TheWPCTraveler said:
Any stable empire brings peace to its core lands, given a long enough period of time. Once you get to the periphery, you end up with a rather messy situation depending on your neighbors and other great powers and even the attitude of the borderlands toward the central authority. I can say the same about the Eastern Roman Empire (the Byzantines) that came before it, for instance. Or the Persian Empire(s) that sprang up and even rivaled the Ottomans for some time after their Turkic/Mongol night. Or Austria(-Hungary). Or even the Russian Empire and its successor, the USSR. The problem, of course, is that they all have one thing in common: they are large land empires with a large contingent of its primary culture (Turkish for the Ottomans, (Austrian) German for the Austria, Russian for the Russian Empire/USSR and so on) to administrate as well as tolerance for other cultures within (so no mass genocides unless necessary --- they cause civil wars and instability in regions where those populations have sizeable influence).
By the way, jihad is sanctioned by the Koran. So, both of you are partially correct. After all, it is a matter of enforcing the rules. But you Turks can't act all blameless, either. It's not as if you had anything with the Greeks and Armenians, nope. Nuh-uh. Let's memory-hole that, shall we... |
What happened at the end of the Ottoman Empire and rise of nationalism is unfortunate but it doesn't negate the fact that they lived peacefully for centuries. The Ottomans were the first true multicultural society. Jews, Muslims, Christians lived peacefully from Thessaloniki(read about its Jewish Ottoman culture) to co-existence of the religions in Jerusalem.
In fact Istanbul had a huge Christian and Jewish population until the end. All this wouldn't have happened if the Ottomans didn't allow for this co-existence to happen. The Ottomans had they wished, could have forcefully converted their subjects, like it happened in other empires around the world.
The dream collapsed when outside forces got greedy and destabilized the Ottoman regions. They would all be for the better if they kept on being administrated with the Millet system.
It's a really interesting story, the collapse of the Ottomans resulted in all the misery of today. Saudi Arabia is funding worldwide terrorism now, but they wouldn't be if they weren't getting rich with oil.
Fei-Hung said:
The Sauds and the West fear Turkey. The Ottoman Empire was no joke and they don't want anything remotely as powerful, even if it's good as they will see it as a threat.
As you said, the Ottomans did what most of human civilisations couldn't do which is bring peace in the middle east and unite people. The likes of ISIS, AlQaeeda etc have grown from the west meddling in things they don't know off and going for quick wins.
Also, let's not forget buried history. The secular leader in Turkey that was put in charge and hailed a hero by the west. The people he tortured, took basics rights away from, prisoned and killed. Yes, they weren't reporters, but the fact they were mostly civilians makes it worse. |
Agreed.
If the Ottomans existed today, they would be a superpower only behind the US and Europe. They would control all of the oil, and since they controlled the oil, there wouldn't be a Saudi Arabia funded terrorism problem.
It's a shame the West made such a mess of the middle east, now they're paying the price of a destabilized region leaking thousands of unhappy people.
