Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World - Jack Weatherford
Review & Rating: 9/10
A must-read in many contexts. One to learn history. But another to learn about systems for effective government and organization.
The book not only goes into depth (as much as it could) on the history and philosophy of Genghis Khan but also the growth and transformation of an enterprising nation. A nation that morphed into a conglomerate. One that started as a formation of tribal nations that banded to form a competitive force that conquered and built a decentralized system.
In many ways, much of the successful businesses in modern times exemplify similar tactics to the Mongolian army in regards to a stoic way of living, speed, constant iteration, psychology, etc… not to mention how Genghis Khan built a decentralized military unit and nation where accountability resided on groups as no individual was above the community they were part of. A meritocratic system where shepherds could become generals, where incentives of leaders were aligned with the ruling Khan.
It’s also a book of world history that shows the Mongol influence in the formation of countries in Asia, the use of war tactics in WW2, a paper money system backed by silver, the creation of guns through merging Chinese gunpowder and Muslim flamethrowers, the introduction of technology to the West, inspiring the Renaissance, the impact of a global pandemic to a world that thrived on the benefits of globalized trade and many more.
Book Notes:
Khan’s Mongol army had conquered more territory in 25 years than the Romans did in 400 years, an area about the size of the African continent at its height. It stretched from Siberia to Hungary, the Balkans, Vietnam, and Korea. All with a population of 1m and an army of 100k.
Khan introduced the first international postal system, abolished taxes for doctors, teachers, priests, and educational institutions, abolished torture, and granted immunity to ambassadors/envoys.
Khan’s empire lasted ~150 years after his rule with descendants ruling various countries like India until 1857 and latest in Uzbekistan until 1920.
Khan’s vast empire seems to be one of the early forms of globalization and its merits. He combined engineers from China, Persia, and Europe to combine Chinese gunpowder and Muslim flamethrowers to introduce the cannon. He transplanted food, engineering know-how, and products from East to West and vice versa.
Apparently, the Mongols chose not to invade Europe after seeing the poverty of medieval kingdoms when compared to the Chinese and Muslim empires.
“Hurray” is a Mongol term of bravado.
Genghis Khan, named Temujin, was born in 1162, founded the Mongol nation in 1206, and died in 1227. No grave/tomb exists as Mongol culture believed the dead returned to be one with the earth and the soul resided in the Spirit Banner.
Khan means chief and Genghis is the Persian derivation of Chinggis, which means strong/firm/fearless/wolf. Chinggis Khan was the title Temujin’s followers had bestowed upon him.
The Mongol army traveled light without supply trains. Instead of carrying siege weapons, they had engineer teams who could build whatever they needed with available materials. An early case of an army that emphasized the skills of human capital over-reliance on hard assets.
Havoc/panic was part of military strategy. The army would race in to scare the farmers and funnel them into the enemy castles. This would overcrowd the enemy strongholds and reduce the # of days they could withhold a siege before they ran out of food. It was a focus on having the enemy surrender and submit to Mongol rule instead of winning via #s slaughtered. It let their small and fast army be efficient in this regard. The primary objective of campaigns was to not actually fight battles. but use fear to overwhelm enemies.
“[Khan] recognized that warfare was not a sporting contest or a mere match between rivals; it was a total commitment of one people against another. Victory did not come to the one who played by the rules; it came to the one who made the rules and imposed them on his enemy.” / In a business context, it reminds me of Amazon’s mentality.
Similarity with Mongol and Korean culture include naming convention (use of common root word in name), counting of age (born as 1), and overriding value of kinship over other social principles.
Khan was an outcast in the tribal steppe world and he developed philosophies that went against convention like not showing favouritism based on kinship, distrusting high-ranking authority, distrusting social constructs gained with merit, etc…
Khan broke off with tradition by promoting those outside his kin into high-ranking positions, showing a preference for ability over blood. He also utilized fictive-kinship by adopting boys from conquered tribes to be his own sons. He further focused on flattening the hierarchy by redistributing conquered land/goods with his clan, another unprecedented move.
Throughout his ~60 year reign, none of Khan’s general deleted him and he never punished his generals. Trust and loyalty went both ways. A rare record for any great leader.
