And that's not counting in that ATL, Greece would've just eaten up a good chunk more of Turkey, including the Straits, which really won't endear them to the Turks.
Pride Goes Before a Fall: A Revolutionary Greece Timeline
- Thread starter Earl Marshal
- Start date
By the same logic from the Greek point of view in 1930 Turkey had caused the deaths of hudrends of thousands of Greeks and systematically expelled something in the order of 1.5 million between 1913 and 1922. So it should be really preparing for a war of revenge to resettle among other things as many refugees as it could in Thrace and Constantinople. Instead Venice Los and Kemal were clever enough to sign a treaty of friendship that year that four years later was followed by military alliance.
That's not adressing my point. Greece in that ATL will have swallowed up yet another big chunk of Turkey in a few years time, including their capital. What reason does Turkey have to believe that Greece, or it's allies are going to stop them in 20 years time if Greece feels they need more room?
Not the capital at least in my scenario. I'd expect Constantinople to remain out of Greek control in almost every scenario of Greek victory in Asia Minor. Probably some kind of League territory that technically still belongs to Turkey. But anyway that's not your question. The only reason will be that after the alt call it 1921 there are no Greek populations to the east of the border so Greece has neither incentive nor excuse any more, both countries have ended with the grand majority of their respective nations within their borders. Would that be sufficient? It was in OTL. I think you can very reasonably argue it will not in the ATL. Or not. It all depends on factors like who runs the respective states and other external issues (Mussolini''s Italy alternatively courting and having designs on both nations for example)
Seen, remaining out of Greek hands.
In theory, yes, but like I said, Turkey doesn't know that? For all they knew, Greece is going to rest for a bit, and come back on in to finish the job. And I suspect there's going to be figures on the Greek side urging the same thing....
Why would Greece want a chunk of underdeveloped land full of hostile people? Megali Idea was about a state that would incluude all areas populated by Greeks(how that last bit was defined depended on who you asked, but it did not include areas with no Greeks at all), not about room. And why would the powers allow Greece to "finish the job"?Nobody wants Greece to become too powerful. If alt-Greece decides it wants all of Anatolia, it will become common knowledge, just like it was common knowledge before that it had aspirations over the Greek-populated parts of the Ottoman Empire. Otherwise Turkey would have no more reason to fear than Greece feared for the Eastern Aegean before Turkey started claiming it.
Chapter 37: Crisis in the East
Chapter 37: Crisis in the East
The Battle of the Giaour and Hassan
The end of the Greek War of Independence did not result in the lasting peace that the Ottoman Empire expected, far from it in fact. Although hostilities with the Russians and Greeks had ceased with the signing of the Treaty of Adrianople in September 1829 and the Treaty of London in May 1830, fighting would unfortunately continue in every corner of the Empire. Some groups wished to establish themselves as independent nations separate from the Empire, others simply wanted to carve out privileges for themselves and curtail the various reforms that Sultan Mahmud had struggled for so long to enact. Surprisingly, the borders with Greece, Persia, and Russia would prove to be the most peaceful over the coming decade as internal unrest tore at the very fabric of the Ottoman Empire.
Muhammad Ali, the self-appointed Khedive of Egypt, had been especially busy since he abandoned the war with the Greeks in 1827 as he attempted to establish his grip over the Hejaz, the Najd, and the Sudan. Although they had been conquered long before, they remained rebellious and resistant to the rule of Cairo. Nowhere was this more evident than in the Arabian Peninsula. After Ibrahim and his men departed for Greece in 1824, the Saudis wasted no time in returning to power in the Najd. Under the leadership of Turki bin Abdullah bin Muhammad, the Saudis quickly ousted the meager Egyptian garrisons left behind in the region and managed to retake the cities of Diriyah and Riyadh from the forces of Muhammad Ali. With this act, Turki bin Abdullah bin Muhammad had established the Second Emirate of Najd, it would not last long.
