Expansion in the Middle East After destroying the Khwarazmian empire, Genghis Khan was free to move against
Western Xia. In 1226, however,
Jalal al-Din Mangburni, the last of the Khwarezm monarchs, returned to
Persia to revive the empire lost by his father,
Muhammad ‘Ala al-Din II. The Mongol forces sent against him in 1227 were defeated at
Dameghan. Another army that marched against Jalal al-Din scored a pyrrhic victory in the vicinity of
Isfahan but was unable to follow up that success. With Ögedei's consent to launch a campaign,
Chormaqan Noyan left
Bukhara at the head of 30,000 to 50,000 Mongol soldiers. He occupied Persia and
Khorasan, two long-standing bases of Khwarazmian support. Crossing the
Amu Darya River in 1230 and entering Khorasan without encountering any opposition, Chormaqan passed through quickly. He left a sizable contingent behind under the command of Dayir Baghatur, who had further instructions to invade western
Afghanistan. Chormaqan and the majority of his army then entered
Tabaristan (modern-day Mazandaran), a region between the
Caspian Sea and
Alborz mountains, in the autumn of 1230, thus avoiding the mountainous area to the south, which was controlled by the
Nizari Ismailis (the Assassins). Upon reaching the city of
Rey, Chormaqan made his winter camp there and dispatched his armies to pacify the rest of northern Persia. In 1231, he led his army southward and quickly captured the cities of
Qum and
Hamadan. From there, he sent armies into the regions of
Fars and
Kirman, whose rulers quickly submitted, preferring to pay tribute to Mongol overlords rather than having their states ravaged. Meanwhile, further east, Dayir Baghatur steadily achieved his goals in capturing
Kabul, Ghazni, and Zabulistan. With the Mongols already in control of Persia, Jalal al-Din was isolated in Transcaucasia where he was banished. Thus all of Persia was added to the Mongol Empire.
The fall of the Jin dynasty At the end of 1230, responding to the Jins' unexpected defeat of Doqolqu Cherbi (Mongol general), Ögedei went south to
Shanxi with
Tolui, clearing the area of the Jin forces and taking the city of
Fengxiang. After passing the summer in the north, they again campaigned against the Jin in
Henan, cutting through territory of South China to assault the Jin's rear. By 1232 the Jin Emperor was
besieged in his capital of
Kaifeng. Ögedei soon departed, leaving the final conquest to his generals. After taking several cities, the Mongols, with the belated assistance of the
Song dynasty, destroyed the Jin with the
fall of Caizhou in February 1234. However, a viceroy of the Song murdered a Mongol ambassador, and the Song armies recaptured the former imperial capitals of Kaifeng,
Luoyang, and
Chang'an, which were now ruled by the Mongols. In addition to the
war with the Jin dynasty, Ögedei
crushed the Eastern Xia founded by
Puxian Wannu in 1233, pacifying southern
Manchuria. Ögedei subdued the
Water Tatars in the northern part of the region and suppressed their rebellion in 1237.
Conquest of Georgia and Armenia in 1184–1230 The Mongols under Chormaqan returned to the
Caucasus in 1232. The walls of Ganja were breached by
catapult and
battering ram in 1235. The Mongols eventually withdrew after the citizens of
Irbil agreed to send a yearly tribute to Ögedei's court. Chormaqan waited until 1238, when the force of
Möngke Khan was also active in the north Caucasus. After subduing
Armenia, Chormaqan took
Tiflis. In 1238, the Mongols captured Lorhe whose ruler,
Shahanshah, fled with his family before the Mongols arrived, leaving the rich city to its fate. After putting up a spirited defense at Hohanaberd, the city's ruler,
Hasan Jalal, submitted to the Mongols. Another column then advanced against Gaian, ruled by Prince Avak. The Mongol commander Tokhta ruled out a direct assault and had his men construct a wall around the city, and Avak soon surrendered. By 1240, Chormaqan had completed the conquest of
Transcaucasia, forcing the
Georgian nobles to surrender.
