Would the Mongols have conquered western Europe?

Hello,
this post is so full of errors and ignorance that I could not resist to reply.

scottyd2506 said:

Yes most of the armies they fought from Asia to East europe was untrained peasants .

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I am not sure if you are serious. Do you even know about China in that time? China, as divided as it was, fielded extremely large armies against the mongols, thus defeating them several times. They were the only ones, who defeated Chinggis Khan in several battles as non-mongolian people. In addition, they were very organized and disciplined, because they were experienced in dealing with dangerous nomads such as the mongols. They also used Rocket launchers and bombs and what happened with China?

Also, if you compare Chinese fortifications to European ones, the latter appear like a joke. But maybe we shall look at the other enemies the mongols faced? How about the Russians? Their army relied on steppe warfare just like the Mongols. They made use of the compound bow in high numbers, which made them able to harm the mongols from distance. This is another thing the (western) European lacked, their warfare was based on melee, thus unable to inflict considerable damage to the highly mobile Mongols. So where can we find your untrained peasants? Well In Europe. Europe didn't have a standing arm in that time and because of that, they were untrained, unexperienced and not able to execute complicated maneuvers, while the Mongols were experts at that.
European armies consisted mostly in peasants, lead by the feudal elite, who had the best equipment but were low in numbers. A good example of a typical European army is the one, who fought the Mongols at Legnica.
If anything could have stopped the Mongols it would be logistics or the amount of fortifications, not the laughable European armies. Is it really so hard to swallow for you that the west wasn't the one of the best for one time? It certainly looks like it.

scottyd2506 said:

Bull crap, most compound bow today that shoot 340 fps can barley reach 800 meters.. what a crock. no bow in the middle ages could do over 150 fps. or near 800 meters except maybe on a steep decline

Remember range is velocity with aerodynamics.. the arrows of the mongols would be lighter than Europeans arrows that needed to be HEAVY to penetrate good armor.. thus would not range as well.

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Bullcrap, Mongols had two types of arrows, one light version for long distances and one for short distances, which were heavier thus able to penetrate heavy armor. You clearly lack knowledge about the Mongols.

scottyd2506 said:

Just an Excuse for a loss. Remember the mongols said they wanted tio conquer Germany, even after the great Khan died they came back.. maybe the Mongols was divided, but both of them was present in Europe...

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Mongols never intented conquest after Ögodei died. Mainly because Europe was, in comparison to China or the middle east, a thirld world country which wasn't worth the trouble. Later they also had internal problems, Mongols fought Mongols. The time for an invasion was clearly over.

scottyd2506 said:

East Europe might have been a cakewalk with it low population poverty peasant army the Mongols faced. But Western Europe was a TOTALLY WHOLE different beast. it was like they hit a BRICK wall of death! and they knew it. they never figured out how they could conquer it. That is why it never happened.
That is true History, not "what if" and "they could have" bla bla bla

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Wishful thinking has nothing to do with true history.

scottyd2506 said:

Of course all this and that is pure speculation, as the Mongols NEVER faced any WESTERN European power. To assume they would conquer a super power like Germany or France like they did a poor low population 3rd world country like Lithuania, Hungary and Poland is crazy. It is pure wishful thinking. not to add the terrain as the Forests gets thicker as you go west.

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LMAO! Superpowers in medieval Europe? That made my day. Take Germany for instance, one of their biggest cities had a population of 1000-1500 arround 1200. It was maybe slightly higher in the time the Mongols arrived. Now go figure, what numbers "Germany" could have mobilized to stop the Mongols. Their army not only lacked professional soldiers, they also lacked numbers.

DreamWeaver said:

rehashing previous posts with sweeping generalisations isnt really going to work. Lets see the quantitative evidence, some numbers crunched, source material analysed to back up those claims please.

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Numbers crunching are your intrinsic fallacy. "Numbers" and "quantities" do not make for victory as Darius, Xerxes, The Romans under Scipio the senior, Marc Anthony, Napoleon and so many other generals unfortunately discovered. Leadership, logistics, focus, mobility, adaptability and superior technology are the keys to military victory. Leadership is the primary affector. A small force can easily defeat a large poorly led or badly positioned one. No matter how much "pasturage" is available.

