Chapter 35: Campaign Anatolia (Part 6)

Moving into a meeting After the battle I had many of my commanders and a few messengers in my tent. Looking at the commanders I began to give orders saying "After this battle, the beylics we just defeated will be practically leaderless. We must seize these beylics immediately before they can request support from other powers, and others take advantage of our efforts.

-This must be done with what I will call an iron fist method. I order you all to put down any rebels claiming to lead these beylics we now rightfully own. If anyone is brave enough to claim to own anything that is rightfully mine, hang or behead them on the spot. you must take control of all governmental institutions and military installations.

-All forts, castles, city walls, and treasuries will be seized as well. I want any soldiers of these beylics who surrender to be enrolled into a local militia of the area used to temporarily garrison settlements and maintain law and order in conjunction with our forces."

Hearing this my commanders began to discuss and then one Omar stepped forwards and said "My lord will our current army be used to control these beylics? Will we be ending the campaign here with these gains?"

I responded "We shall send the remaining number of militia forces five thousand men will be split throughout the beylics to maintain law and order under the temporary Governing of Mehmet pasha. Though you all must lead our army first through these lands to remove any remaining enemy forces, erasing any remaining leaders of these beylics.

-We do not have the properly trained governmental forces to adequately administrate these new regions as they were not a part of our campaign strategy. But with this plan, we should be able to restrain these lands and prevent any rabble from causing too much trouble for a few months until we can send the proper administrators, and garrison the settlements."

Hearing this my commanders seemed to understand, and we began to plan out a proper strategy to complete this takeover of these new lands. First, the messengers were sent to Mehmet to have him begin to arrange the militia and follow the new plan.

After this meeting, everyone went back to their tents to rest or join the feast to celebrate the victory before resting themselves. I decided as a dictator I would act like one for just a moment, I told my troops we could only take a rest and must begin marching within 3 hours. None too many were happy about this but then I asked "does gold not excite you? A battle with no loot to be had is just not an ottoman battle at all!"

After this brief resting time, I soon found myself on the road again marching towards my goals. These lands are still very well maintained, for example, there is a giant mountain on the route to the more southern coastal lands but the old roman roads here are still maintained well by its primarily Greek inhabitants.

After marching the rest of the day, we made camp in Aydin lands. The following morning, we force-marched to their capital Aydin city. Surrounding the city with my troops, I waited for the gates to open.

My spies infiltrated the city long ago, so now I just need them to open the gates for me. The garrison can be no more than a hundred men, so they have no chance of guarding the entire wall. Within an hour two gates were opened the northern and western gates both were swung wide open awaiting my army's entrance.

Sending my full force into the city, I had no hope for the survival of this place. I will capture the majority of the populace here and send them elsewhere to boost Turkish Muslim populations in Rumelia. The treasury of the state belonged to me as well all was taken into my state's coffers, as well as a percentage of the loot the soldiers have taken whilst destroying the city.

I decided to loot and burn the entire city simply because it would make taking over the rest of the beylics easier for us. This city wasn't that wealthy, to begin with so I will not lose out on much, and I gain a decent sum of wealth for sacking an entire city and securing its entire populace.

After an entire day, the city was a dead zone. Then my troops spread out and began to spread out rule over the Aydin region, no sacking taking place in these areas as the majority surrendered rather easily.

We followed this process in securing the remainder of the ruler fewer beylics, except the destroying a city part. But we would secure more and more peoples along the way, sending them north onto my border with the Balkans. Whilst I ordered the majority of the Turkmen nobles and beys to be killed, I saved anyone willing to submit to me, though their lands would be taken unless they were willing to surrender it upon their deaths.

The only truly wealthy beylic we came upon was Menteşe, they have a small official navy and many merchants and guilds located in their port cities. This region was very well maintained, the ports were in great shape and capable of hosting a sizable fleet of military or trade ships. The roads still connected most of the wealthy trading communities allowing for expedient trade.

This process took an entire week sadly, and this pushed the date of the end of my Anatolian campaign even further away. Once we spread our rule over these lands the militia under Mehmet were brought to the area where they will spread their numbers throughout the lands and keep a firm grip on these lands until I can centralize the rule here with my governmental forces.

Once all was completed, I gathered all my forces in Saruhan once more, and we eventually marched toward Karasi lands to rearm and restock my army for another long campaign into the Anatolian beylics, and even further afield.