The uprising had thoroughly embarrassed Muhammad Ali and remained a blight upon his prestige, one he acted to remove posthaste. With his forces freed from the war in Greece with the Treaty of Alexandria in 1827, Muhammad Ali immediately dispatched his son to Arabia once again to deal with the rebellious Arabs. Though they put up a determined resistance, the Saudis fell beneath Ibrahim Pasha and his armies, and the Najd was subjugated once more expanding Muhammad Ali’s realm from Alexandria in the North to Khartoum in the South, and from outskirts of Tobruk in the West to the ruins of Diriyah in the East. Turki bin Abdullah bin Muhammad and his family were captured and sent to Cairo in chains effectively putting an end to the Second Emirate of the Najd. While some Saudis would continue fighting, by 1830 the region was generally pacified and returned to Muhammad Ali’s control.
Still, this was not enough to sate the ambitions of Muhammad Ali, he remained tempted by the allure of a far greater bounty, a bounty that sat on his doorstep to the North, a bounty by the name of Syria. The Eyalets of Damascus, Sidon, Tripoli, and Aleppo were among the wealthiest and most populous provinces in the Empire and would serve as the crowning achievement for the Khedive of Egypt.[1] Adding Syria to his already impressive demesne would undoubtedly make Muhammad Ali and his dynasty the greatest powerbrokers in the entire Ottoman Empire. He only needed to reach out and take it. Fortunately for the Khedive, the Empire now loomed on the edge of collapse.
Nearly nine years of constant war, rebellions, unrest, and conflict had drained the coffers and pools of manpower available to the Ottoman Empire. Defeat after defeat, suffered first at the hands of the Greeks, then by the Allied Powers at Cesme, and finally by the Russians at Kars, Erzurum, Provadiya and Adrianople sapped the Ottoman Sultan’s resolve and weakened his military might both on land and at sea. Greece had gained its independence, Serbia had achieved its autonomy, the Danubian Principalities were leaning closer to Russia every day, Algiers had been conquered by the French, and Tripolitania and Tunisia continued to drift further away from the control of the Porte. Muhammad Ali of Egypt had even taken advantage of the war with the Greeks to strengthen his own position within the Empire, and now he stood poised to take even more. However, something of a more immediate concern to the Sultan were the recent developments out of Albania and Bosnia, regions which up till now had been extremely loyal and faithful to the Porte.
Discontent had been growing in the Balkan Sanjaks of the Ottoman Empire for years following the destruction of Ali Pasha of Ioannina in 1822. Ali Pasha, like Muhammad Ali, had been a great magnate of the Empire, one whose power and influence reached from Shkoder in the North to the Morea in the South. It is alleged that his armies of Albanians and Greeks reached as high as 50,000 men, and his immense wealth dwarfed that of even Sultan Mahmud himself. Despite his humble origins he was a man of art and philosophy praised for his brilliance by the likes of Lord Byron and Edward Trewlany, but he was also responsible incredible acts of brutality and cruelty during his reign in Ioannina.[2] Of all the Sultan’s vassals in the Balkans, Ali Pasha was the most powerful and the most willful by far. His power deeply concerned Sultan Mahmud and so he sought to destroy him. He soon received a golden opportunity.
Ali Pasha of Ioannina
In 1819, a cousin of Ali Pasha by the name of Ishmael had fled to Constantinople after a dispute with the Pasha of Ioannina and soon came into the service and protection of the Sultan. When several Albanians attempted to murder Ismael the following February, the assassins were quickly captured, interrogated, and then killed after revealing they were in the employ of Ali Pasha. Armed with a convenient excuse, Mahmud stripped Ali of his titles, appointed Ishmael the Pasha of Ioannina in his stead, and ordered him to arrest his overbearing cousin. Ali Pasha predictably refused to surrender and revolted sparking a war that pitted much of Albania against the Porte.
The revolt of Ali Pasha started well enough for the former Pasha of Ioannina. He dispatched envoys to the Powers calling for help, he allowed the Souliotes to return to their valley as part of an arrangement for their aid, and he purchased mercenaries and stockpiled supplies for a coming fight. His army some 15,000 strong under the command of his lieutenant Omer Vrioni was positioned on the main road to Ioannina in the pass of Mestovo, another army under the command of the Klepht Odysseus Androutsos defended Livadeia and Central Greece against the Ottomans, while his sons Mukhtar and Veli defended the North and South of Epirus respectively. Another thing working to his benefit was the poor supply situation and equally poor leadership of Ishmael Pasha who dithered away the months with his feckless strategies.