Apparently a third world country (Europe) built some pretty good cathedrals. I don't see a lot of Krak de Chavaliers in other parts of the world.

I think this idea that Europe was the biggest **** hole in the world in the 1200s is a bit overstated. Notre Dame was there in the 1100s. I don't think we can realistically say a bunch of uneducated hillbillies built that.

What is true though is that writers in the Arab world didn't mention Europe much, but nor did Europe have much of an idea of what was happening the Middle East. Doesn't this mean they were both backwaters? No, in this liberal era that means Europe was a backwater, and the Middle East was some sort of beacon of enlightenment, of course!
And women and blacks were supressed! Ah that feels good! Damn Jesuits! Ahh..... cultural marxist endorphin release.

Waterbabies said:

Apparently a third world country (Europe) built some pretty good cathedrals. I don't see a lot of Krak de Chavaliers in other parts of the world.

I think this idea that Europe was the biggest **** hole in the world in the 1200s is a bit overstated. Notre Dame was there in the 1100s. I don't think we can realistically say a bunch of uneducated hillbillies built that.

What is true though is that writers in the Arab world didn't mention Europe much, but nor did Europe have much of an idea of what was happening the Middle East. Doesn't this mean they were both backwaters? No, in this liberal era that means Europe was a backwater, and the Middle East was some sort of beacon of enlightenment, of course!
And women and blacks were supressed! Ah that feels good! Damn Jesuits! Ahh..... cultural marxist endorphin release.

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Apparently, the Taj Mahal, Angor Watt, the Forbidden city and the Great Wall of China were tiny constructions. No Cathedral in Europe comes close to some of the truly colossal constructions built in Asia.The Cathedrals were impressive for their times, in Europe, but they were the only real architecture of any importance (other than certain castles) until after the Renaissance. However,during the same time as Europe's cathedrals, many of the most beautiful architectural masterpieces of impressive size were built in Asia. Plus at around the same time of the "Cathedrals," the Aztecs built a huge city on water, Tenochtitlan, that is believed to have been the largest city in the world at the time. And incredibly beautiful as well.
There isn't a cathedral in Europe that comes close to the size of the Pyramids or to Teotihuacan either. Constructions built hundreds or thousands of years before.
The Arab world was about as excited about European knowledge as we would be today about Yemen. There was very little intellectual growth in Europe once the Catholic Church took over. Plus, most of what knowledge had occurred before the Catholic hegemony was either destroyed or forbidden. The only architecture the church was interested in was a church or cathedral. If it hadn't been for several important causalities such as the Protestant Reformation, the printing press, The discovery of the New World and the Renaissance, Europe would never had amounted to much and would still be a backwater.

Western feudal warfare revolved around castles and sieges. They were the most advanced fortifications at the time. Much else in western warfare wasnt terribly well developed, but siege warfare and construction of good fortification was.

Conquoring China fairly much next door to your homeland and conquering Europe a vast distance away two different sort of tasks. The Mongols can much much easily put more resources (manpower) into china. Mongol forces operating a long way from home is a totally different kettle of fish. The Bulk of Mongol forces are always going to in the east, they could not and would not send most of their forces west.

They never really made any real progress towards real conquest in Europe. They needed to be setting up real administration to provide a local base for further conquest. Their loot and burn tactics would bite them badly had they persisted in the style of their 'invasion', it was a raid more than an invasion.

Germany and France were heavily settled and the totals of men with military training and weapons was high. Of course the poor administration structures, organization, logistics meant that feudal overlords would struggle to put a fraction of these numbers into the field. They would be offensively weak. But the large numbers of fortified places and local military forces would make conquest slow and time consuming. With no vast amount of pasture living off the land would be much more difficult. Also like Machaveilli says conquering a vast empire is much easier than a area of independent states.China the long existence of large empires means you only have to replace one rule with another. Feudal Europe each little pissy feudal lord and his castle need to be reduced, much difficult and time consuming.

pugsville said:

Western feudal warfare revolved around castles and sieges. They were the most advanced fortifications at the time. Much else in western warfare wasnt terribly well developed, but siege warfare and construction of good fortification was.

