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The Mongol armies were extremely disciplined and well trained. I don't know why everyone acts as if the Mongols were this undisciplined horde. They weren't. They were extremely disciplined and the meriotocracy that Chingis Khan implemented made it such that Mongol generals were the highest quality of soldiers. The Meritocracy system instituted by the Mongols also saw the quality of their entire army improve because every Mongol warrior was extremely skilled and disciplined.
This is why the individual Mongol was allowed greater freedom to act independently on the Battlefield so long as the overarching goals were meant.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=14K6KtBlusY
So you admit that you have no arguments and lack the ability to discuss the matter in a civilized way?
And BTW, Wikipedia is always a good start as long as there are sources cited und you check those sources yourself.
Once on the other bank though still outnumbered he drew the Scythians into Battle by a weak attack to encorage them towards his main force. Killing most of the attackers, and taking a number of prisoners.
Accepted Scythians aren't 13th Century Mongols but they would be a fair approximation of what the Mongol Army would have been like in the 4th Century BC or near enough 1st Century when Caesar was around.
That said Alexander saw little point Conquering the Scythians, it would take too long, and there were easier pickings elsewhere.
I do wonder though whether the Mongols and Romans would have fought each other. After periods of expansion both seemed to settle on an Empire that was at the limits of what they could control Politically. They'd Raid and explore a bit beyond their but seemed more preoccupied with holding what they had taken, than Conquering the whole World.
My guess is Caeser and the Khan would have probed each other for weaknesses then concluded an uneasy peace, then got back to Succession disputes, Court Intrigues, and all the Campaign stuff.
- Do not let them chose the battlefield. Force them into defence. (That worked fine for the Vietnamese later.)
- Strongholds are your friends. Cavalry-based armies have a hard time to siege them.
- Use your terrain. Mountains and forrested areas proved to be very helpful.
- Use your climate. Delay them. They will have to retreat in autumn.
- Target the horses. Without food and horse-supplies they will have to retreat. Evade battles. A given area can support a big horse herd only for a short time.
Caltrops, Sharpened Stakes, Spiked Nets, Punji Sticks, Tetsubishi, Trou De Loup, Cheval De Frise were all used to Hamper Cavalry in the Middle Ages. The Romans certainly used Pit Traps to slow Enemy Troops in front of Fortifications.
Plan B would be Wagon forts.
1. Traditional Mongols = herdsmen = not just horses but they had goats / sheep too. So they didnt just milk horses and eat them. They also had goats for meat and milk too. Horses were just prized much more.
2. Horse food: My point about grass was that ANY horse could survive grazing in grasslands
(which is much more than just grass btw). However, normal everyday grazing and forced, hard marches are NOT the same thing. I come from family with horses and cattle but I honestly didnt know specifics of the breed, so I looked into Mongolian horses. From breeding / geneology sites they could do avg 40km / day. Just as any troop they could be pressed to do more. BUT not drive across entire countries AND fight full force after. The legend of anything further than that was actually distance a RIDER would travel after switching out several steeds. Since it really doesnt matter if you're invading a country and forcing your mount to use speed of attack as factor...if you bring other horses along to do the same...you get the same result = another tired horse. The extended distance legends of Mongolian horses came after Mongolin Empire was established and they had set up waystations with local horses to use across it. So riders could do up to 200mi / day...but not a horse. But they did use them to cross mountain ranges though. However, Mongolians were expert horsemen that would know that if you give better food to any animal it can peform better longer = reason for needing grain. If they were nomadic tribesmen they would have had to worry about garrisoning horses until later after moving on to more civilized cities. Basically, you dont train for power lifting by eating just salads and then running a marathon right before the big event.
3. Cant have your Mongolian BBQ and eat it too for 2 reasons: a) You cant claim ALL troops that Mongolians commanded later at height of their Empire as ALL traditional Mongols (about the time they finished off the last of the Chinese kingdoms). They didnt just mass produce Mongolettes and have instant life-long trained warriors on horseback in just couple generation span. They were many conscripted peoples fighting for them at that time. Which would be same static armies that the Romans would excel at fighting. b) By the time that Song dynasty (which actually had almost no real fighting force from already fighting other Chinese states) surrendered w/o a fight, Kublai was already losing his grip on the thing that the Mongolian Empire was built upon = the ACTUAL Mongolian Horde = losing that mobility factor that was their claim to fame AND shifting to more static fightng styles troop styles + standard cavalry of other countries they had subjegated. The only thing that maintained the Empire itself for so long after was purely momentum AND no one else was remotely the size / strength to challenge them. Since someone likes to throw tantrums about what historians would say, I found single quote from actual museum from people who actually do that for a living:
"The horse also made it possible for the Mongols to evade intruders and retain their independence. They finally conquered the Chinese empire, but after Genghis Khan’s grandson Khublai Khan ascended China's dragon throne, he lost control of strategic horse-breeding areas of the steppes. His decline began when he could no longer mobilize and unify the mounted nomadic warriors as his grandfather, uncle, and brother had."
