Aq Qoyunlu ruling Anatolia

If the Aq Qoyunlu and the karamanids Somehow beat the ottoman empire and conquered it, how long would it last?

Neither Karaman nor Aq Qoyunlu have the potential to defeat the Ottomans. An inferior army in quality and quantity. I give one possibility: Timur, after his victory in Ankara, grants Anatolia to one of the named Turkomans.

But even this won't last half a century. As soon as Timur is gone and the Ottomans are stable again, it will most likely be teared apart by joint Mamluk-Ottoman-Qara Qoyunlu invasion. And most Turkmens won't suddenly swear allegiance to the new Karamanli or Aq Qoyunlu rulership so it will be more of a confederacy of Anatolian Turkmens, which is so fragile that it is an easy "picking them one by one" contest.
 
As soon as Timur is gone and the Ottomans are stable again, it will most likely be teared apart by joint Mamluk-Ottoman-Qara Qoyunlu invasion. And most Turkmens won't suddenly swear allegiance to the new Karamanli or Aq Qoyunlu rulership so it will be more of a confederacy of Anatolian Turkmens, which is so fragile that it is an easy "picking them one by one" contest.

At this early stage (when Istanbul is still Constantinople), do the pro-Turkish segments of the Anatolian population really have any particular loyalty to the Ottoman family? If a fragment of Murad Hudavendigar's empire holds out in Europe/Bithynia then I can see people sticking by them but if they are completely broken by Timur then the ghazis may just switch to whichever other dynasty has the best chance of scoring more victories against the Romans, followed swiftly by opportunists like the Greek converts to Islam. If that dynasty happens to be Uzun Hasan's descendants then so be it.

I can actually see the Aq Qoyunlu being fairly successful in Eastern Turkey-- by promising to protect the eastern beyliks like Eretna and the Ahis from a resurgent West Anatolian power (and from the Mamluks) they could probably win local support. The Armenian/Azeri steppe AQ is based in also extends west beyond the Lake Van region, so communication/trade links are easy to maintain. The character of the state would probably be highly confederal-- while the area makes sense as an economic/military unit, political power likely stays diffuse.

The winner of a no-Ottomans scenario in the short term is likely Persia, as without an analogue to the Ottomans the future Safavids won't have any rivals for hegemony over Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Eastern Anatolia. However, this might work against them in the long-term-- without the shock of Chaldiran, efforts at continued military modernization won't be as urgent and Ismail I's religious outlook will remain the dominant influence on foreign policy. The Ottomans unleashed a military revolution, and without them we may see less improvement in Middle Eastern and East European models of warfare.
 
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What made infantry so effective, and why didn't other Turkmen states have it?

They were disciplined for one and quite good when used defensively against armies largely cavalry based.. It is also good to have infantry when you use artillery as the cavalry force can't use the artillery properly.

I can't tell why other Turkmen states did not consider to use it, maybe the Ottoman wars in the Balkans were the reason the Ottomans started to use Infantry units. Warfare affected them that they started to use infantry units. The Safavids learned as the first Turkmen originated dynasty after the Ottomans the need of infantry. They got really good results in the 1603-18 war as a result.
 
At this early stage (when Istanbul is still Constantinople), do the pro-Turkish segments of the Anatolian population really have any particular loyalty to the Ottoman family? If a fragment of Murad Hudavendigar's empire holds out in Europe/Bithynia then I can see people sticking by them but if they are completely broken by Timur then the ghazis may just switch to whichever other dynasty has the best chance of scoring more victories against the Romans, followed swiftly by opportunists like the Greek converts to Islam. If that dynasty happens to be Uzun Hasan's descendants then so be it.

The winner of a no-Ottomans scenario in the short term is likely Persia, as without an analogue to the Ottomans the future Safavids won't have any rivals for hegemony over Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Eastern Anatolia. However, this might work against them in the long-term-- without the shock of Chaldiran, efforts at continued military modernization won't be as urgent and Ismail I's religious outlook will remain the dominant influence on foreign policy. The Ottomans unleashed a military revolution, and without them we may see less improvement in Middle Eastern and East European models of warfare.

The Ottomans lost control over Anatolia in OTL after Ankara but they regained it regardless. Mostly by the Princes from Anatolia who conquered but still. The reason I give the Ottomans a huge chance to regain most of Anatolia is because Anatolia would be too unstable to accept any Aq Qoyunlu or Karamanli rule anyway. The Troops from Rumelia would swoop back in and many Ghazi's will swear allegiance to the Ottomans if it seems hopeless, which largely around Bursa and the Aegean Coast, while the interior is save for the time being from Ottoman-Mamluk rule. Timur cannot break the Ottomans entirely as the Ottoman Centre is in Edirne. Unless Timur sends his Army across the straits which is really against his will and that of the Venetians and Genoans. And as Timur is unable to break the Ottoman power entirely and leaves Anatolia for Central Asia, the Ottomans are safe.

I agree with the second part, Persia would be better off without a stronger Ottoman Empire on its border and so are the Mamluks. But I would like to remind you that the defeat against the Ottomans in Chaldiran is what caused the Safavids to adopt Gunpowder units and stop being so reliant on the Turkmens. There is a decent chance that without these changes the future of the Safavids is even more endangered than it was OTL. You could say that the Uzbeks would eventually sweep in when Ismail dies. Whether successful or not is up to speculations. But the Safavids are not in the most ideal position. In the absence of the Ottomans in Anatolia, the Mamluks are the best off. The Muslims are in general worse off with the Safavids being all free.
 
What edge do the Aq Qoyunlu have at this point though? Sure they swept the Kara Qoyunlu aside but that was one tribal federation pushing another out of Iraq and thus taking them over.

The Qizilbash-Safavid alliance at least had Shia Islam and its large presence in eastern Anatolia but even if they had won at Chaldiran they didn't have the strength to contest most of Anatolia themselves, not against the greatest Ottoman rulers.

The Qara Koyunlu were early enough that maybe you could "wank" them to be a peer competitor to the Ottomans but the Ottomans themselves had an administrative structure and were a state rather than a tenuous post-Mongol federation.
 
By the way, it is not inevitable that non-Ottoman Anatolia falls. But it is extremely vunerable. The Ottomans want it back, the Qara Qoyunlu will want a decent share and the Mamluks want a barrier for Syria. And of course being so decentralized that it is more a confederacy who would switch allegiances than accept any centralization attempt.
 
The only plausible scenario I can think of is one where Timur decides to keep going and gets a foolish Christian power like Venice or Genoa to ferry him over. Then he smashes the vulnerable Ottomans during their interregnum but dies along the way and his empire is shattered. That might, might, be enough but Karaman and the other Beyliks are the big winners from such a scenario and they would have some of the same advantages the Ottomans did.
 
Well I had the Akk Qiyunlu fill the gap left by a Viaconti Italy left Crusade of Barna which shattered the Ottomans and spanked the turks.
Realistically you'd need Hungary or some Italian power to smash the Ottomans in the Nalkans roughly simultaneously with tamerlane smashing them in Anatolia. The Mamluks are not an insurmountable challenge for an Iranian power given Egypt was hard hit by the Black Death and the government was not ideal.

The Akk Qoyunlu would benefit from Tamerlane sticking around longer since nirv they were his vassals.

Note that the Akk Qoyunlu would probably not see much appeal in Shia Islam (though they might adopt it anyway as an identity marker); the biggest effect of no ottomans, aside from potentially strengthening many players (Mamluks, hungary, Venice, Iran) is the question of religion. A Sunni Iran could have massive implications especially if they can hold onto Mesopotamia and Armenia/Kurdistan.
 
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