Conquoring China fairly much next door to your homeland and conquering Europe a vast distance away two different sort of tasks. The Mongols can much much easily put more resources (manpower) into china. Mongol forces operating a long way from home is a totally different kettle of fish. The Bulk of Mongol forces are always going to in the east, they could not and would not send most of their forces west.

They never really made any real progress towards real conquest in Europe. They needed to be setting up real administration to provide a local base for further conquest. Their loot and burn tactics would bite them badly had they persisted in the style of their 'invasion', it was a raid more than an invasion.

Germany and France were heavily settled and the totals of men with military training and weapons was high. Of course the poor administration structures, organization, logistics meant that feudal overlords would struggle to put a fraction of these numbers into the field. They would be offensively weak. But the large numbers of fortified places and local military forces would make conquest slow and time consuming. With no vast amount of pasture living off the land would be much more difficult. Also like Machaveilli says conquering a vast empire is much easier than a area of independent states.China the long existence of large empires means you only have to replace one rule with another. Feudal Europe each little pissy feudal lord and his castle need to be reduced, much difficult and time consuming.

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This might hold true in a sane world, but the Mongols had one peculiar nasty habit. They only had to take one city in many regions, demonstrate what happens when you put up any resistance and most of the other cities would automatically capitulate.
Much of the Mongol conquest was due to fear not military victory. More psychological that confrontational. Genghis Khan attacked just one city in Kwarazim (Samarkand), killed everyone in it, stacked all the skulls in front of the totally levelled site and the rest of Kwarazim surrendered. I doubt if the many separate principalities of Europe would have remained strong against a few of these Mongol "demonstrations."

Exactly right about that habit Zarin. But it totally failed in Europe. Despite what happened to Pest and places east of the Danube, the Hungarians just continued to fortify, even forming giant compounds out of combined communities. They pretty much turned every hilltop into a fortress, and they burned their stuff so the Mongols wouldn't get it. Interestingly, Juzjani describes defenders doing the same thing in India.

So that tactic backfired in Europe, and that tactic happened to be vital to Mongol success. Look at Russia. Only Novgorod voluntarily submitted. Later, Danylo of Galicia did too, but only to buy time so he could......... I'm not going to bother saying it.

Well aware of the Mongolian "terror" tactic. Thing is pretty much all or nothing one shot strategy. If they fight on they know it's pretty total war. If they dont surrender they will fight harder. I dont think it would have gotten them far in europe, they decimated Poland and Hungary but no sign of people coming across. Most fortified places in Hungary were successful in defying the mongols. And western Europe was much better fortified.

If Mongolia was right next to western Europe and the full mongol strength could be applied in a long campaign they would have some sort of shot. It was a long long way, only a fraction of the mongol could be used therefore the had no prospect of success what so ever. Numbers do matter.

Waterbabies said:

Exactly right about that habit Zarin. But it totally failed in Europe. Despite what happened to Pest and places east of the Danube, the Hungarians just continued to fortify, even forming giant compounds out of combined communities. They pretty much turned every hilltop into a fortress, and they burned their stuff so the Mongols wouldn't get it. Interestingly, Juzjani describes defenders doing the same thing in India.

So that tactic backfired in Europe, and that tactic happened to be vital to Mongol success. Look at Russia. Only Novgorod voluntarily submitted. Later, Danylo of Galicia did too, but only to buy time so he could......... I'm not going to bother saying it.

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I think everyone is forgetting a very important point here. Even after the Mongols withdrew, these conquered areas of Europe continued to pay tribute. One only pays tribute out of fear. Obviously these vassal states did not want the Mongols to return with a vengeance, so this "scare" tactic worked in Eastern Europe. Whether or not it would have worked in Germany or other western principalities would have depended on how nasty the Mongols chose to be. And the Mongols really knew no limits when it came to instilling fear in any population. But this we will never know. Although, I feel the Christian sensibilities of western Europe might have been utterly shaken to the core.

