I read a long discussion about this on Quora. What I could gather from that was there were far more castles in Europe than China. Also Europe has too little plains to be able to support a mongol army very long. They each had something like 5 horses. There isn't enough grass for a large mongol army like that. One the debaters claimed e.g. that European castles were very well supplied for long sieges and would run out of food much later than an occupying mongol force which would be vulnerable to counter attacks.
European heavy cavalry was not useless against mongols. It is just that they were seldom effective when mongols could just run away from the battle field. Easy to do when they were much lighter armoured. But if Mongols maintained a siege they had to stay in position which would have made them vulnerable to European nights which were probably superior to mongol soldiers if they could not perform hit and run tactics.
Apparently the mongols beat the Hungarians initially but when they came back and the Hungarians had built lots of castles, they were soundly beaten. The sieges dragged on and they would get harassed by Hungarian forces which could always retreat back to castles while mongols starved.
My understanding is that the Mongols managed to conquer the more hilly southern China by using conscripted Chinese soldiers. So they were not really using standard Mongolian tactics there. Duplicating this in Europe would have been difficult because unlike China Europe did not have the same kind of central government which would have allow the conquest of a few cities to gain huge tracts of land and extra manpower. They would have had to conquer huge numbers of castles which would have dragged out in time.
In fact Machiavelli talks about this in the Prince. The Ottomans, Roman Empire, China etc were far more centrally controlled which made them one strong unit but once you conquered the central city of government you would control the whole country. The Feudalistic European countries however might not as easily marshal huge combined forces but they were extremely difficult to conquer because you had to conquer every little vassal state one by one. Considering that every one had a castle this was no easy task.
One should not completely discount the effectiveness of European military. During the crusades, the muslim forces would usually use Mongol like tactics to wear them out. But whenever the crusaders managed to corner a muslim army they crushed it with their heavily armoured knights.
The Mongols lacked siege engines when they first rolled into China, but they quickly conscripted Chinese siege engineers from conquered areas and used them. The Mongols were very good at recognizing who would be useful among conquered peoples and conscripting them. If the conscriptees did good work for the Mongols, they would be rewarded.
China was full of stone fortifications at the time. Fortresses and fortified cities were common in China and the siege engineers were among the best in the world.
After the Mongols begin expanding elsewhere, they took their siege engineers with them. Central Asia, the Middle East, Russia, and Europe. Fortifications weren't a problem for them.
The Mongols weren't bothered much by a lack of plains. Their horses were hardy and could survive on what was available.
The Mongols strength wasn't that their warriors were so much better individually. An individual European knight was much harder to beat than an individual Mongol. It was that they worked very well together. Their teamwork and discipline was unprecedented, and their lack of a supply train, their excellent mobility, and their incredibly good coordination allowed them to attack from multiple directions simultaneously. They struck where they weren't expected and could ride circles around other armies.
Their ability to divide and conquer their enemy was also very good. They'd take advantage of divisions in their enemy and exploit them. They turned the Hungarian people against the Cuman horseman who had fled to Hungary, depriving Hungary of large numbers of steppe horsemen.
The Mongols drove deep into Europe during their conquests, devastating Poland and Hungary, and making it as far as eastern Germany. The only thing that ended up saving Europe wasn't Europe's political system, fortresses, knights, or feudalism. It was the simple fact that the Mongol khan had died and the Mongols turned around and went back home. Europe would have been toast otherwise. The Mongols had far larger military forces at their disposal and the brutality to keep their conquered peoples in line.
They never made a concerted effort to conquer Europe again, although they dominated Russia (including the heavily forested areas) for centuries. They used conscripted Russians against each other as well, so often the Mongols themselves didn't even need to get involved to keep their lands.
Interestingly, at the Battle of Mohi, the Hungarian army managed to hold on against the Mongols for a while when they were both fighting at close quarters across a bridge. With fighting like that, the Mongols were at a disadvantage.
The Mongols got tricky and attacked the bridge during the night, and bombarded the Hungarians with all sorts of artillery. There were explosive devices used that night, and some historians speculate that there could have been gunpowder used in that battle. It also could have been just burning pots filled with flammable material. The Chinese did have gunpowder at the time, although it wasn't being used for guns, so the Chinese engineers may have used it.
At any rate, that whole attack was just a diversion. The Mongols had also crossed the river during the night, and when morning arrived, the Hungarians were surrounded. The Mongols left an escape path purposely, prompting the Hungarians to start to panic and run through the gap in the Mongol lines. Then it was easy to chase them down and kill them. European knights are a lot easier to beat when they have flung away their armor and a fleeing in panic.
