I was reading a fragment of Toynbee’s Study of History, in which the author says that, had Timur focused on conquering the Eurasian steppe instead of raiding Iran, Turkey and Hindustan, (all members of his own “Iranic civilization”) by “today” (=1938) we might have had a huge empire with an extension similar to that of the (former) USSR, but whose “core” would have been Samarkand instead of Moscu.
The author says that, of all those peoples who were in conditions of submitting the Eurasian Nomads by 1400 (the Muscovites, the Lithuanians, the Cossacks and the Transoxanians), the Transoxanians were those in the best position in order to achieve this. But Timur wasted his life fighting against states which were parts of his own “civilization”, instead of focusing on “expanding” this civilization (the “Iranic” branch of the Islamic civilization) in every direction (North, East and West).
As Timur failed, when the Eurasian nomads were finaly “submitted” in the XVIII century, they weren’t beaten by any Islamic state, but by Russia (an Orthodox Christian one) and by Manchu China.
So, what if Timur had focused on conquering the Eurasian steppe, from Mongolia to Ukraine? Could he have formed an empire that could have survived after he had died? What would have happened with this empire later? Could he have survived against Modern European armies, if technological progress in Europe follows the path it did IOTL? Could this empire have survived to the present day? Thoughts?
The author says that, of all those peoples who were in conditions of submitting the Eurasian Nomads by 1400 (the Muscovites, the Lithuanians, the Cossacks and the Transoxanians), the Transoxanians were those in the best position in order to achieve this. But Timur wasted his life fighting against states which were parts of his own “civilization”, instead of focusing on “expanding” this civilization (the “Iranic” branch of the Islamic civilization) in every direction (North, East and West).
As Timur failed, when the Eurasian nomads were finaly “submitted” in the XVIII century, they weren’t beaten by any Islamic state, but by Russia (an Orthodox Christian one) and by Manchu China.
So, what if Timur had focused on conquering the Eurasian steppe, from Mongolia to Ukraine? Could he have formed an empire that could have survived after he had died? What would have happened with this empire later? Could he have survived against Modern European armies, if technological progress in Europe follows the path it did IOTL? Could this empire have survived to the present day? Thoughts?