With 20-40% of the Hungarian population we can safely discount the mongol terror as effective in his case. If killing that amount of population has not led to wholesale surrender it's unlikely further killing is going to get the desired result.

Zarin said:

Numbers crunching are your intrinsic fallacy. "Numbers" and "quantities" do not make for victory as Darius, Xerxes, The Romans under Scipio the senior, Marc Anthony, Napoleon and so many other generals unfortunately discovered. Leadership, logistics, focus, mobility, adaptability and superior technology are the keys to military victory. Leadership is the primary affector. A small force can easily defeat a large poorly led or badly positioned one. No matter how much "pasturage" is available.

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Did you even read that post? Apparenty not judging by this strawman. Im talking logistics here.

So you cant offer a rational counter argument based on analysis of source material and extrapolation of known figures to back up your sweeping generalisations?

or are you just avoiding answering the question?

No matter how much "pasturage" is available.

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Logisitcs man logistics! What do you think horses eat?!

DreamWeaver said:

Did you even read that post? Apparenty not judging by this strawman. Im talking logistics here.

So you cant offer a rational counter argument based on analysis of source material and extrapolation of known figures to back up your sweeping generalisations?

or are you just avoiding answering the question?




Logisitcs man logistics! What do you think horses eat?!

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You keep talking about numbers and quantities. You are a bean counter. I think I've answered that question quite adequately. However, please feel free to rant on if you must.
And horses also eat fodder and grains which can be transported. So this "pasturage" argument is utterly fallacious. But, if you insist, "pasturage" may be used, if you have conquered anywhere and the Mongols had a tremendous amount of "anywhere" to draw fodder and grain from. Many times over the "anywhere" of what remained of Europe.

The mongolians would never have been able to go that far without taking out constantinople and the byzantine empire, (wich was nigh impossible at the time) because if they would have attack the holy roman empire, the byzantines would simply team up with their close allies, the venetians and genoese and kill them.

lennertman said:

The mongolians would never have been able to go that far without taking out constantinople and the byzantine empire, (wich was nigh impossible at the time) because if they would have attack the holy roman empire, the byzantines would simply team up with their close allies, the venetians and genoese and kill them.

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I 'm reasonably sure that the Byzantine Empire was on the Mongol agenda for future conquest. Constantinople finally fell when the Turks invented a cannon big ebough to bring down those very thick walls. Attila had humiliated the Byzantines almost 800 years prior to the Mongols, so they weren't all that.

Zarin said:

You keep talking about numbers and quantities. You are a bean counter. I think I've answered that question quite adequately. However, please feel free to rant on if you must.
And horses also eat fodder and grains which can be transported. So this "pasturage" argument is utterly fallacious. But, if you insist, "pasturage" may be used, if you have conquered anywhere and the Mongols had a tremendous amount of "anywhere" to draw fodder and grain from. Many times over the "anywhere" of what remained of Europe.

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You havent answered the question at all. You havent evenm offered a decent retort

Do you understand how logistics works? Evidently not, it not fallacious as its a simple principle of warfare.

Armies have to be fed, armies with horses have to be fed more because the horses also require food. You can either live off the land or supply that arm.

If you live off the land you have to either make use of what is naturally available to you, so for horses this is going to be either eating and living off the pasturage and grazing land potential of the region. Or you have to take the supplies needed from the enemy, a risky and contested action that cna not guarentee either success nor that you will take enough to actually supply yourself entirely or partially for any lenght of time.

You may supply your army with food gathered from ones own lands etc and transport it with the army to as to keep them fed while on campaign instead of forcing them to live off the land.

Obviously there will always be a mixture of both.

Now, I have offered a reasoned argument as to why the Mongols would not have been able to live off the land in Central/Western Europe thus making any longterm or meanigful conquest unlikely to succeed. There wasnt enough pasturage to make living off the land for that number of horses a viable option.