Soon though, Ali Pasha’s allies abandoned him. Omer Vrioni and the Albanians sought clemency with the Sultan and left Ali Pasha by the thousands. The Greeks similarly withdrew their support for Ali Pasha when the Greek War of Independence erupted in 1821. Most problematic of all for Ali Pasha was the replacement of Ishmael Pasha by the more competent Khursid Pasha who quickly moved against Ioannina and put Ali Pasha under siege. By the Summer of 1821, even his sons had deserted him leaving Ali Pasha with only the castle of Ioannina and a few hundred men. After a year-long siege, Ali Pasha finally surrendered under a guarantee of clemency and exile in early January 1822. Instead, he was betrayed by the Ottomans and executed ending his threat to the Sultan once and for all.
The Head of Ali Pasha of Ioannina offered to the Sultan Mahmud II
The destruction of Ali Pasha terrified the magnates of the Ottoman Empire who had grown powerful and rich off the weakness of the Porte, as the attempts by Mahmud to strengthen the Government threatened their own privileges and powers. These feelings were worsened by the abolition of the Janissaries and the subsequent reforms initiated by Sultan Mahmud II in 1826 which only confirmed their earlier suspicions regarding the Sultan and his intrigues. Power was slowly being centralized within the Porte and the Sultan, and the autonomy of the provinces were slowly being reduced. With the Janissaries destroyed, Mahmud turned his attention to the reduction of the Bektashi Order and the elimination of its followers in the Balkans. The Sultan cracked down on corruption, he reformed the Timar/Ziamet system, he confiscated property of known traitors, he abolished the Sipahis, and he diminished the powers of the Pashas. Still the notables of the Empire did not rebel in the vain hope that the Sultan would cease his reforms and return to the traditional ways of the Empire, they were to be greatly disappointed.
The final straw came during the Russo-Turkish War. During the winter months of 1828 and 1829, Albanian beys had gathered in the city of Berat to discuss among other things the modernization policies of Sultan Mahmud and the centralization of the Porte. Both policies came at their expense as the autonomy and privileges they had enjoyed for generations were gradually stripped from them and vested in the Central Government. The leader of this meeting was an Albanian bey by the name Ismail Qemail of Vlora who continued to express loyalty to the Porte and the Sultan while also withholding men and arms from the war with Russia. By allowing the Turks to suffer the brunt of the losses in the war with Russia, the Albanians, and the Bosnians to a lesser extent, hoped the Sultan would comprise with them in return for their support in the war.
Their behavior was not portrayed in the best light to the Grand Vizier Khosref Pasha who personally traveled to Berat in January to arrest Ismail Bey and several of his followers for their supposed acts of sedition. Though Ismail Bey surrendered himself peacefully, many of his followers did not as the Albanians mistook the Ottoman presence as an attack and defended themselves in kind. When the fighting finally came to an end a few minutes later, over a hundred civilians and soldiers were killed in the mishap including Ismail Bey when he tried to intervene. Rather than pacifying the Albanians, this act incensed them and threatened to plunge the whole region into war once more. The Ottoman response was not forth coming due to the resources needed in the wars with Russia and Greece. Ultimately, it would take over a year before an Ottoman army finally arrived in Albania to restore order in July 1830.
Rather than force the Albanians into conflict, however, the Ottomans invited the beys to meet with the Sultan’s representatives in Monastir where they would hear their complaints and work to reach an agreement amiable to both sides. To that end, the three strongest beys of Southern Albania, Veli Bey, Arslan Bey, and Zylyftar Bey Poda all traveled to Monastir to treat with the Sultans emissaries. To their horror, the meeting was nothing more than a trap meant to lure them in and kill them. In the ensuing battle, over 300 Albanian beys and their guards were killed along with several Ottoman soldiers. Of the three leading Beys, only Arslan Bey managed to escape with his life and was soon forced to flee to Ioannina where he raised the flag of revolt.[3]
Massacre of the Albanian Beys
Arslan Bey was joined several months later by Mustafa Bushatli Pasha of Shkoder and the Bosnian Captains, chief among them Husein Gradascevic. The Bosnians like the Albanians, had become alarmed at the Sultan’s centralizing efforts which cut away at their autonomy and powers. Most damning of all, however, was the cessation of several traditionally Bosnian municipalities to the newly formed Principality of Serbia under the Treaty of Adrianople in 1829. Gradascevic, who had thus far been a loyal, if rowdy, servant of the Sultan, could not bear the insult to his fellow Bosnians. Encouraging his followers to rise up in the defense of Bosnia against the Serbs and the traitorous Turks, Gradascevic soon became the de facto leader of the Bosnian rebellion. Within the span of six months, the Western half of the Balkans from Novi Grad to Ioannina were in revolt.
