Draft:Safavid Capture of Mesopotamia (1623-1624)

In 1624, Shah Abbas I captured Mesopotamia, including Baghdad, expelling the Ottomans and securing Safavid control.

During the war

Shah Abbas went to war against the Ottomans in The area called Mesopotamia The Safavid army Encircled Baghdad which had been occupied on January 14 1624 A large part of the city's Sunni population was brutally slaughtered, in 1624 Safavid Forces Kicked The Ottoman Forces out of Mesopotamia. Kirkuk, Shahrazur, and Mosul in Iraqi Kurdistan were Occupied by The Safavid Army With local Ottoman troops leaving even before The Safavids arrived. The Holy Shiite cities of Najaf and Karbala (Modern Southern Iraq) were also occupied Also the eastern Anatolia war also were conquered by the Safavids. Hafez Ahmad Pasha, now chosen as the commander-in-chief of all Ottoman forces fighting Iranian forces, was ordered by Istanbul to kick the Iranians out of Baghdad.!" He led a powerful army to Baghdad by November 1625. Shah Abbas had sent support for his Baghdad soldiers. Despite this, the Ottomans were ready and provided with supplies. Shah Abbas had also made his army get ready to arrive at Baghdad to defeat the Ottoman forces. Hafez Ahmad Pasha had no plans to wait for Shah Abbas' arrival. He prosecuted his siege with vigor, aiming to take over Baghdad before Shah Abbas arrived. In this attempt, Ottoman forces achieved success in making a breakthrough in one of Baghdad's walls. They then launched strike after strike that breach, in a desperate attempt to break into the city. All of these experiment were pushed back by the Iranians. When the Ottomans broke through their breach they were shocked by this protection and lost 5,000 men before fleeing. Shah Abbas eventually achieved Baghdad by May 1626, six months into its siege. An attack offensive on Ottoman forces was excluded as they had to break up a wide ditch and area their artillery and fighters after these. The Ottomans were therefore able to start again their siege of Baghdad and feel politely secure from a frontal Safavid invasion. Shah Abbas adjusted to this apparent impasse by placing the besiegers themselves under siege. He successfully cut off all of Hafez Ahmad Pasha's significant supply highways. In the meantime, the Iranian garrison's food collections in Baghdad were running dangerously low. A raiding party desperately sailed out with boats onto the Tigris River’ and were resupplied by the shah's headquarters. Hafez Ahmad Pasha's failure to prevent this resupply confirmed to bea significant mistake, as Shah Abbas had succeeded in encircling the Ottomans who were sandwiched between Shah Abbas' relief force and the reinvigorated Baghdad soldiers. Hafez Ahmad Pasha was forced to abandon the protection of his defenses to launch a major attack against the waiting Shah Abbas. The Ottomans were poorly mauled and suffered heavy casualties.