What advantages/opportunities did the Caliphates have that allowed

>>315015
I guess unified purpose in face of unorganized or distracted (with other conflicts) opponents (or against organized focused opponents, but with less motivation).

>>315015
Only a few opponents offered any real resistance.

A lot of the land was occupied by desert nomads and tribals who were no real threat.

>>315015
Diplomacy and culture that allowed the Arabs to unite the nomadic and semi-nomadic tribes of Mesopotamia, Egypt, and North Africa, something the ERE and Persians had never managed to do without crushing them or else crowning a puppet to handle it. When the Arabs invaded Syria and Iraq they didn't bother marching on the cities like the Romans and Persians would have always done, but instead made treaties with the countryside to join them first before surrounding urban centers and simply waiting for their surrender.

Sassanid Persia

No seriously, the entire system of government and rule was taken from them which made the growth so much easier to sustain and organize into a single entity.

1. Khalid ibn al-Walid. Likely the greatest General of the Islamic and possibly entire Persian world. Having an Alexander or Caesar-esque figure heading your armies is a huge plus
2. The Sassanians and Romans were worn out after having fought for years, I'd argue that if the two empires would band together, Islam would have remained a small status.
3. Sassanian political system, inheirited after capture of the empire.
4. large portions of the caliphate were pretty empty, or were ran by Bedouin tribes.
5. Religious devotion

>>315015
The divine will of Allah

>>315084
This.

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>>315169
This, Masha'Allah

>>315150
First two explain the spread of the Rashidun and the 2 is really just a crutch Byzaboos/Persiaboos fall back on out of insecurity

>>315363

You have to admit that the devastating war fought between the Byzantines and the Sassanids must have helped the Arabs defeat both powers a few years later.

Arabs still won fair and square though. A giant empire cannot excuse itself by saying the sun was in its eyes.

>>315084

Yeah this. In a lot of ways the conquests were partly a mass revolt against the Byzantines and Sassanids which the Caliphate united under their flag and eventually religion. Aramaic and Arab speaking people were steadily becoming the majority in Iraq and Syria, and Romano-Punic urban culture had been deteriorating as Berber tribes pushed Byzantine settlement to a small handful of towns on the North African coast.

>>315384
Yeah, won't argue there. I would just say better leadership/moral/skill on the side of the Rashidun were a more important factor in them defeating the two largest empires of the Mid East at that time than them being "worn out" from each other.

Which group in the Byzantine/Sassanid empires benefited most from the change in administration?

>>315428
Probably the Sassanids, barring the monarchy, as a large amount of Sassanid political figures were inducted into the Muslim ranks.
The Byzantines had to now deal with a unified and stronger enemy at their doorstep for the next 800 or so years of their existence, which eventually killed them

>>315384
its was a lot more then "something was in my eye"

The Caliphate was organzed. The HRE wasn't an empire it was a loose collection of states that spent half their time attacking each other.

Even in the middle of the crusades Europe would waste resources attacking itself.

homogeneity

>>315015
religious collectivism

>>315601
delet this

Spengler has the answer but I'm sure it'll just get dismissed here because it's not materialistic.

>>315015
Its soldiers were religious fanatics. Kinda like today's jihadists in the Islamic State.

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>>315169
Anything but this is false akhi. The word of Allah swt is the word of the sword.

>>315601
>Even in the middle of the crusades Europe would waste resources attacking itself.

just like the muslims though

>>317218
Later on yes, but not so much during the Umayyads.

>>315015
Persia and the Byzantines were worn out from fighting each other for hundreds of years, so when a new power came along they both got btfo quickly.

>>315015
The Caliphs didn't gain all that land. The early Caliphate was not a centralized state and the rulers' actual power was tiny. It was strengthened only during the late Umayyads and it was one of the reasons why the Umayyad Caliphate was overthrown.

The actual conquests were usually done by private Arab bands who raided neighboring lands with or without caliphal blessings. Sometimes, as in the case of Egypt, the invasion was actually done in spite of the Caliph's explicit order not to to this.

The raiders entered a new land. Sometimes they were beaten, sometimes they returned with loot. And sometimes they found it possible to actually hold the territory. In such case, they sent a messenger to the Caliph for an official sanction of the conquest.

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It's a cop out answer born out of personal feelings to simply say because both major empires they faced were weak and crippled. While they had been at war for a while they were both quite wrong, and the Byzantines had just had a major military reformation as well.

The main reason the Byzantines lost so hard was because they had no fall back plans. They were so assured of their victory over the Arabs that when they lost, stunningly, they just collapsed, whereas if they were fighting the Persians they would have had back up plans in place.

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>>317318

>>315169
Any answer that's not this is just plain wrong.

>>315428
Arabs. Both empires had a massive amount of them under their rule.

>>317327

did the greeks even try

>>315413
A 30 years war and specially the civil war that followed it suppose a significant loss in human capital. More important than the loss of manpower is the loss of experts and seasoned officers, because they've been killing each other.

Its true than adding more causes than the typical "they were weakened" is in order, but both empires were indeed not in the best moment to resist a significant threat.

>>315472
Persians*

The sassanid family was all killed or exiled in china. If anything they were the greatest victim.

>>317223
But you (or him) were talking about crusades and the fucking HRE>>317234

Justinian fucked up all of North Africa, leaving an easy conquest, Plague of Justinian wiped out 20,000,000 between Sassanids/Byzantines, incompetent leaders in Sassanids/Byzantines, the big one would be the unhappiness of people living in those regions because of the heavy taxing in order to fund wars between Sassanids/Byzantines

>>317281
>Sometimes, as in the case of Egypt, the invasion was actually done in spite of the Caliph's explicit order not to to this.


rather, it was actually umar being thinking that amr ibn ash 4000 soldiers arent nearly enough to conquer the whole egypt and wait for further reinforcement. but amr arrived too fast on egypt. later he sure proved umar wrong though

>>317389
Not the original anon who was talking about the crusades, but I assume that he was using the Crusades as an example of the time when Christendom was most unified under a common goal, and yet they still had plenty of infighting.

The other anon said Muslims did same thing, and I added in the part that the divisiveness in Islam only came later, and that at the height of their unification (the Umayyad Caliphatee) the Muslim World was not very divided.

>>315428
Non-Orthodox Christians
Jews

>tfw if the Romans and Persians didnt fight for a shitty buffert zone that covered most of Syria/East Anatolia for almost 700 years on and off then there would be no mudslimes all over the place today and the ME might have been a good place while Anatolia stayed pure
What is it with medfags/mesopotamians and assuring their own self-destruction?

>>317530
Nigger at least try to sound reasonable and impartial this isn't a /pol/ circlejerk