*** POV: Suleyman Osmanli (Brother of MC)

Walking into the main tent of our camp, I looked around the room identifying all my army's commanders and beys. Once I realized all was here, I started the meeting by saying "All beys and commanders who joined me on this campaign I thank you, I can say you all fought valiantly and bravely! But this is not the end, my brother your Sultan ordered us to secure all the coastline.

We must find a way to complete this all while keeping our army from losing too many men, and while staying within the time frame. Which is hard I know; it took us a long time to complete the conquest of the Canik tribes spread throughout this sparsely inhabited region."

One of the loyal beys stepped forward and said "you say we are to battle with the Romans in Trebizond and somehow make it back to the Jandarid port city in 10 days. I say this is impossible, they have too many castles, and there are too many mountainous regions not allowing for a quick conquest nor the easy passing of supplies.

I say we should just use diplomacy and turn these Romans into vassals who can pay us in soldiers and taxes. We can always return later when we have more time to complete the conquest of their lands, and we can also use these Romans when we fight in Crimea."

Hearing his complaints, I begin to think, I believe my brother would accept this outcome. Because this gives me more time to complete the conquest of Crimea, I can also save many of my men's lives and save supplies and gold. Thinking along these lines I replied "So which Diplomat will we send to negotiate with the Romans?

-I think we should send one of the diplomats, the vizier granted us... But what do you all think?"

The bey replied, "I agree with this proposal, though what shall we do with this downtime?"

I said "We shall continue to suppress the dissidents in the region and clean up the various bandits within these new lands, so the people here can prosper. We will also begin to raid the lands in Trebizond, we cannot have them negotiate on even terms, right?"

After saying this everyone agreed, so we moved on to completion of our tasks. Everyone has a role, and my role is to raid and destroy Roman castles on the border with our new lands in Canik. I will completely devastate the roman borderlands; I will become such a menace that they will have no choice but to capitulate to our demands.

Thinking of this I gathered the men to my banner, in this conquest we shall need to move swiftly as we do not have much time. I am bringing only horsemen, and to get into the forts we will use my brother's new weapon he calls the "Grenade"...

5 days later, I am looking, over the horizon at the last roman fortress on our border. It is completely emptied of its garrison and inhabitants this is the fourth fort I came to that was deserted. I see, I must return to camp maybe there is good news by now, obviously the Romans do not want to fight...

Sometime later I arrived in the main tent ready to read the reports, and when I walked in I was surprised to see several Romans inside as well... I asked, "So what has happened here?"

The diplomat we sent to the Romans stepped forward and said "My prince, this man here is the roman leader, he is the next in line Despot of Trebizond he goes by the name of Alexios. He is the heir to the throne there, and his father sent him to negotiate terms on their behalf."

I responded not to the diplomat but directed my words toward this Alexios. I said "Oh? So this boy was sent to negotiate... I see, so what are your terms? I sent my diplomat with pretty clear instructions and terms. We will not be enforcing any of our beliefs or governmental laws upon you, and all your Romans must do is pay us gold for our coffers and men for our army."

The boy Alexios stepped forwards uncowed by my display. He responded "My father the ruler of Trebizond has sent me to negotiate as he doesn't feel the terms are fit for the situation. We believe the terms should be leaner, we will submit only gold or men as we have not been defeated in battle and are not afraid of war. But we do not wish for war when we can pay for peace.

I stepped closer to the boy and said "YET! You have not been defeated "yet" is what you should have said. Now listen I will help you out as I also wish for peace and your assistance on something. So, in the way of leniency, I will half the required gold and manpower required for you to offer, but in exchange, I request a few guides or scouts who know the Crimean lands, and I want all the maps you have of the area and the black sea."

He responded quickly and still very boldly "DEAL!"

After seeing his display of boldness, I knew this boy Alexios would be a very shrewd ruler in the future. But now this isn't important as I now have made a great achievement, I now control the entire eastern Anatolian coastline. I also have gotten us an official guide for the invasion of the Genoese lands in Crimea, and a few current maps in the process as well.

My little brother should be pleased with such actions no doubt my father should be proud as well. I am very satisfied with the life of a soldier, there is nothing more suitable for me in this world than a battlefield. I will help my family expand our territory until the day I die or can no longer ride a horse *hahaha*.

-Authors note: Sorry I meant to post this yesterday, but things happened that just interrupted my writing process... I was just a little too busy, but I will make up for it this week. Hope you all enjoy the chapter, as I am attempting to improve my writing daily.