NINEFirearms, Slaves, and Empires
Because we tend to equate the history of the Middle East with that of the
Arabs, we assume that Muslim military might, political power, and artistic
elegance all peaked sometime before the Mongol conquests. This is wrong.
To be sure, the Mongols abused Muslims in thirteenth-century Transoxi-
ana and Khwarizm, Khurasan and Persia, Iraq and Syria. Their record for
mass murder and destruction stood unbroken until the time of Hitler and
Stalin. Their champion wrecker, Hulegu, hated Islam generally and its
political claims specifically. Yet his descendants, the Il-Khanid dynasty,
converted to Islam within half a century and adopted Persian culture. In¬
directly, Hulegu and his heirs laid the groundwork for a succession of
Muslim military states: the Mamluks in Egypt and Syria, the Safavids in
Persia and Iraq, the Timurids in Central Asia and later in India (where
they became known as the Mughals), and most notably the Ottoman Em¬
pire, which ruled the Balkans, Anatolia, and most of the Arab lands up to
modern times.
What have firearms to do with Muslim empires? None of the states we
have just listed started out using them. We chose this title because all those
who took power after the Il-Khanids either learned to use firearms or died
out because their enemies had done so. The harnessing of gunpowder,
used in fireworks since ancient times, transformed the nature of European
and Middle Eastern politics and society. Once this change occurred,
around the fourteenth century, any army or navy that failed to adapt to us¬
ing firearms in sieges and later in battles got crushed. Cannons and mus¬
kets required disciplined foot soldiers trained to load, fire, and maintain
them. The need to recruit, train, and pay foot soldiers led to the rise of
central governments and the fall of feudal lords who fought on horseback