Khan introduced organized looting where all loot was brought to his central control and he redistributed it to his followers. A sharing of the benefits scenario that reminds me of Costco and Amazon in their ’scale efficiencies shared’ model. Khan also allocated shares of dead soldiers for his widow and children to let his soldiers know that their great Khan would take care of their families in death. A continuous theme of Khan earning loyalty and trust from his followers by treating them right.
Those from old nobility/aristocratic lineage did not like Khan’s new system of redistributing wealth to all soldiers. But Khan focused on abolishing the power of the aristocracy and trying to create a merit-based hierarchy that garnered stronger loyalty from the poor and that outweighed a few dissatisfied nobles who no longer had real influence.
Khan’s armies started with squads of 10. The eldest of the 10 was the leader but the group could decide to change leaders. The squad was never allowed to leave another behind to be taken as captive. A company was formed by 10 squads (100 men total). Ten companies formed a battalion (1,000 men, called minigan). Ten battalions formed one Tumen (10k men). Khan chose the leader of each Tumen. No one could change/abandon their squad up to Tumen as the penalty was death. It’s said he had 95 battalions under his command.
Khan adopted his military organizational hierarchy to his whole society, which led to the formation of city-states that worked autonomously.
When fighting a much larger force, Khan would order each camp to set up 5 campfires instead of 1 so as to appear much larger at night as they camped outside the enemy stronghold.
Khan’s use of squads allowed each unit to attack the enemy from different directions and retreat quickly into different directions. Most enemies were not willing to mobilize full units to chase after individually smaller squads. A ‘death by a thousand cuts’ approach that companies can use to attack competitors. It’s how a decentralized company might tackle problems.
In Khan’s merit-based nation, even shepherds and camel boys could become generals of battalions. Much like the Greeks, all healthy males older than 15 were part of the army. Khan allocated the leadership of Tumen to the most loyal and capable. Even his eldest sons did not lead full Tumens.
Khan created a common law for the nation. The law focused on eliminating strife, not on upholding good behaviour. It reminds me of Munger’s rule on inversion. One designs laws to eliminate all strife/conflict so all that’s left is for goodness to manifest naturally.
Some of Khan’s laws included: no kidnapping of women, all children were legitimate regardless of the mother’s marital status, forbade the selling of women into marriage, forbade enslavement/abduction of any Mongol, penalty of theft was execution, no hunting during breeding season, hunters had to limit their killings to only what they needed.
There was total religious freedom in the Mongol nation. The common law ruled above all and religion was seen as one type of public service for the people. Other essential public services like doctors, lawyers, undertakes, teachers were exempt of taxes given their essentiality to the nation.
Future khans had to be elected by the Khuriltai, kind of like a senate. A rare form of democracy during this era.
Much like how an army squad was responsible for its unit of 10, so was the family unit. Mongol society viewed solitary individuals as having no legal existence outside the family unit. Hence, the family unit was responsible for the behaviour of everyone and one person’s crime could mean punishment for the entire family. I could see such unitary accountability as a way of making people think about the consequences of their actions further. A clear distinction of the Eastern communal society versus the Western individualistic society.
This also led to how a unit had ranks while the individual didn’t. So, Khan’s Tumen was ranked higher than the Tumen of another general’s. This meant the lowliest soldier in Khan’s Tumen ranked higher than the highest-ranking leaders of other Tumen.
An alignment of interests was established among all of Khan’s generals by requiring they send their sons and the sons’s best friends to him so that they would form the Khan’s own personal battalion. This made the generals accountable to Khan with the lives of their sons while the Khan was accountable to the generals as their sons could betray the Khan as well. This actually meant many families had direct links to the imperial court as the sons would also be trained to become administrators of the court.
“What he could not control, he had destroyed.”
Is it odd to think of Khan as building a vertically integrated system that goes out to destroy competition if it won’t become part of the system?
The choice of control or destroy meant Khan made battle the last resort, always opting to cooperate with other nations and having them join his court.
“Although on the battlefield the soldiers were expected to obey without question, even the lowest ranking were treated as junior partners who were expected to understand the endeavour and to have some voice in it.”
As the primary military strategy relied on speed, this meant they had quite a minimalist attitude to maintain a lean army. The army only had cavalry. They had no supply trains except reserves of horses that traveled along. Their diet consisted of meat and dairy products that did not need to be cooked, hence no campfires need be lit. Fasting was also a regular part as Mongol soldiers could go 1-2 days without any food.