http://www.amnh.org/explore/science-bulletins/bio/documentaries/the-last-wild-horse-the-return-of-takhi-to-mongolia/article-the-horse-in-mongolian-culture
1. Unconventional fighting tactics: I dont think this had as much to do with horse mobility as sure determination that "if I can't have it neither would you!" mentality of the Mongols. Yes Draginpurake, you are absolutely right in saying traditional cavalry vs walled fortresses is ridiculous to even fathom. Fighting tactics during this era pretty much boiled down to 2 things: a) large armies smacking togther until one won; or b) retreating in your fort and other side trying to gather enough troops to overcome your defenses (which typically took 10-15 / 1 ratio for success). However, the attackers goal usually wasnt to destroy entire countries. They wanted tax paying populace left over to help fund the invader's coffers. Mongols didnt care if you retreated into fort. They destroyed everything around you they couldnt carry off while you watched from the walls and realized that there would be nothing left once you came out...people, crops, infrastructure, etc. Even if your army survived their attack,they had nothing to eat or fund a continued fight. And the Mongols could ride back to their steppes and say "see you again next year for the same thing....unless you want to pay us not too?"
Reason why I dont think this fighting tactic mattered much for horse troops is if you think about the Northern European barbarian invasions....they had almost no calavry and SUCKED at using siege weapons (if they used andy at all) but still were able to devastate walled city civilizations. How? Because they didnt care about keeping the populace as much as taking the land for themselves. So destroyed everything a standing army needed to wage continuous warfare and then wait them out as it was easier than actual fighting often.
2. Speed: Sure other nations had calvary troops but why were the Mongols better at it? Well think about most nationstates and their armies of that era. Most had little standing, year round armies. The large portion of most nationstates at the time was drafted citizens and / or mercenaries from else where. Both things that take time to gather in any usable force. So if you remove that time to make a size able force by speed of attack...now you've got the balance of force in your favor.
Added to fact that unlike most nation's of the time the Mongols were a warrior nation. Every citizen was trained to fight, sometimes even the women. Children played games to incorporate warror skills early in life. So now, in most cases vs a lot of the nations they fought, you have more trained warriors vs smaller warrior force maybe complimented by drafted citizens fighting along side.
Now combine BOTH of those 2 factors and no doubt easy win for ANY army able to do both things...regardless if they were Mongols or not. Then look to see any other true confederation / empire of same size at approximately the same time....and there's no real competition for the Mongols. In my mind does that make Mongols an unbeatable force? Absolutely not, it was simply their time to shine and other's time to fade into history.
Now add an empire nation able to fund itself and it's armies from a tax base the Mongols would NOT be able to destroy so that it's able to have standing year around warriors regardless of all the raiding in the world...and all that advantage the Mongols used vs other countries become a moot point. Then become as ruthless as the Mongols themselves and then use standing armies, plus conscripted calavry troops vs the TRUE supply lines of the Mongols...their women and children left behind in their homeland of the steppes by the men riding off in the distance...and Romans just made money off of new batch of slaves and those fast little horses dont add up to much. And IF the Mongolian warriors wanted to have anything beyond what they had on their saddles to call an Empire THEN they would eventually have to stand and fight Rome's static / combined not-static army and dont see that working in their favor however glamorous their prairie pirate lifestyle may seem to some. Basically, that would do exactly what you said at that point and change the setting of the battle to be one that the Roman's chose vs one in favor of the Mongols. And you could easily do that one Mongol tribe at a time until not much but bunch of raiding Men left with nothing but empty pastures to call home.
On a separate note about how well fortified settlements would last against the Mongols,the Chinese are actually a good comparison to the Romans in the sense that they also had a large empire (not as large but large enough that multiple emperors had to complete separate sections of the Great Wall at different times to keep the Mongols and other barbarians out). Like Rome, the Chinese also had fortifications, riches, corruption and a huge diverse population. It's pointless to speculate what would happen to Rome if the Mongols attacked the city without first considering their historical impact on "civilized" ancient China. Granted that both belonged to different time periods, but the Mongols' ability to adapt enemy technology and use it against them might have given Rome a much tougher time than other barbarians.
I find the Battle of Xiangyang between the Song and Mongols particularly interesting. According to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Xiangyang "From late 1267 to 1271, Song reinforcements from the south tried, many times, to attack the Mongol positions, in order to supply Xiangyang. Unfortunately, outside of Xiangyang, the Song forces were no match for the Mongolian cavalry." If true, this meant that the Mongols might have simply cut off Roman supplies during a siege of Rome and force them to rely on external reinforcements which would have been picked off by the Mongolian cavs. I'm not saying the Roman situation is exactly the same as the Song, but the similarities should be considered when looking at Mongolian siege abilities.