The Mongols may not have been the toughest individual warriors around, but their trickiness, teamwork, brutality, and ability to make up for their weaknesses with skilled conscripts got them very good results. The army that wins isn't always the toughest one, but the one that doesn't panic and run.
If anyone's interested in the Mongols, I recommend listening to some older episodes of Dan Carlin's Hardcore History podcast. He had five two-hour episodes about the Mongols that were very interesting and well researched.
5 horses is quite a bit of food to feed the army... the more the army eats the more grass you have left for the horses... so when the castle is running out of food you have 1 good well fed horse and 1 good well fed soldier who has to win or he doesnt have enough horses to go home
That's fine for the first siege (assuming an extra couple months was all you needed), but now you have to supply up with 4x(number of horsemen) for the next one to be in the same position. Tens of thousands of horses for even a smallish Mongol army. And at least some of them must be trained for war, specifically in the Mongol fashion, not just any ol' training. In short, it's not gonna happen on any reasonable time scale.
Plus you lose whatever advantage the extra horses gave you until you get more—I mean, I'm sure they didn't keep them around just for fun. Greater travel speed by resting them off, extra cargo/loot capacity, whatever their reasons were.
> What I could gather from that was there were far more castles in Europe than China. Also Europe has too little plains to be able to support a mongol army very long. They each had something like 5 horses. There isn't enough grass for a large mongol army like that.
Just noting that these claims are highly speculative and not widely accepted by historians.
> European heavy cavalry was not useless against mongols...
Agreed. The mongol skirmishers were not the superhero units some people make them out to be but otoh they were experts at inducing their opponents into favorable engagements.
> Apparently the mongols beat the Hungarians initially but when they came back and the Hungarians had built lots of castles, they were soundly beaten. The sieges dragged on and they would get harassed by Hungarian forces which could always retreat back to castles while mongols starved.
This is basically correct but I'm skeptical the larger conclusion is proper. The Hungarians learned something from the first Mongol invasion that had success in the second. Some people's takeaway from this is that stone castles were some kind trump card against the mongols generally but given experience in China and elsewhere it's more likely just a weakness of that specific invading army. The mongols showed up in Russia/Eastern Europe with Chinese siege technology which was enough to beat most everyone they faced ... until it wasn't (2nd invasion of hungary, etc.). They ran into the same problem in China, personified by the Siege of Xiangyang but over years the mongols learned lessons too and increased their siege technology with Arab trebuchets and then every fortified city they faced afterwords in China fell like sand castles. Presumably the same pattern would have repeated in an extended invasion of Europe.
> My understanding is that the Mongols managed to conquer the more hilly southern China by using conscripted Chinese soldiers. So they were not really using standard Mongolian tactics there.
They used all sorts of troops and tactics including lots of Mongolians.
> Duplicating this in Europe would have been difficult because unlike China Europe did not have the same kind of central government which would have allow the conquest of a few cities to gain huge tracts of land and extra manpower. They would have had to conquer huge numbers of castles which would have dragged out in time.
I find this unconvincing, letting the mongols take you apart a small kingdom/castle/city state at a time was not a successful strategy anywhere as even if you had equal or superior troops the mongols could bring overwhelming numbers to bear on you. This is basically what happened to Russia and most of central Asia. Also Song China had tons of fortified outposts.
European heavy cavalry was not useless against mongols. It is just that they were seldom effective when mongols could just run away from the battle field. Easy to do when they were much lighter armoured. But if Mongols maintained a siege they had to stay in position which would have made them vulnerable to European nights which were probably superior to mongol soldiers if they could not perform hit and run tactics.
Apparently the mongols beat the Hungarians initially but when they came back and the Hungarians had built lots of castles, they were soundly beaten. The sieges dragged on and they would get harassed by Hungarian forces which could always retreat back to castles while mongols starved.
My understanding is that the Mongols managed to conquer the more hilly southern China by using conscripted Chinese soldiers. So they were not really using standard Mongolian tactics there. Duplicating this in Europe would have been difficult because unlike China Europe did not have the same kind of central government which would have allow the conquest of a few cities to gain huge tracts of land and extra manpower. They would have had to conquer huge numbers of castles which would have dragged out in time.
In fact Machiavelli talks about this in the Prince. The Ottomans, Roman Empire, China etc were far more centrally controlled which made them one strong unit but once you conquered the central city of government you would control the whole country. The Feudalistic European countries however might not as easily marshal huge combined forces but they were extremely difficult to conquer because you had to conquer every little vassal state one by one. Considering that every one had a castle this was no easy task.
One should not completely discount the effectiveness of European military. During the crusades, the muslim forces would usually use Mongol like tactics to wear them out. But whenever the crusaders managed to corner a muslim army they crushed it with their heavily armoured knights.