Being an itinerant social studies teacher, every once in a while I feel impelled to look over some interesting pieces of history. I wrote a few things about the battle of the Talus River several months ago. This battle, in the mountains of Kirghizstan, was the first and seemingly last military contest between the Chinese and the growing Abbasid dynasty (the Islamic Caliphate in Bagdad).
There were a few seemingly trivial consequences (the knowledge of how to make paper was taken from Chinese prisoners after the battle…), but of more importance is the fact that this created what would become a ‘natural’ boundary between these two worlds. There is so much to consider about this conflict…what would the world be like if:
· The Chinese won…
o How far might they have expanded?
· If there was no real unrest in the central Asian region, would the Caliphate extended into China?
In any case, these sorts of “what if? “ questions can lead you to (1) starting to understand strategic geopolitical thought, and (2) start to see how important some seemingly inconsequential action really are.
For instance, at about the same time…since we are talking about the eight century, the term ‘about the same time’ can mean something like ‘within a generation…’ there was a similar military expansion effort coming from the Arab world. In this case I was after the Arab takeover of the Iberian Peninsula (i.e. modern Spain and Portugal). An Arab army of over 50,000 was advancing through the south of France (nee Gaul), and finally there was a battle near the city of Tours…
Where the Caliphate won the battle of the Talus River, but never advanced beyond this, a similar army in France was soundly beaten (by Charles (the hammer) Martel…the grandfather of Charlemagne). The net result is that these two battles in the mid eight century have effectively delimited the boundaries of much of our present world (e.g. the Western World, the Dar al Islam, and the Orient).
Once again, these ideas a fraught with many potential ‘what if’ questions and hypothetical outcomes. These two (comparatively ) obscure battles may have had a comparable impact upon some of these civilizations as the Persian Wars the Greek fought (480’s B.C.E.)…
This should leave you with plenty of ideas about how our lives might have been far different than they are now…
