War and Civil Conflict 600 CE to 1450 - AP World History: Modern

The First Crusade was waged from 1096-1099 and ended with the brutally violent conquest of Jerusalem by the Crusaders. The Crusaders established a series of small Crusader States on the Mediterranean coast of the Middle East, which they would rule with varying degrees of control for the next two centuries.

Saladin was a Kurdish general and founder of the Ayyubid dynasty who ruled in the twelfth century. He is most famous for the reconquest of Jerusalem, which sparked the Third Crusade, and the subsequent defense of the city against the forces of Christendom.

Most of the so-called Crusader States (sometimes also called Latin States) were created in the aftermath of the First Crusade. They were generally small, militarized kingdoms located on the Mediterranean coast of the Middle East. They gradually declined or were conquered by the forces of Islam, however, and the last Crusader State was abandoned by the Europeans towards the end of the Thirteenth Century.

In the late-eleventh century, at the time of the First Crusade, the Islamic world was highly fragmented and resistance was weak and poorly organized. The Abbasid Caliphate was very weak at this time and incapable of coordinating resistance. However, over time the Islamic resistance grew much stronger and by the time of the Third Crusade (1189 - 1212), they were able to hold off the Christian advance on Jerusalem.

The Battle of Talas was fought between the Islamic forces of the Abbasid Caliphate and the forces of Tang China in 751. It halted the eastward expansion of the Abbasid Caliphate and the westward expansion of Tang China.

The Battle of Talas was fought between the Arab Abbasid Caliphate and the Chinese Tang Dynasty in 751 CE. Prior to the battle, Chinese forces had been spreading rapidly westward and facing little opposition; however, at the Battle of Talas, they were defeated by the Arab forces, and Chinese expansion was halted for several centuries. The battle is considered important for transferring control over the “Silk Road” from Chinese to Arab hands and for turning back the massive forces of the Tang Dynasty. Also, it is sometimes said that Arabs learned the art of paper making from the Chinese prisoners they captured in the battle, thus spreading paper-making technology to the Middle East and eventually Europe.

Prior to the invention of the cannon in the fourteenth century, the most useful weapon a lord or a king could have was a castle. Castles were built of stone and could withstand constant barrage from trebuchets and catapults provided they were sufficiently manned; however, the invention and subsequent improvement of the cannon gradually rendered castles obsolete as the additional firepower of a cannon could blast right through the stone walls of a castle. This changed not only military life, but also social, economic, and political life in Europe as the feudal system, predicated in many ways on the protection offered by the lord's castle or stronghold, became gradually obsolete.

Charlemagne worked very closely with the Papacy, and both believed the expanding Muslim influence to be a threat to Christendom. In the Mid-Eighth Century, Charlemagne began a war with the Muslims under the Umayyad Caliphate to stop their expansion.

Genghis Khan's empire stretched from China to Western Asia but his advance into Africa was arrested by Mamluks, a group of slaves who freed themselves and then immediately fought off the Mongol army.

The Red Guards were young Maoists during the Cultural Revolution in China, they existed hundreds of years after Genghis Khan's empire had already collapsed.

The Vietcong were Communist Vietnamese in the 20th century who fought against the United States, they existed hundreds of years after the Mongol empire had already collapsed.

The Confederates were a group of southern planters and soldiers who attempted to break away from the American union in order to protect their slavery based economy.

The Boxers were 19th century anti-Western fighters, they existed long after the Mongol empire had already collapsed.

The War of the Roses was one of many bloody civil wars fought over the issue of succession. After the death of Henry V in 1422, the lack of a strong Lancaster heir (the crowned successor, Henry VI, was an infant) led to a conflicting claim by Richard, Duke of York. After some initial successes by the House of York, the Lancasters eventually won out and reclaimed the throne.

The Hundred Years’ War, which lasted, off and on, from 1337 to 1453, and was fought between England and France, was caused by a perfect storm of motivations. Taken together, various social, economic, and political factors conspired to push these two nations ever deeper into the throes of military and nationalistic conflict. One of the main causes was a long history of disputed ownership of the territory of Flanders – a prosperous center of cloth manufacturing, France technically owned Flanders, but many of the territory’s citizens and funds were far more loyal to England, which provided the territory with the wool it needed for its cloth industry. The English King Edward III also administered several former French pieces of land – but these lands were still nominally owned by the French crown, which had loaned the territories to England since the Norman Conquest. By the time of the outbreak of the Hundred Years’ War, neither nation was content with this system of land loaning, because each side believed that it deserved sole control over these territories. Relations were worsened when Edward III declared that he was the rightful heir to the French King Charles IV, who died in 1328 without a male heir. Enraged by the English king’s pretensions, the French nobility selected Philip VI as their new ruler, which outraged Edward III in turn. The long tradition of hatred between these two nations, nurtured within both English and French societies for centuries, at last came to a violent head.

