MWC Special Feature

PETRO-BOURSES -WOULD HISTORY REPEAT ITSELF!
 
The Khwarezmian Empire, also spelt as Chorasmia, based on the Amu Darya (Oxus) delta, south of the Aral Sea coast, an entrepot for exchange of goods between Slavic lands in the West, Muslim states in South and China in the East, began as a part of the Ghaznavid empire .Its founder, Anushtegin, a slave, was appointed governor of Khwarezm around 1077 by Sultan Malik Shah of the Seljuqs, who had replaced the Ghaznavids as the new warlords in the region. Anesthetic’s   descendants governed Khwarezm on behalf of the Seljuqs but the defeat in 1141 of Seljuq Sultan Sanjar by Buddhist Karakitai (Qara Khitay) confederation of northern China, forced Anushtegin’s grandson Atsiz to acknowledge the overall sovereignty of the Karakitai.
 
Following Sanjar's death in 1157, Khwarezm Shah Tekish emerged as one of the contenders for supremacy in Iran. By 1200, his son the Khwarezm Shah Allauddin Muhammad II emerged victorious (reigned 1200–20). He took over all of Persia from the Seljuk Turks by 1205 and in 1212 defeated the Gur-Khan of the Karakitai. Now his empire stretched from the borders of India to those of Anatolia. However, Muhammad II, a vain man unable to control his army leaders, thought himself to be Alexander the Great II. 
 
Muhammad II won approval in the Islamic world by freeing himself from a humiliating tributary status to an infidel power, the Karakitai. Nevertheless, Gurkhan’s own vassal from the east, Küchlüg Khan, a renegade Mongol, delivered the coup de grace to the Karakitai Empire. Thus, from 1211 onward Muhammad II faced another hostile opponent in Central Asia, Küchlüg Khan. However, the destruction of Karakitai only worsened the situation on the eastern border. The post-Karakitai wars between him and Küchlüg Khan damaged the safety of the Central Asian trade arteries from China to the West.
 
At the same time, the new Mongol leader Genghis Khan had risen to power and took over Peking in 1215 as the lord of China. While agriculture revenues were important, customs duties from the caravan trade along the silk routes passing through their territories were very important .So Genghis Khan was much concerned with Chinese trade outlets to the West. {mosgoogle right}
 
Unlike the fighting forces based on tribal levies and loyalties in trans-Oxania and in the Islamic world, Genghis Khan, himself an orphan with no clan loyalties, structured his forces mostly from detribalized warriors on the Chinese bureaucratic principle. He was free to augment his forces by reorganizing his defeated foes into tens and hundreds and put his own men in command over each of the units. (A modern variation is Al Qaida and its self perpetuating cells, without loyalties to states i.e. tribes but the Ummah)
 
Genghis Khan first sent a goodwill mission with gifts to Muhammad II expressing desire for trade relations. Two years alter he sent a trade caravan of 450 men , mostly Muslims with about 500 camels,  laden with merchandise of gold, silver, Chinese silk, targhu stuffs,  beaver-skins, sables, and  other  articles.  The caravan was detained as spies by order of Mahmood II‘s governor Inalchik in the frontier province of Utrar. There is some confusion among historians on the degree of responsibility borne by Muhammad II and his governor, but except one all, the traders were killed.  “According to one historian, the governor acted solely out of cupidity to seize the merchants' wares after informing the Shah that the merchants were behaving like spies. While the Shah had sent an order to only detain them, the governor carried out the massacre at his own initiative.  Later the Shah was obliged to condone his governor's action.
 
Ibn al-Athar's account blames the Sultan who ordered the merchants to be killed, their merchandise sold to the merchants of Bukhara and Samarqand .He divided the spoils from the sales with his governor. It is very likely that the sale of the merchandise to the merchants (with a profit for them) was partly to compensate them for the cessation of trade with the nomad Mongols.
 
At the same time, Muhammad II had dispatched an embassy to Genghis Khan on a spying mission without any intention of entering into commercial relations .Therefore he suspected the caravan sent by the Mongols had the same purpose. {

When Genghis Khan sent three diplomats to Muhammad II for reparations, one was killed and the beards of the two were burnt.

Genghis Khan retaliated with a force of around 200 000 men and soon stormed Bukhara and Samarkand, now the Khwarezmian capital. The Shah fled but was hounded out. He escaped to an island in the Caspian Sea and died a few weeks later. In addition, many of the lustrous cities of Central Asia on the Silk routes, like Bukhara, Samarkand, Khiva, Termez, Heart etc lay in smoking ruins
 
“Regardless of how one resolves the question of whom really provoked the Mongol-Khorezmian war, its outcome was as predictable as the war itself was inevitable.”

Muhammad’s son Jalaladdin Mingburnu became the new Shah but he had to flee towards India. He was caught up by Mongols and defeated at the Battle of Indus .He and his closest followers then fled to Armenia where they attacked the Seljuk Sultanate of Rum .He was defeated and assassinated in 1231. However, his followers remained loyal to him even after his death and raided the Seljuk lands calling themselves the Khwarezmiyyas. Ayyubid Sultan Salahadin later hired them as mercenaries and they helped him capture Jerusalem in 1244, triggering the seventh Crusade .The Khwarezmiyyas served in Egypt as Mameluks before they were finally defeated by Mansur Ibrahim some years later.
It would appear that Genghis Khan had still not decided whether to establish trade relations with Khwarezm Empire or conquer it. Unfortunately, his hand was forced by actions of Mahmood II and his Governor Inalchik in Otrar.
 
Taming of the Soviet Union,
 
Things have not changed that much even now.  One of the determinants of modern day economic might is the availability and control over raw materials, now a days energy resources and control over sea and land routes.  Military power is used to augment economic wealth by even plain plunder .Economic power is then used to further reinforce the military muscle. 
 
The Cold War was a competition between the two blocks, with mutual assured destruction i.e. military capability of destroying each other but the Soviet Union lost out having been forced to divert unconscionable amount of its GDP to maintain military parity. US led West was fortunate in having two Russian leaders , a naďve  Mikhail Gorbachev , who apparently knew little about communism or capitalism and was frightened by US threats of embarking on a Star Wars program , matching which would have proved ruinous to the Soviet economy.( There are simpler solutions as Russia now suggests ). He was dazzled by his popularity in the manipulated US media (which now brushes aside Gorbachev outbursts against the West) as a historic peace maker, which he found of little avail at home when he stood for Presidential elections .He was a total failure in leveraging Soviet military power (yes, some money in royalties for his books and lecture fees in the West) Look at the way the north Koreans are playing the game or even Iran, just with a threat to become a nuclear power. After all Israel holds the Middle East to ransom by its undeclared nuclear bombs and its patron USA defied UN opposition and invaded Iraq unilaterally for its oil wealth.