Now you have claimed

horses also eat fodder and grains which can be transported

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. This is true but you need to show that the Mongols, had the ability and resources to supply that army in Europe so it could make a longterm or meanigful conquest. This requires the use of numbers, not vapid sweeping generalisations and declaring other to be bean counters. The numbers are integral to the argument. How much food does a horse require on a daily basis? How many horses are in the Mongol Army? How long is it going to take to conquer Europe? What is the total amount of fodder needed, daily, weekly, monthly. yearly? Where are you going to get it from? How will it get to the army? How is that supply going to be maintained? How long can the army survive on it? What happens if it runs out? How will the army transport it? How much extra resources will the army require in this transportation, since pack animals need to be fed also? How will this transport effect the progress and stratergy of the army, in battle and on the move? and so on and so forth.

This is how history works, its what historians do. You put for ward an idea, and then back it up with sources and infromation. Its what modern military planners do, its what medieval europeans and mongols did.

DreamWeaver said:

You havent answered the question at all. You havent evenm offered a decent retort

Do you understand how logistics works? Evidently not, it not fallacious as its a simple principle of warfare.

Armies have to be fed, armies with horses have to be fed more because the horses also require food. You can either live off the land or supply that arm.

If you live off the land you have to either make use of what is naturally available to you, so for horses this is going to be either eating and living off the pasturage and grazing land potential of the region. Or you have to take the supplies needed from the enemy, a risky and contested action that cna not guarentee either success nor that you will take enough to actually supply yourself entirely or partially for any lenght of time.

You may supply your army with food gathered from ones own lands etc and transport it with the army to as to keep them fed while on campaign instead of forcing them to live off the land.

Obviously there will always be a mixture of both.

Now, I have offered a reasoned argument as to why the Mongols would not have been able to live off the land in Central/Western Europe thus making any longterm or meanigful conquest unlikely to succeed. There wasnt enough pasturage to make living off the land for that number of horses a viable option.

Now you have claimed . This is true but you need to show that the Mongols, had the ability and resources to supply that army in Europe so it could make a longterm or meanigful conquest. This requires the use of numbers, not vapid sweeping generalisations and declaring other to be bean counters. The numbers are integral to the argument. How much food does a horse require on a daily basis? How many horses are in the Mongol Army? How long is it going to take to conquer Europe? What is the total amount of fodder needed, daily, weekly, monthly. yearly? Where are you going to get it from? How will it get to the army? How is that supply going to be maintained? How long can the army survive on it? What happens if it runs out? How will the army transport it? How much extra resources will the army require in this transportation, since pack animals need to be fed also? How will this transport effect the progress and stratergy of the army, in battle and on the move? and so on and so forth.

This is how history works, its what historians do. You put for ward an idea, and then back it up with sources and infromation. Its what modern military planners do, its what medieval europeans and mongols did.

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You are just going to go on aren't you? OC about pasturage?
I don't need to prove what is obvious. You don't conquer 2/3rds of the known world with poor logistics, poor care of your armies and/or livestock. Nor with incompetence in any military arenas. This "pasturage" is a thin air argument. "Pasturage" obviously did not effect the Mongols' momentum or advances. Anywhere. A fact. One that it is not necessary to prove with detailed quantitative lists. Lists don't change or prove anything. Only results.
Your argument is merely a distraction, based on fallacious minutia and not on anything of real historical substance.
The Mongols had no problem whatsoever with logistics, fighting skills, mobility, technology and generalship. Yours is a cream puff approach to history. The approach of a bean counter. And bean counters make the worst possible generals.

Zarin said:

You are just going to go on aren't you? OC about pasturage?
I don't need to prove what is obvious. You don't conquer 2/3rds of the known world with poor logistics, poor care of your armies and/or livestock. Nor with incompetence in any military arenas. This "pasturage" is a thin air argument. "Pasturage" obviously did not effect the Mongols' momentum or advances. Anywhere. A fact. One that it is not necessary to prove with detailed quantitative lists. Lists don't change or prove anything. Only results.
Your argument is merely a distraction, based on fallacious minutia and not on anything of real historical substance.
The Mongols had no problem whatsoever with logistics, fighting skills, mobility, technology and generalship. Yours is a cream puff approach to history. The approach of a bean counter. And bean counters make the worst possible generals.