Korea In 1224, a Mongol envoy was killed in obscure circumstances and Korea stopped paying
tribute. Ögedei dispatched Saritai Qorchi to subdue Korea and avenge the dead envoy in 1231. Thus, Mongol armies began to
invade Korea in order to subdue the kingdom. The
Goryeo King temporarily submitted and agreed to accept
Mongol overseers. When they withdrew for the summer, however,
Ch'oe U moved the capital from
Kaesong to
Ganghwa Island. Saritai was hit with a stray arrow and died as he campaigned against them. Ögedei announced plans for the conquest of the
Koreans, the
Southern Song, the
Kipchaks and their European allies, all of whom killed Mongol
envoys, at the kurultai in Mongolia in 1234. Ögedei appointed Danqu commander of the Mongol army and made Bog Wong, a defected Korean general, governor of 40 cities with their subjects. When the court of Goryeo sued for peace in 1238, Ögedei demanded that the king of Goryeo appear before him in person. The Goryeo king finally sent his relative Yeong Nong-gun Sung with ten noble boys to
Mongolia as
hostages, temporarily ending the war in 1241.
Europe depicting the Mongols capturing a city (16th century) The Mongol Empire expanded westward under the command of
Batu Khan to subdue the western steppes and drive into Europe. Their western conquests included
Volga Bulgaria, almost all of
Alania,
Cumania, and
Kievan Rus', along with a brief occupation of
Hungary. They also invaded
Poland,
Croatia,
Serbia,
Bulgaria, the
Latin Empire, and
Austria. During the siege of
Kolomna, Ögedei's half brother Khulgen was killed by an arrow. Amid the conquest, Ögedei's son
Güyük and Chagatai's grandson
Büri ridiculed Batu, and the Mongol camp suffered dissension. Ögedei harshly criticized Güyük: "You broke the spirit of every man in your army... Do you think that the Russians surrendered because of how mean you were to your own men?". He then sent Güyük back to continue the conquest of Europe. Güyük and another of Ögedei's sons,
Kadan and
Melig attacked
Transylvania and Poland, respectively. Although Ögedei Khan had granted permission to invade the remainder of Europe, all the way to the "Great Sea", the Atlantic Ocean, the Mongol advance stopped in East Europe early in 1242, the year after his death. Most historians agree with Mongol accounts which attribute the drive's failure to his untimely demise necessitating
Batu's withdrawal to personally participate in the election of Ögedei's successor. Batu, however, never reached Mongolia for such an election and a successor would not be named until 1246. A minority of historians have argued that the advance stalled because European fortifications posed a strategic problem for the Mongols.
Conflict with Song dynasty In a series of
razzias from 1235 to 1245, the Mongols commanded by Ögedei's sons penetrated deep into the Song dynasty and reached
Chengdu,
Xiangyang and
Yangtze River. But they could not succeed in completing their conquest due to climate and the number of Song troops, and Ögedei's son Khochu died in the process. In 1240, Ögedei's other son
Khuden dispatched a subsidiary expedition to
Tibet. The situation between the two nations worsened when Song officers murdered Ögedei's envoys headed by Selmus. The Mongol expansion throughout the Asian continent under the leadership of Ögedei helped bring political stability and re-establish the
Silk Road, the primary trading route between East and West.
India Ögedei appointed Dayir Baghatur in Ghazni and Menggetu Noyan in
Qonduz. In winter 1241 the Mongol force invaded the
Indus valley and besieged
Lahore, which was controlled by the
Delhi Sultanate. However, Dayir Baghatur died storming the town, on 30 December 1241, and the Mongols butchered the town before withdrawing from the
Delhi Sultanate. Some time after 1235 another Mongol force invaded
Kashmir, stationing a
darughachi there for several years. Soon Kashmir became a Mongolian dependency. Around the same time, a Kashmiri
Buddhist master, Otochi, and his brother Namo arrived at the court of Ögedei. == Administration ==