“The Turk never built anything; his mission in life has been to destroy.” — Robert E. Howard, 1930

After seemingly endless cyber-troubles, I’m back to blogging—to some degree. Even though I’m well over a week past the three hundred and fortieth anniversary of the Battle of Vienna, major respects must be paid. That sort of badassery only comes along once a century, if that.

The run-up to the Battle of Vienna is complicated. The Ottoman Empire had been conquering parts of Eastern Europe ever since Sultan Mehmed II besieged and seized Constantinople, the greatest city of the West at that time. Mehmed's great-grandson, Suleiman the Magnificent, tried to take Vienna--itself the next 'keystone' or 'gateway' in the westward Turkish advance across Europe--in 1529. Robert E. Howard's "The Shadow of the Vulture" tells the tale of that attempt, which I discussed here.

Allah’s Shadow Upon This Earth, the Sultan Mehmed IV.

Mehmed IV—the Sultan of Sultans of the Ottoman Empire in 1683—was trying to equal or surpass two of his illustrious forefathers, basically. Suleiman had almost taken Vienna. Perhaps Mehmed could finally wipe out the blot on his family's honor and spread the Ottoman yoke even further? Taking Vienna would open up all of central and western Europe, the kingdoms of which were riven by ethnic and sectarian divisions. Mehmed was convinced by his grand vizier, Kara Mustafa Pasha, to strike for Vienna. War was declared by the Sublime Porte in August, 1682. The Ottomans spent most of the next twelve months pacifying their European provinces and then advancing toward Vienna. The Grand Vizier arrived at the gates of Vienna and delivered his terms of surrender on July 14, 1683.

Kara Mustafa brought with him over one hundred thousand imperial troops. In addition, Mehmed's vassal, the khan of the Crimean Tatars, brought forty thousand steppe horsemen to the fight. In contrast, the Austrian defender of Vienna, Ernst Rüdiger Graf von Starhemberg, commanded fifteen thousand regular troops and some eight thousand Viennese volunteers. May their names be remembered in glory forever.

The Ottoman Empire ruled approximately one-quarter of Europe in 1683.

Kara Mustafa employed his formidable Ottoman artillery to batter the Viennese ramparts, while simultaneously sending the Sultan's janissaries in waves of assaults. As always, I can’t mention the janissaries without also mentioning the diabolical Turkish system of devshirme. Under the Turkish sultanate, all non-Turks were technically slaves of the Ottoman sultan. Non-Muslim boys across Eastern Europe were taken by the Turks and raised to be janissaries. Never allowed to have families, they were used against their own kin to conquer further lands for the Ottoman throne.

Meanwhile, the Holy Roman Empire was negotiating with the Kingdom of Poland. Help was on the way. Would it be in time?

The king of Poland in 1683 was Jan Sobieski. A warlord with three decades of victories under his substantial belt, Sobieski had fought and beaten Cossacks, Swedes, Tatars and Turks. His countrymen had elected him king in gratitude. While he looked like an amiable peddler of pierogis, Sobieski was a soldier to the bone and--thus far--unbeatable.

Sobieski joined forces with German troops under the command of aristocrat-adventurer, Charles of Lorraine, on September 6, 1683. Their combined army numbered around seventy thousand with Jan in senior command. About three thousand of Sobieski’s troops were the feared 'winged hussars' of Poland, elite heavy lancers who were at the apex of their century-long golden age.

Meanwhile, the Viennese defenders had their backs to the wall. Starvation stalked their ranks while they fought off well-fed janissaries night and day. Kara Mustafa's sappers constantly dug like rats beneath the bastions of Vienna. Despite von Starhemberg's inspired and almost suicidal leadership, the Viennese were at the breaking point on September 11. They knew that relief forces were close. In utter desperation, the defenders sent up a signal rocket.

Nothing happened. Then September 12 dawned.

The soldiers of the Holy Roman Empire were the first to engage the Turks, inflicting damage and forcing the Turks to divert troops from the siege. Charles of Lorraine continued to throw his men at the Ottomans until, at four o'clock that afternoon, Sobieski unleashed his hussars. It was possibly the largest charge of heavy cavalry in recorded history. Jan rode in the vanguard.

The hussars and their fellow Polish cavalry—numbering some twenty thousand in all—avalanched down the slopes of the Kahlenberg like a force of nature. Eyewitness accounts from both sides describe the charge in elemental terms like ‘thunderbolt’ and ‘earthquake’, Tons of armored men hurtled down a mountainside astride tens of tons of horseflesh with one goal: destroy the Turk.

The Ottomans, fighting on two fronts, broke. The hussars rampaged through the Turkish camp, killing at will, their feathered harnesses fluttering like the wings of Death’s angels. A reckoning for two centuries of invasion and brutality was at hand. Grand Vizier Kara Mustafa Pasha barely escaped with his life.

Sobieski had shrewdly negotiated for rights to all the spoils from the Ottoman camp. The plunder he took back to Warsaw is still legendary in Poland. It was their finest hour.

Kara Mustafa was strangled by his janissaries in Belgrade on Christmas Day, 1683, upon direct orders from Allah's Shadow Upon This Earth, Mehmed IV. I kinda feel sorry for ol’ Mustafa. He simply didn’t understand European tenacity.

The Battle of Vienna marked the high tide of Turkish western expansion. It would be a long, grinding retreat from then on. Arthur D. Howden Smith was still fighting alongside patriotic Macedonian partisans just a century ago, trying to expel the Turk from Europe. Even the Balkan War of the 1990s had its roots in Ottoman imperialism.

An excellent documentary—I believe it is an Austrian production—can be found here.

There was also a well-done movie made about the Battle of Vienna:

September Eleven 1683

Finally, check out this great song from Sabaton. The video uses clips from the movie: