1403: The Anti-Ottoman Coalition

In 1403, following Tamerlane's devastation on Turkish Anatolia, Suleiman had to temporarily focus on securing his empire in Asia, leaving the European Ottoman possessions open to attack. Now, at the time Manuel II was in northern Italy, and visited Genoa and Venice to propose an alliance to take advantage of the Ottoman's setbacks.

To stop the alliance from forming, Suleiman ceded Thessaloniki, the Thracian seaboard, and some islands to the Byzantines, and the emperor, satisfied, didn't form a coalition to take advantage of Tamerlane's invasion.

WI Suleiman doesn't pacify the Byzantines and Venetians by ceding land, and an anti-Turk coalition of Genoese, Venetians, Byzantines, and crusader Latins attack Ottoman Rumelia at its most vulnerable?
 

Keenir

Banned
WI Suleiman doesn't pacify the Byzantines and Venetians by ceding land, and an anti-Turk coalition of Genoese, Venetians, Byzantines, and crusader Latins attack Ottoman Rumelia at its most vulnerable?

well, would that coalition work with or at odds with the alliance of Aragon & the Timurid Empire? (the latter alliance was actually proposed in 1402)

in any event, the Byzantines won't be able to do more than cheer from the sidelines, as they were weaker than some of the offshore Greek despotates.
 
In 1403, following Tamerlane's devastation on Turkish Anatolia, Suleiman had to temporarily focus on securing his empire in Asia, leaving the European Ottoman possessions open to attack. Now, at the time Manuel II was in northern Italy, and visited Genoa and Venice to propose an alliance to take advantage of the Ottoman's setbacks.

To stop the alliance from forming, Suleiman ceded Thessaloniki, the Thracian seaboard, and some islands to the Byzantines, and the emperor, satisfied, didn't form a coalition to take advantage of Tamerlane's invasion.

WI Suleiman doesn't pacify the Byzantines and Venetians by ceding land, and an anti-Turk coalition of Genoese, Venetians, Byzantines, and crusader Latins attack Ottoman Rumelia at its most vulnerable?

They get utterly crushed. The Byzantine army is largely irrelevant and Venice and Genoa are too mutually hostile and commercial in outlook to maintain a long war. The Ottomans still control a huge empire in the Balkans, which is the center of their power, not Anatolia as is commonly misunderstood.
 
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