Seeking to take advantage of this great opportunity, Muhammad Ali of Egypt dispatched his own representatives to the Sultan’s court in Constantinople. There, he revealed his demands. In return for his continued cooperation and loyalty to the Porte, Muhammad Ali demanded the Eyalets of Damascus, Sidon, Tripoli, and Aleppo. Muhammad Ali believed it to be a fair arrangement considering the past deals made between them in 1823 and 1826. The Sultan, however, was not amused at the Wali of Egypt’s demands after his blatant betrayal in 1827 with the Treaty of Alexandria and promptly berated the emissary ad nauseam before having the man forcibly removed and shipped back to Egypt in chains. Muhammad Ali, however, had not waited for the Sultan’s response and on the 11th of May 1831, Muhammad Ali made his move. Dispatching his son Ibrahim at the head of his fleet, the Egyptian army and Navy departed for Syria and war.
Next Time: The Syrian War
[1] Aleppo had once been the second city of the Ottoman Empire during the 16th and 17th Centuries thanks in large part to the silk trade with Safavid Persia. Their collapse in 1722 would similarly result in an economic collapse of Aleppo which would last for much of the 18th and early 19th centuries. Damascus similarly was an important center of trade in the Ottoman Empire, serving as a decent junction between Anatolia, Egypt, and the Holy cities of Mecca and Medina.
[2] He allegedly killed over 700 men for no other reason than being descendants of men who killed his father and raped his mother and sister over forty years earlier. Another story relates an incident where Ali Pasha drowned Greek women who were accused of being adulteresses. In most cases they had been falsely accused or arbitrarily chosen, but it made no difference and they were killed regardless. This last story influenced in part Lord Byron’s poem the Giaour which details a man, the Giaour, seeking to avenge his murdered lover who was drowned by the local Ottoman lord Hassan.
[3] In OTL, Resid Pasha managed to kill over 500 Albanian Beys and their guards, of the three Arslan Bey managed to escape but was quickly hunted down and killed in the ensuing chase. The Massacre of the Albanian Beys at Monastir created a power vacuum in Albania that lasted for several years. Here Resid Pasha is long dead and the attempts to deal with the Albanians are less effective as a result.
The Battle of the Giaour and Hassan
The end of the Greek War of Independence did not result in the lasting peace that the Ottoman Empire expected, far from it in fact. Although hostilities with the Russians and Greeks had ceased with the signing of the Treaty of Adrianople in September 1829 and the Treaty of London in May 1830, fighting would unfortunately continue in every corner of the Empire. Some groups wished to establish themselves as independent nations separate from the Empire, others simply wanted to carve out privileges for themselves and curtail the various reforms that Sultan Mahmud had struggled for so long to enact. Surprisingly, the borders with Greece, Persia, and Russia would prove to be the most peaceful over the coming decade as internal unrest tore at the very fabric of the Ottoman Empire.
Muhammad Ali, the self-appointed Khedive of Egypt, had been especially busy since he abandoned the war with the Greeks in 1827 as he attempted to establish his grip over the Hejaz, the Najd, and the Sudan. Although they had been conquered long before, they remained rebellious and resistant to the rule of Cairo. Nowhere was this more evident than in the Arabian Peninsula. After Ibrahim and his men departed for Greece in 1824, the Saudis wasted no time in returning to power in the Najd. Under the leadership of Turki bin Abdullah bin Muhammad, the Saudis quickly ousted the meager Egyptian garrisons left behind in the region and managed to retake the cities of Diriyah and Riyadh from the forces of Muhammad Ali. With this act, Turki bin Abdullah bin Muhammad had established the Second Emirate of Najd, it would not last long.