While France wielded several advantages over England during the Hundred Years’ War, the strength of the French military cannot be counted as one of them. In fact, when it came to overall strength, the English military was by far more superior, especially in terms of both their level of training and their weaponry (English archers were known for their keen use of the treacherous longbow). By contrast, the French army, although larger – which reflected the overall greater size of the French population – was not nearly as well trained as their English counterparts. However, the French government was much richer than their English foes, which helped them to be able to procure more replacements (of both men and weapons) after every English victory, while the English army had a more difficult time finding replacement weapons and fighting men. Perhaps most crucially, France possessed the defensive advantage – because most of the fighting ended up occurring on French lands, the French soldiers were automatically able to benefit from their knowledge of the terrain and the support of the local peasant population. The English army, meanwhile, was forced to navigate across unfamiliar territory, coming up against obstacles put in their way by both nature and the local populace. Lastly, French morale received a substantial boost from the inspiration presence, speeches, and military engagement of the famous Joan of Arc. The so-called Maid of Orleans, with her courageous fighting spirit, encouraged the French people to fight onward, even after devastating defeats.

The Hundred Years’ War, with its forty-four nonconsecutive years of actual combat, finally came to an end in 1453, with a decisive French victory. France’s military position had been strengthened with a newly-formed alliance with Burgundy, allowing the French forces to concentrate all their military might on ousting the English. Eventually, the English army could hold on no longer, and with the declaration of French victory, England was forced to relinquish nearly all the French territory that it had once held under King Edward III. Only the coastal region of Calais was left under English control. Due to the overwhelming expenses run up by the war, both England and France raised taxes upon their respective populations, with the greatest burden falling, once again, upon the already struggling peasant class. The French king took special advantage of these circumstances and moved to shore up the monarchy’s position of dominance over the nobility, so that the French crown exercised more and more political, social, and even economic control.

All of these were part of the longterm consequences of the Crusades. The role of knights in the Crusades led to the growth of chivalry as a social code in Europe. Relations between the Islamic and Christian world naturally worsened as a result of two centuries of warfare and massacres. In many ways, we are still feeling the effects of this today; however, there were positive consequences too. The reawakening of classical knowledge, that had for so long been preserved by the Byzantines and the Islamic empires of the Middle East, led to the Renaissance in Europe. The exposure to Middle Eastern technology led to greater technological exchange in Eurasia, which was particularly beneficial to the Europeans.

In 1233, Genghis Khan, with a massive force of highly skilled Mongol warriors behind him, attacked Russia. By this time, the Mongols had invaded and conquered various parts of China and the Middle East, and Moscow found itself hard-pressed to withstand the ruthlessly targeted invasion of its territory, as Genghis Khan gained control of more and more swathes of Russian land. With the final fall of Russia to Mongol forces in 1240, the country came under firm Mongol control and would remain a part of the Mongol Empire for almost three centuries (until Ivan the Great’s liberation of his people in 1480). As a Mongol-controlled state, Russia adopted a curious mixture of Christian, Mongol, and Islamic practices, although the Russian people were allowed to preserve a great deal of their religious and political policies. The Mongols moved the center of Russian political, social, economic, and cultural primacy from Moscow to Kiev; the city would remain a potent force within Russian life for centuries to come.

Enrico Dandolo ruled over the Italian city-state of Venice at the height of its power and influence. Venice, at the time, was an influential maritime city-state and was immensely wealthy as a result of trade in the Mediterranean. Enrico Dandolo is most notable for calling for the Fourth Crusade.

In 1096 C.E., Pope Urban launched the First Crusade in order to take back control of Jerusalem from the Seljuk Turks. The many crusades that followed all professed a desire for Christian control of the Holy Land, a place that both Christians and Muslims saw as an essential part of their religious identity. Although a Latin Empire was established in Constantinople during the Fourth Crusade, this development ultimately distracted from the crusaders' goals and deepened the schism between the two Christian churches. While the most positive result of the Crusades was arguably the European rediscovery of ancient ideas, this development was also unintended.

The stated goal of the crusades was reclaiming Jerusalem from Muslim armies and spreading the "true faith" of Christianity. In addition to the religious goals, the crusades provided significant opportunities for political gain. In the middle ages, land was power and a war meant the opportunity to gain land. Noblemen from across western Europe flocked to the Middle East in an effort to gain the glory that would lead to greater power abroad that would translate back to their homelands. The Europeans saw anyone who was not of the Christian faith as a pagan or a heretic who was living in sin, they had little to no regard for the inhabitants of the cities they were fighting for.

Temujin is the given name of the warrior ruler Genghis Khan. Genghis Khan united the Mongol tribes in the twelfth century under his rule and soon led his horde on a series of conquests across Eurasia. In the generations immediately following his death the Mongols conquered the largest land empire ever seen in human history - stretching from China all the way to the gates of Vienna, and including much of northern India and the Middle East.