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Hello and welcome to history.

Yes because you choose to ignore it rather then respond to it. If my argument is fallacious, then do tell upon what fallacy it falls? What false peice of logic is the crux of my arguemnt?

Currently you havent proven anything. It is in no way fallacious, it is a perfectly pertinent point and one that needs to be considered in relation to the OP. Im not sure why you are so hostile to it. You have indicated the importance of logisitce yet you fail to respond adequately when those logistics are called into question.

I have seen the pasturage and logisitcs argument for Mongols and other Steppe horse peoples, regularly. If its good enough and pertinent enough for professional military historians, including those at USMA West Point, then it will suit for me.

Cream Puff history you say, well if thats so its done me well from my undergraduate days to my doctorate.

DreamWeaver said:

Hello and welcome to history.

Yes because you choose to ignore it rather then respond to it.

Currently you havent proven anything. It is in no way fallacious, it is a perfectly pertinent point and one that needs to be considered in relation to the OP. Im not sure why you are so hostile to it. You have indicated the importance of logisitce yet you fail to respond adequately when those logistics are called into question.

I have seen the pasturage and logisitcs argument for Mongols and other Steppe horse peoples, regularly. If its good enough and pertinent enough for professional military historians, including those at USMA West Point, then it will suit for me.

Cream Puff history you say, well if thats so its done me well from my undergraduate days to my doctorate.

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I guess that makes you the greatest military genius in history. How many battles have you fought and won. How many nations have fallen to your vast historical wisdom?
I make no pretensions about my military abilities. My argument has been based on what actually occurred in history. Which is what military academies teach. But military academies also have an intrinsic weakness, more than amply demonstrated throughout "history." They are always fighting the last war not the next one. Great generals get beyond statistics and bean counters. They do the unexpected.
Your argument has no foundation in historical reality relative to the Mongols and their actual capabilities and what actually occurred. Which is what history is.
Plus, I'm sure that "pasturage" (NOT!) is one of the main foundations of current American military wisdom. "Pasturage" as you define it. We do have to feed those vast herds of American military horses don't we?

Zarin said:

I think everyone is forgetting a very important point here. Even after the Mongols withdrew, these conquered areas of Europe continued to pay tribute. One only pays tribute out of fear. Obviously these vassal states did not want the Mongols to return with a vengeance, so this "scare" tactic worked in Eastern Europe. Whether or not it would have worked in Germany or other western principalities would have depended on how nasty the Mongols chose to be. And the Mongols really knew no limits when it came to instilling fear in any population. But this we will never know. Although, I feel the Christian sensibilities of western Europe might have been utterly shaken to the core.

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That's incorrect in that Poland and Hungary did not pay tribute to the Mongols. You might mean Russian states continued to pay them, but Hungary didn't. In fact, exactly the opposite. 10 years or so after the invasion the Mongols offered a deal to Bela IV that if he would join their empire and help conquer the rest of Europe, Hungary would get 1/3 of the booty and never have to pay tribute. Bela politely declined the offer. The Mongols by then had a pretty bad track record for keeping their promises, but they made up for that by letting women do all the manual work in their camp and not caring what religion the local survivors of genocide had.

Also regarding the landmarks in Asia you mentioned, I believe only Angkor Watt and maybe a Western Hemisphere one are older than Notre Dame. The Aztec Empire was only 100 years old or so when the Spanish showed up, so their capital was relatively new, which doesn't decrease the accomplishment. It still wouldn't be as old as Notre Dame though. The Forbidden City and Great Wall were built in the Ming Period (as we have them today. Whatever dirt mounds were there before doesn't really qualify). The Taj Mahal is from the mid 1600s. Notre Dame is from the 1100s. I don't want this to be a urinating contest. As for European knowledge being of little value to the Middle East, they did think highly of ancient philosophy and math from Greece, and translated what they could get from Byzantine resources. So they didn't have a wholesale rejection of everything European.