The uprising had thoroughly embarrassed Muhammad Ali and remained a blight upon his prestige, one he acted to remove posthaste. With his forces freed from the war in Greece with the Treaty of Alexandria in 1827, Muhammad Ali immediately dispatched his son to Arabia once again to deal with the rebellious Arabs. Though they put up a determined resistance, the Saudis fell beneath Ibrahim Pasha and his armies, and the Najd was subjugated once more expanding Muhammad Ali’s realm from Alexandria in the North to Khartoum in the South, and from outskirts of Tobruk in the West to the ruins of Diriyah in the East. Turki bin Abdullah bin Muhammad and his family were captured and sent to Cairo in chains effectively putting an end to the Second Emirate of the Najd. While some Saudis would continue fighting, by 1830 the region was generally pacified and returned to Muhammad Ali’s control.
Still, this was not enough to sate the ambitions of Muhammad Ali, he remained tempted by the allure of a far greater bounty, a bounty that sat on his doorstep to the North, a bounty by the name of Syria. The Eyalets of Damascus, Sidon, Tripoli, and Aleppo were among the wealthiest and most populous provinces in the Empire and would serve as the crowning achievement for the Khedive of Egypt.[1] Adding Syria to his already impressive demesne would undoubtedly make Muhammad Ali and his dynasty the greatest powerbrokers in the entire Ottoman Empire. He only needed to reach out and take it. Fortunately for the Khedive, the Empire now loomed on the edge of collapse.
Nearly nine years of constant war, rebellions, unrest, and conflict had drained the coffers and pools of manpower available to the Ottoman Empire. Defeat after defeat, suffered first at the hands of the Greeks, then by the Allied Powers at Cesme, and finally by the Russians at Kars, Erzurum, Provadiya and Adrianople sapped the Ottoman Sultan’s resolve and weakened his military might both on land and at sea. Greece had gained its independence, Serbia had achieved its autonomy, the Danubian Principalities were leaning closer to Russia every day, Algiers had been conquered by the French, and Tripolitania and Tunisia continued to drift further away from the control of the Porte. Muhammad Ali of Egypt had even taken advantage of the war with the Greeks to strengthen his own position within the Empire, and now he stood poised to take even more. However, something of a more immediate concern to the Sultan were the recent developments out of Albania and Bosnia, regions which up till now had been extremely loyal and faithful to the Porte.
Discontent had been growing in the Balkan Sanjaks of the Ottoman Empire for years following the destruction of Ali Pasha of Ioannina in 1822. Ali Pasha, like Muhammad Ali, had been a great magnate of the Empire, one whose power and influence reached from Shkoder in the North to the Morea in the South. It is alleged that his armies of Albanians and Greeks reached as high as 50,000 men, and his immense wealth dwarfed that of even Sultan Mahmud himself. Despite his humble origins he was a man of art and philosophy praised for his brilliance by the likes of Lord Byron and Edward Trewlany, but he was also responsible incredible acts of brutality and cruelty during his reign in Ioannina.[2] Of all the Sultan’s vassals in the Balkans, Ali Pasha was the most powerful and the most willful by far. His power deeply concerned Sultan Mahmud and so he sought to destroy him. He soon received a golden opportunity.
Ali Pasha of Ioannina
The revolt of Ali Pasha started well enough for the former Pasha of Ioannina. He dispatched envoys to the Powers calling for help, he allowed the Souliotes to return to their valley as part of an arrangement for their aid, and he purchased mercenaries and stockpiled supplies for a coming fight. His army some 15,000 strong under the command of his lieutenant Omer Vrioni was positioned on the main road to Ioannina in the pass of Mestovo, another army under the command of the Klepht Odysseus Androutsos defended Livadeia and Central Greece against the Ottomans, while his sons Mukhtar and Veli defended the North and South of Epirus respectively. Another thing working to his benefit was the poor supply situation and equally poor leadership of Ishmael Pasha who dithered away the months with his feckless strategies.
Soon though, Ali Pasha’s allies abandoned him. Omer Vrioni and the Albanians sought clemency with the Sultan and left Ali Pasha by the thousands. The Greeks similarly withdrew their support for Ali Pasha when the Greek War of Independence erupted in 1821. Most problematic of all for Ali Pasha was the replacement of Ishmael Pasha by the more competent Khursid Pasha who quickly moved against Ioannina and put Ali Pasha under siege. By the Summer of 1821, even his sons had deserted him leaving Ali Pasha with only the castle of Ioannina and a few hundred men. After a year-long siege, Ali Pasha finally surrendered under a guarantee of clemency and exile in early January 1822. Instead, he was betrayed by the Ottomans and executed ending his threat to the Sultan once and for all.
