia. The Islamic tide began to rise in 632 when the Prophet Mohammed died in the holy city of Medina. This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below. Still, it’s hard to deny that certain events - and certain men - have been pivotal in saving the civilization western intellectuals disparage. The notion of “decisive battle,” like the “Great Man” theory of history, is out of favour among postmodern intellectuals, who, in catering to the fashions of multiculturalism and the current anti-western climate of opinion, tend to disregard “famous victories” of Western history. In the politically incorrect language of 19th-century historian Friedrich von Schlegel, “the arm of Charles Martel saved and delivered the Christian nations of the West from the deadly grasp of all-destroying Islam.” The Battle of Tours in 732 AD, in which Charles Martel and his Frankish army defeated the Saracen forces south of Paris, prevented Islam from dominating western Europe. The victory arguably gave Europeans time to save the cultural inheritance of the collapsing Roman Empire. Activate your Online Access Now Article contentĪ thousand years later in western France, the Roman nobleman Flavius Aetius bested the marauding hordes of Attila the Hun at the Battle of Chalons in 451 AD. If you are a Home delivery print subscriber, unlimited online access is included in your subscription. Manage Print Subscription / Tax Receipt.National Capital Region's Top Employers. ![]()
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