Expansion of Islam in case of a Recovered Persia and Roman Empire?

Crusader0926

Had there been delays or a shift in schedule of events so that the Persians and Romans had enough time to recover from their war, how much would the Caliphate be blunted in their conquests? Would they shift more of their energy into the South (and perhaps East)?

How long would it even take for each empire to recover?

Would the Caliphate even attempt outright war if each empire was at pre-war strength?
 

BigBlueBox

Banned
The best PoD for this is Emperor Maurice never gets overthrown, and the final war between the Byzantines and Sassanids never happens.
 

Tibi088

...Im sorry to be that one but if they have enough time to recover they have enough time to start the next round - which knowing them they would.
 

TyranicusMaximus

A major part of the Muslim Caliphate's legitimacy came from military conquest. It's not at all certain that Arabia was facing massive demographic pressure, at least not more than it was long before. What Islam brought was a sense of unity and likely discipline as well to these forces and enabled them to negate the disadvantages Arab militaries had had up to this point.
 
Practical Lobster

Practical Lobster

KingOnTheEdge said:
personally i'm fond of the idea that they expand overseas into east africa and southern asia, dunno how plausible it is tho
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I'd suggest "not very" - there's simply no prestige to a small scale Arabian monotheistic religion and without the outlet of expansion and the possibility of attaining wealth outside of Arabia, I can't see any would-be Caliph being able to hold things together long. Likely we'd see a fracturing of Islam around successor "prophets" and probably a decent number of converts would return to whatever belief system they had prior to Islam. Why southeast asians and east africans would have any incentive to convert to this religion is beyond me. Islamic merchants spread their religion to Southeast Asia, but the reason they could do so was because Islam had already won footholds in the Indian subcontinent through outright conquest.
 

Tibi088

Miguel Lanius said:
I think the Arabs would "Go Viking" and take to the seas as pirates, attacking East Africa, Egypt and India.
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There is the small problem that going viking en masse needs a lot of ships/boats which need a lot of wood which I think Arabia has a very short supply of. Also doesnt hurt if you are used to travelling/sailing on water.
 

BigBlueBox

Banned
Ethiopia, while nowhere near as powerful as Rome and Persia, is not a pushover. It would be a serious obstacle in the way of Islamic expansion onto East Africa. Without the wealth of Persia, the Levant, and Egypt, the early Caliphates will also have far less soft power and control over trade, and thus there would be far lower incentives for rulers to convert to Islam of their own free will. Islam likely remains restricted the Arabian Peninsula.
 

walmart

Something to keep in mind, despite the 602-628 war. Both the Byzantines and the Persians still field larger armies and were still defeated.
 
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