The Head of Ali Pasha of Ioannina offered to the Sultan Mahmud II
The destruction of Ali Pasha terrified the magnates of the Ottoman Empire who had grown powerful and rich off the weakness of the Porte, as the attempts by Mahmud to strengthen the Government threatened their own privileges and powers. These feelings were worsened by the abolition of the Janissaries and the subsequent reforms initiated by Sultan Mahmud II in 1826 which only confirmed their earlier suspicions regarding the Sultan and his intrigues. Power was slowly being centralized within the Porte and the Sultan, and the autonomy of the provinces were slowly being reduced. With the Janissaries destroyed, Mahmud turned his attention to the reduction of the Bektashi Order and the elimination of its followers in the Balkans. The Sultan cracked down on corruption, he reformed the Timar/Ziamet system, he confiscated property of known traitors, he abolished the Sipahis, and he diminished the powers of the Pashas. Still the notables of the Empire did not rebel in the vain hope that the Sultan would cease his reforms and return to the traditional ways of the Empire, they were to be greatly disappointed.
The final straw came during the Russo-Turkish War. During the winter months of 1828 and 1829, Albanian beys had gathered in the city of Berat to discuss among other things the modernization policies of Sultan Mahmud and the centralization of the Porte. Both policies came at their expense as the autonomy and privileges they had enjoyed for generations were gradually stripped from them and vested in the Central Government. The leader of this meeting was an Albanian bey by the name Ismail Qemail of Vlora who continued to express loyalty to the Porte and the Sultan while also withholding men and arms from the war with Russia. By allowing the Turks to suffer the brunt of the losses in the war with Russia, the Albanians, and the Bosnians to a lesser extent, hoped the Sultan would comprise with them in return for their support in the war.
Their behavior was not portrayed in the best light to the Grand Vizier Khosref Pasha who personally traveled to Berat in January to arrest Ismail Bey and several of his followers for their supposed acts of sedition. Though Ismail Bey surrendered himself peacefully, many of his followers did not as the Albanians mistook the Ottoman presence as an attack and defended themselves in kind. When the fighting finally came to an end a few minutes later, over a hundred civilians and soldiers were killed in the mishap including Ismail Bey when he tried to intervene. Rather than pacifying the Albanians, this act incensed them and threatened to plunge the whole region into war once more. The Ottoman response was not forth coming due to the resources needed in the wars with Russia and Greece. Ultimately, it would take over a year before an Ottoman army finally arrived in Albania to restore order in July 1830.
Rather than force the Albanians into conflict, however, the Ottomans invited the beys to meet with the Sultan’s representatives in Monastir where they would hear their complaints and work to reach an agreement amiable to both sides. To that end, the three strongest beys of Southern Albania, Veli Bey, Arslan Bey, and Zylyftar Bey Poda all traveled to Monastir to treat with the Sultans emissaries. To their horror, the meeting was nothing more than a trap meant to lure them in and kill them. In the ensuing battle, over 300 Albanian beys and their guards were killed along with several Ottoman soldiers. Of the three leading Beys, only Arslan Bey managed to escape with his life and was soon forced to flee to Ioannina where he raised the flag of revolt.[3]
Massacre of the Albanian Beys
Arslan Bey was joined several months later by Mustafa Bushatli Pasha of Shkoder and the Bosnian Captains, chief among them Husein Gradascevic. The Bosnians like the Albanians, had become alarmed at the Sultan’s centralizing efforts which cut away at their autonomy and powers. Most damning of all, however, was the cessation of several traditionally Bosnian municipalities to the newly formed Principality of Serbia under the Treaty of Adrianople in 1829. Gradascevic, who had thus far been a loyal, if rowdy, servant of the Sultan, could not bear the insult to his fellow Bosnians. Encouraging his followers to rise up in the defense of Bosnia against the Serbs and the traitorous Turks, Gradascevic soon became the de facto leader of the Bosnian rebellion. Within the span of six months, the Western half of the Balkans from Novi Grad to Ioannina were in revolt.