I agree that they had a low opinion of their contemporary European culture, and where there is smoke there is fire usually, but all the same... The achievements of European medieval culture are so badly underestimated nowadays that it's verging on inaccuracy. The castles and cathedrals show there was some knowledge of engineering and science. Their efforts tended to generally go toward war or religion, but they also had universities already by then. They were not some group of knowledge hating cave dwellers at the time and painting them as that creates a totally false impression of the real society that the Mongols would have encountered.

Waterbabies said:

That's incorrect in that Poland and Hungary did not pay tribute to the Mongols. You might mean Russian states continued to pay them, but Hungary didn't. In fact, exactly the opposite. 10 years or so after the invasion the Mongols offered a deal to Bela IV that if he would join their empire and help conquer the rest of Europe, Hungary would get 1/3 of the booty and never have to pay tribute. Bela politely declined the offer. The Mongols by then had a pretty bad track record for keeping their promises, but they made up for that by letting women do all the manual work in their camp and not caring what religion the local survivors of genocide had.

Also regarding the landmarks in Asia you mentioned, I believe only Angkor Watt and maybe a Western Hemisphere one are older than Notre Dame. The Aztec Empire was only 100 years old or so when the Spanish showed up, so their capital was relatively new, which doesn't decrease the accomplishment. It still wouldn't be as old as Notre Dame though. The Forbidden City and Great Wall were built in the Ming Period (as we have them today. Whatever dirt mounds were there before doesn't really qualify). The Taj Mahal is from the mid 1600s. Notre Dame is from the 1100s. I don't want this to be a urinating contest. As for European knowledge being of little value to the Middle East, they did think highly of ancient philosophy and math from Greece, and translated what they could get from Byzantine resources. So they didn't have a wholesale rejection of everything European.

I agree that they had a low opinion of their contemporary European culture, and where there is smoke there is fire usually, but all the same... The achievements of European medieval culture are so badly underestimated nowadays that it's verging on inaccuracy. The castles and cathedrals show there was some knowledge of engineering and science. Their efforts tended to generally go toward war or religion, but they also had universities already by then. They were not some group of knowledge hating cave dwellers at the time and painting them as that creates a totally false impression of the real society that the Mongols would have encountered.

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What knowledge the Arabs did admire from Europe came from civilizations that had passed many centuries before them. This knowledge only comes down to us through their foresight in retaining such. Something that the Catholic Church was totally determined to destroy and eliminate from access by public perusal. The only real growth in European knowledge comes after the Renaissance, the discovery of the New World, the printing press and the Protestant Reformation. Then it came in great leaps.
It is true that some universities were built in Europe, but the knowledge available in them was severely limited by church oversight. Severely limited. There wasn't much else besides cathedrals and castles that stand out in European architecture after Rome fell.
And although it is true that the Great Wall was modified over many hundreds of years, it was originally constructed by the first Emperor of China. A singular architectural accomplishment. Long before those cathedrals.
There are so many architectural structures throughout Asia of grandeur, size and magnificence. Great temple complexes in India, constructions in China, Persia, Southeast Asia that are far more expansive and detailed than anything ever built in Europe.
To compare the great cathedrals of Europe to the numerous complexes in Asia is like comparing apples to oranges. Some of these Asian structures are very old and very complex. People tend to grossly underestimate what was built in Asia.
When it comes to the Americas, I only used Tenochtitlan as a singular example of what was available. Timeline approximate. Only to demonstrate just one of the high points of Native American genius. One those Europeans totally destroyed. This did not include the Mayan, Zapotec, Toltec and Mixtec complexes of singular magnificence. Nor did it include the great structures built in South America by the Incas or the Chimu. Many of the aforementioned structures built long before any of the great cathedrals.
I am not very impressed by European architectural accomplishment between the Fall of Rome and the Renaissance. After all, in history, this is referred to as the "Dark Ages." For many good reasons.
As to your denigrating references to Mongol treatment of their women, the average woman in European society fared little better. At least the Mongols didn't hunt them down and burn them at stakes as witches. Something I'm sure Europeans are real proud of.