Great Warriors of Sui and Tang Dynasties

Chapter 1381 Paganism
The power of Medina on the peninsula on the northern shore of the Red Sea is growing stronger and has seriously threatened the Red Sea route. Mecca, the commercial center of the peninsula, is now also facing the military threat of Medina.

Daqin has great interests in the Red Sea and Mecca, but the church forces in Medina are very rude to the traders in Daqin.

In order to protect its own interests in the Red Sea, the imperial court is discussing to send troops to intervene.

The nobles of Mecca have requested several times to send troops to Daqin's ocean-going fleet, and Qin merchants also hope to have a fleet escort, and even hope that Daqin can obtain its own colony in the Red Sea and establish a castle port to protect these overseas Chinese merchants.

Many Meccan nobles, after being repeatedly defeated by the Xianjia church army in Medina, simply asked the Great Qin Emperor to join them. They hoped to be the same as Turks, Khazars, etc., as well as those kings in Daxia and Hezhong. Attached to Daqin, he became the feudal vassals of the emperor of Daqin.

In this way, they can continue to maintain their status and interests, and on the other hand, they no longer have to face the military threat of Medina, and become princes of the Great Qin Dynasty. Naturally, the fleet of the Great Qin Dynasty will help them defeat those damned heretics .

For this reason, these aristocrats asked to be attached, voluntarily became the princes of the Great Qin Dynasty, and asked the imperial court to send officials to take over the commercial city of Mecca, and at the same time asked the imperial court to send a fleet to transport troops to garrison there.

This is also unreasonable. Today, most of the Arabian Peninsula has surrendered to paganism. Those tribes that refused to surrender were also defeated and conquered by them. Those who resisted were bloody suppressed. The nobles were reluctant Abandoning Mecca is even less willing to be suppressed.

The Persian Sasanian was too busy to take care of himself at this time, so he could only seek help from the Eastern Great Qin Empire, which often sailed on the Red Sea.

The emperor has agreed to the request of the Quray clans of Mecca.

For Daqin, it would be very beneficial if this important commercial city could become a colony.

Of course, this has to be recognized by the Persian Sasanians, otherwise it will be very troublesome in the future.

The emperor now wants to take advantage of the civil strife in Persia to support the coup of the Persian prince to overthrow his father, Emperor Kuslao II, and to end the war with Rome. It is also necessary for Rome and Persia to agree to give up part of the control of the Red Sea to Qin.

Even Emperor Luo Cheng wanted Persia to cede their two enclaves on the Arabian Peninsula, Oman and Yemen, the northeast and southeast corners of the peninsula to Daqin directly, so that Daqin would not only be a colony of Mecca Instead of an isolated land, there are three lands.

More importantly, Yemen controls the northern end of the entrance to the Red Sea, and Oman controls the southern end of the entrance to the Persian Gulf. In addition, Mecca, an important town on the land trade route on the Arabian Peninsula, means that Daqin controls the relationship with Western Persia, Rome, and Franks. The trade gate of other countries.

Originally, the Red Sea was controlled by the Roman Byzantine Empire, but because of years of wars, the number of pirates in the Red Sea became more and more rampant.On the other hand, the other trade route from the Persian Gulf through the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers has always been exploited by Persian Sassanian checkpoints, and at the same time blocked by the Lahmites and Gasanians, and by Rome and Persia. At the same time interference, so the commercial status of Mecca is becoming more and more important.

At this time, the three largest city-states on the peninsula, Mecca, Medina, and Taif, were all next to the oasis, with no problem with water sources, and they were in habitable places between the Red Sea and the Great Eastern Desert.

Although these three cities are all in the desert, some are mountain cities and some are valley cities, but because of the continuous Zamzam Spring, they have become the gathering route for camel caravans.

At the same time, Mecca is also a holy place on the peninsula. Although there are frequent conflicts and wars among the tribes, they will cease fighting for a period of time every year and go to Mecca for pilgrimage.

This time is also the time for the annual arbitration disputes among the tribes, and it is also the time to solve the debt problem. People also take the opportunity to trade in Mecca, which makes the city of Mecca more important and more important among the three cities of the peninsula. Business is booming.

Daqin hopes to succeed Rome and Persia in controlling the Red Sea. Daqin has a powerful ocean-going fleet that can fight against pirates, but the fleet also needs supply places, and more importantly, a military port.

Although Mecca is not close to the sea, it is not far from the northern shore of the central part of the Red Sea. If Daqin can control the city of Mecca, then with the support of Mecca on land, and a military port by the sea, the Red Sea can be firmly controlled , no longer afraid of rampant pirates.

Of course, the emperor had another consideration, which he didn't tell his courtiers.

That is, the emperor was also somewhat afraid of this emerging pagan power. History has proved that this power, which was later called the Saracens Empire by the Europeans and the Dashi Empire in the East, was extremely powerful. It was so powerful that the Tang Empire in the East could hardly contend for supremacy.

The emperor was very worried about the rise of this force, so he wanted to kill them before they could unify the peninsula and really rise up.

That's why the emperor supported the coup d'état of the Persian prince behind the scenes, mobilized the two countries of Persia and Rome to fight, and accepted the enclosing request of the nobles of Mecca on the northern shore of the Red Sea.

The ultimate core reason is simply to contain this emerging pagan force.

Both Persia and Rome can only compete for hegemony in the west, and their power cannot reach the east at all.But paganism is different. Once they get up, no one can stop them. They will fight all the way to the Western Regions.

They will control the sea and land trade routes in the west and master the power of foreign trade, which is absolutely unacceptable to Daqin.

North Africa and the East exchange spices, leather, medicines, silk, slaves, weapons, grains, tea wine and other commodities. If this trade route is controlled by them, the pricing power will be in their hands, and Daqin's foreign trade will be greatly reduced. In the hands of others, make wedding clothes for others.

The dragon flag of Daqin will be planted on the city of Mecca on the peninsula, and the pagan eagle flag will never be allowed to appear.

Maintaining a weakened Persia is far more beneficial to Daqin than an uncontrollable emerging eclipse.

"I will send an ocean-going fleet to go, and its four major fleets, Kunlun Sea Fleet, Tianzhu Sea Fleet, Persian Gulf Fleet and Red Sea Fleet will arrive together, as long as the prince is willing to cede Yemen and Oman to Daqin and recognize Daqin's respect for Mecca." Sovereignty, then Daqin guarantees that the northern part of the peninsula on the south coast of the Persian Gulf will still belong to the Persian Sasanian.”

Syria and other places along the Mediterranean Sea in the west, as well as Egypt on the south coast of the Mediterranean Sea, will belong to Rome, the two rivers will return to Persia, and the Turkic army will also withdraw to the north of the Caucasus.

The Arabian Peninsula will eventually form a situation where Great Qin occupies the south and east of the peninsula, Persia occupies the north of the peninsula, and Rome occupies the west of the peninsula.

The Three Emperors Alliance, signed the Three Emperors Covenant, and enjoyed peaceful development together.

(End of this chapter)