Seeking to take advantage of this great opportunity, Muhammad Ali of Egypt dispatched his own representatives to the Sultan’s court in Constantinople. There, he revealed his demands. In return for his continued cooperation and loyalty to the Porte, Muhammad Ali demanded the Eyalets of Damascus, Sidon, Tripoli, and Aleppo. Muhammad Ali believed it to be a fair arrangement considering the past deals made between them in 1823 and 1826. The Sultan, however, was not amused at the Wali of Egypt’s demands after his blatant betrayal in 1827 with the Treaty of Alexandria and promptly berated the emissary ad nauseam before having the man forcibly removed and shipped back to Egypt in chains. Muhammad Ali, however, had not waited for the Sultan’s response and on the 11th of May 1831, Muhammad Ali made his move. Dispatching his son Ibrahim at the head of his fleet, the Egyptian army and Navy departed for Syria and war.
Next Time: The Syrian War
[1] Aleppo had once been the second city of the Ottoman Empire during the 16th and 17th Centuries thanks in large part to the silk trade with Safavid Persia. Their collapse in 1722 would similarly result in an economic collapse of Aleppo which would last for much of the 18th and early 19th centuries. Damascus similarly was an important center of trade in the Ottoman Empire, serving as a decent junction between Anatolia, Egypt, and the Holy cities of Mecca and Medina.
[2] He allegedly killed over 700 men for no other reason than being descendants of men who killed his father and raped his mother and sister over forty years earlier. Another story relates an incident where Ali Pasha drowned Greek women who were accused of being adulteresses. In most cases they had been falsely accused or arbitrarily chosen, but it made no difference and they were killed regardless. This last story influenced in part Lord Byron’s poem the Giaour which details a man, the Giaour, seeking to avenge his murdered lover who was drowned by the local Ottoman lord Hassan.
[3] In OTL, Resid Pasha managed to kill over 500 Albanian Beys and their guards, of the three Arslan Bey managed to escape but was quickly hunted down and killed in the ensuing chase. The Massacre of the Albanian Beys at Monastir created a power vacuum in Albania that lasted for several years. Here Resid Pasha is long dead and the attempts to deal with the Albanians are less effective as a result.
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Oh my. Looks like the Sultan isn't going to have a good time. But perhaps a Turkey without the periphery could modernize more effectively...
Not much different than OTL actually. Bosnian ayans did revolt in 1831, a series of Albanian uprisings also start in 1833 in both cases from local elites opposition to the sultan's reforms and of course the Egyptians did invade Syria reaching all the way to Konya before Russian and European intervention. Now granted the slight differences tend to be to the sultan's detriment, from the death of Reshid pasha to the Egyptian navy being mostly intact post 1827...
The question is whether Muhammad Ali can pull off a win in his war; the Balkan Rebellions will be put down, although it may take more time and manpower ITTL.
Since the Powers are against an Egyptian victory, I guess they’ll need to pull off a 19th century blitzkrieg and force the Sultan to agree to terms before the Europeans can intervene. I don’t think it’ll be feasible, but who knows?
Since the Powers are against an Egyptian victory, I guess they’ll need to pull off a 19th century blitzkrieg and force the Sultan to agree to terms before the Europeans can intervene. I don’t think it’ll be feasible, but who knows?
Well for the most part this is generally an OTL update with some slight differences due to the butterflies, namely the change in Ottoman leadership, the survival of some Albanian beys, the timing of the Egyptian reconquest of the Najd, and the strength of the Egyptian navy.
In OTL, over 500 Albanian Beys and their guards were slaughtered by the Ottomans at Monastir, modern day Bitola. This act effectively crippled the Albanian insurgency/rebellion before it could happen. In TTL's Resid Pasha, the man responsible for the Massacre is long since dead, having died at Missolonghi in January 1826. As such his successor Khosref Pasha was less successful in killing all the Albanian Beys at Monastir allowing them to escape back to Albania to rise in a relatively cohesive revolt.
The Egyptian conquest of the Najd in 1829 is about ten years ahead of schedule as it was later reconquered in 1838 in OTL. The last point, regarding the survival of the Egyptian is pretty important as it wasn't destroyed at TTL's Navarino and is available in the upcoming war with the Ottomans ITTL. So all these points, while relatively minor work to the detriment of the Ottoman Empire as Lascaris said which will definitely have an impact on the upcoming war between the two.
