The Golden Horde Summary

[Kaiser Kirk]

The Golden Horde 
Current Ruler  : Noonien Khan
Government :  Feudal Monarchy
Government Model :  1843 Tokugawa Shogunate (with Emperor as Shogun)
Historical Departure Point(s) :  1395
Traditional Historical Countries :  Imperial Russia.
Traditional Friendly Power(s) :  None.
Traditional Competing Powers(s) : All bordering nations. 

Current Outlook : The Golden Horde has emerged from it's shell, but is not interested in events far beyond it's borders. Rather it looks to bolster it's internal strength, and knows it will eventually have another glorious war.

Military Outlook : The Golden Horde has millions of people, vast resources, huge expanses of fertile land to support the largest army on the planet. It is the aim of the Khan to keep it that way. Reforged since the snowy defeat in 1905-06, the Horde is fierce and well armed.

Naval Outlook : The nature of ships, requiring large crews working in unison, does not fit the warrior view. Small, dashing ships bristling with arms, those have at least some glory to them, and form the limited forces for the flanks of the Horde.

A division of the Mongol Empire, given to Grandson of Ghengis Khan in 1227. Under Batu Khan, the Golden Horde proceeded to conquer the Rus and surrounding territories as a Principality. In 1240, the invasion of Poland and Hungary occurred. The planned 1241 assault on the Eastern Franks, the Romans, and Byzantines was canceled when the Emperor died and the Princes had to return for the coronation. The   until the Mongol Emperor died in battle in 1259, leaving no clear heir. The Toluid Civil War was the result, tearing the Empire asunder. In the West, the Khanate of the Golden Horde was born.

The end of Batu Khan's lineage in 1340 led to decades of  instability in the Golden Horde, which split into the White and Blue Hordes. The populace was also weakened by the outbreak of the Black Death. Tohktamysh Khan failed a coup in 1376, and fled to the Timurid Empire. The White and Blue hordes which led to their defeated in detail by Timur in 1395. Timur, considering himself a spiritual descendant of Genghis Khan, reunified the Golden Horde and placed Tohktamysh Khan (a descendant of Genghis) at the head. Islam was also made the State religion at that time. Despite Parthian counter attacks 1393-1400,  By 1401, Timurid Empire included the lands of the Chagatai Khan, Golden Horde, still most of Parthia, part of Rajasthan and most of Byzantine Anatolia; the peak of power was reached, with the decisive defeat of the Byzantines at the 1402 Battle of Ankara.

1402 also marked the beginning of the downfall, for as the combined Timurid force lost a third of it's army while destroying the Byzantines. The Parthians and Chinese, a dynastic treaty sealed by marriage, launched coordinated attacks, battling towards Samarkand. The Chinese attack was first, and the Timurid army had to retreat in haste, riding hard to the East, only to learn the Parthians had launched an offensive towards their capital. The exhausted Timurid forces lacked the strength to decisively defeat either. The war would continue from 1402-1405. These Battles with the Parthian-Chinese coalition had seen those Empires reclaim their lost lands at the edges of the Khanate, and saw Timur grievously wounded in battle, to die some weeks later from infection.

Timur had two designated successors predecease him, and on his deathbed appointed the strongest Prince, Tohktamysh the descendant of Genghis, as his successor. A civil war followed, and the title fell to Jalan ibn Tohktamysh, but in it's aftermath from the Golden Horde absorbed the Timurid Empire and the old lands of the Chagatai Khanate.  The Golden Horde now stretched from the Germanic peoples in the West to the Han Chinese in the East, ruled once again by a descendant of Genghis Khan, Jalan ibn Tohktamysh The silk road had been lost to the Parthian-Chinese attacks, and the Golden Horde bent it's attention to that task, recapturing much of it in 1411. At that time, all sides agreed to an exhausted peace.

The Golden Horde is a feudal state, with the Mongol Warriors as the Warlords dominating.  Military prowess is glamorized, and warfare is considered a noble calling. Wargames of various types are a common past time, and innovation and trickery are prized. Mass levies raise the common cannon fodder they field to supplement their professional forces.  The view is that the role of non-Mongols in general, exist to be exploited by their betters. A strict class society is in effect, with the serfs at the bottom, and the merchants then skilled craftsmen and then artists all supporting the indulgences of the Warrior class.

The Golden Horde has continued to view conquest and tribute as their right. Sprawling over thousands of kilometers of fertile steppe, they have large numbers of people to devote to war. They have waged war commonly on their neighbors over the centuries, typically launching overwhelming raids and briefly conquering areas to extract tribute.  Their loose domination has generally been thrown off decades later by a new war. The Horde's neighbors have learned that when it is attacking another is a good time to fight, though the Horde has been the subject of repeated coalition wars.

The last Great War in 1872 saw defeat by first the Norse-Parthian Alliance, and then to Wilno and Byzantium in the West, while the Chinese won a victory in the Manchurian Winter in 1905-6. These two embarrassments have convinced the Horde they have fallen behind militarily and since then they have opened more to outsiders, ensuring technological parity by fair or foul means.

While their limited navy is mostly fast light craft, their army has been busy reforging itself to be the undisputed land champion.

The Golden Horde has an upper class descended from the original Mongol riders. A class descended from the conquered peoples warriors, as well as ennobled great artists, engineers and scientists, form the upper crust. A middle class of merchants, artisans and craftsmen populate the towns and villages, while the vast plains are home to Russ, Slav, Turkic, Chinese, and Tungusics, serfs and peasants which support the rest. Serf and slave labor drives mines and industry on a vast scale. The Mongol language serves to unify all, and the Islamic religion dominates, with other "people of the book" (Christians, Jews, Zoroastrians) having to pay an extra tax, while others are banned.