Fortunately for Muhammad Ali, the Powers are still distracted with problems closer to home, a la the Belgian Revolution, and the Polish uprising, that said, those won't last beyond 1831 so the Powers will be looking at the Ottoman Empire again in 1832. Still, this gives Muhammad Ali a few months to claim territory before the Powers intervene to stop him and the survival of the Egyptian Navy will be very important to that end.
Therefore, instead of limiting the privileges granted to Muhammad Ali to keeping Sudan and the hereditary Khedivate, I can predict a more balanced Partition of Ottoman Empire between Porte and Cairo, giving the fact that Egyptian starting point will be far more advantageous.
Then, western intervention in defaulted Egypt (if bankruptcy isn't butterflied away) will lead to something like a pre-1900 Sykes-Picot in Egyptian-ruled Levant....
Will we see a pre-1900 Jewish Palestine ITTL??
Actually its probably just the opposite. The Treaty of Erzurum in 1823, by in large resolved most of the issues between the Ottoman Empire and the Persian Empire at the time. The border was reestablished at the 1639 border and Persian pilgrims were allowed to travel freely to the Shia Holy Sites in the OE. Another thing to note is the terrible state of the Persian military following the most recent war with Russia in 1826-1828 which saw them get thoroughly beaten and humiliated. Tensions remained high with them both in OTL and TTL for several years after the war, so if anything Persia is looking North and not West.
That's not to say they didn't have disputes with the Ottomans still, they certainly did and they nearly went to war again in the 1830's, but they managed to reach an arrangement with them before tensions escalated into war. That could change ITTL though.
I don't know anything could happen.
Am I wrong in asserting that British obsession with Ottoman Empire integrity was limited to cutting Russian access to Mediterranean across the Straits (and through Eastern Anatolia/Greater Armenia if possible)? If a power "other" than Ottoman Empire ruled south of Cilician Gates.... would that doctrine still be in force?.
Or perhaps if Britain and France set foot in Egyptian Levant, Russia should be later compensated accordingly..... again Armenia comes to my mind
Or perhaps if Britain and France set foot in Egyptian Levant, Russia should be later compensated accordingly..... again Armenia comes to my mind
I thought it was more of the “balance of power” obsession Europe had post-Napoleon? They obviously do care very much that Russia not get its Mediterranean port, but the collapse of a major power like the Ottomans is bad news on its own. After all, Russia will benefit immensely if the Ottomans fall apart even if they’re blocked from the Med.
I’m not sure if Britain and France would ever want to give Russia anything in compensation
At this point I think it’s still a fear of the Bear motivating the Western Powers; Germany isn’t a threat yet so there’s no reason to particularly care for Russia.Cmakk is correct. British foreign policy during this time was dead set on preserving the status quo at (almost) any cost and they actively backed up their threats with force if need be. Generally this was directed towards Russia who was their main geopolitical rival at the time and they actively combated their attempts to gain control of the Straits region, or actively destabilize the Ottoman Empire, as evident by their role in the Crimean War.I thought it was more of the “balance of power” obsession Europe had post-Napoleon? They obviously do care very much that Russia not get its Mediterranean port, but the collapse of a major power like the Ottomans is bad news on its own. After all, Russia will benefit immensely if the Ottomans fall apart even if they’re blocked from the Med.
I’m not sure if Britain and France would ever want to give Russia anything in compensation
Their status quo policy also applied to the Egyptians and Greeks as well. During the Second Egyptian Ottoman War in 1840, the British Navy actually shelled Egyptian forces at Acre, Beirut, and Sidon to force them out of Syria, and they likely would have destroyed Muhammad Ali as a political entity had the French not propped him up. The British and French would later occupy Piraeus from 1854 to 1857 to force the Greeks into staying neutral during the Crimean war rather than joining on the Russian side in the conflict as they had intended.
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......which didn't prevent the French setting foot in Mount Lebanon, or more explicitly the British occupation of Egypt....
......which didn't prevent the French setting foot in Mount Lebanon, or more explicitly the British occupation of Egypt....
Well yes, conquering territory is only a danger to peace if someone else does it.
It's one of those irregular verbs 'I provide good government to the natives, Alexander disturbs the status quo, Wilhelm is a blood thirsty imperialist'.