Many of Khan’s generals had been with him for 25 years, some for ~40 years. Years of continued experience within an enterprise seems rather key in the management of organizations too. One might consider that to lead to complacency but the other side of the coin is an organization that can continue to provide an environment for the best to grow and push their limits.
Khan never asked his men to die for him in battle. The purpose of war was to preserve Mongol life.
“On and off the battlefield, the Mongol warrior was forbidden to speak of death, injury, or defeat. Just to think of it might make it happen.”
Fear is the mind killer.
“Mongols did not find honour in fighting; they found honour in winning.”
When the consequences are life and death, it’s not a matter of how but the result that matters.
The Mongols often turned the enemy’s asset into a liability. Most kingdoms had large populations with a wide-ranging diet. This became a liability when the Mongols raided the villages that pushed refugees into the cities. They clogged all supply lines and the dense city population that relied on village farmers didn’t have enough food. This brought chaos internally, leading to the government killing their own people, infighting, etc… until they all surrendered to the surrounding Mongols. The Mongol tactic was akin to how they would herd their grazing sheep and cows. A takeaway is how the Stoic and minimalistic life of the Mongols made them such an amazing army that could take advantage of the fat, and materialistic nations that believed in “excess is success”.
The Mongol army is a reflection of how the strength of minimal, lean, and low-cost operations. The more stoic an organization, the better it can handle difficulties.
The Mongols focused on the acquisition of human talent by rewarding engineers that would defect to them and employing them into Mongol service. They believed in acquiring the skills instead of the weapons they had built.
The Mongol empire reminds me of the conglomerate model like Berkshire Hathaway, all the conquered nations got to keep their way of living and the conquered rulers got to keep their positions as long as they paid tribute to the ruling Mongol empire. Quite like how Berkshire’s subsidiaries send up excess cash flow up to Buffett at HQ.
A downfall for Mongol success was that Khan’s people started to acquire a taste for riches from all the successful conquests and that bred a toxic desire for more and more. Materialism had finally contaminated the nomadic people.
Before his death, Khan completed his control over the Silk Route between the Muslim nations and China. This gave him control over the trade routes. In effect, he owned the toll routes for commerce and didn’t own any method of production. It’s like he owned Visa/Mastercard. They essentially had the best assets in the value chain.
Similar to how he broke the aristocratic rule in the steppe whilst forming the Mongol nation, Khan didn’t take on any aristocrats hostages during his campaign, preferring to kill them ASAP. He found this to be a way to limit future wars. The common people seemed to care little of the merciless death of their own aristocrats as well. Aristocrats were something Khan couldn’t control, so better off destroying them.
Apparently, this nonchalance for aristocracy was common among the Mongol people where the lowliest of Mongol citizens treated visiting European aristocrats the same as they would a peer. Quite a fact hierarchy that seems to have been enforced by Khan’s reign/views but also the nomadic nature of the Mongol people. Showed one’s title somewhere else didn’t apply here in Mongol nation.
Khan allowed freedom of press. Even bad PR was good PR. Spreading fear of him worked well for his army.
While the Western armies used torture and savagery (Christian emperor Basil blinded 15k captives, German Emperor Barbarossa pulled limbs off captives in public and flung live children from catapults against castle walls while the Persians built a tower of heads of captives) the Mongols did not torture, mutilate or maim captives given their abhorrence for blood. Even when executing, they would roll up the punished in a rug before beating them to death so as not to see the blood. Rather hypocritical of Medieval legends that paint the Mongols as barbarians when the Western kingdoms had such creativity with cruelty.
In regards to decision-making, Khan used the fable of the many-headed snake versus the many-tailed snake. The many-headed snake couldn’t decide which burrow to hide in as the heads bickered over all the options until they froze to death in the coming winter while the many-tailed snake chose one hole and stayed warm. Such is the case for most decisions by committee. It might seem optimal but most times it leads to no decision or something so suboptimal, possibly even negative, to appease all.
“…he warned his sons not to talk too much. Only say what needs to be said. A leader should demonstrate his thoughts and opinions through his actions, not through his words: “He can never be happy until his people are happy.” He stressed to them the importance of vision, goals, and a plan. “Without the vision of a goal, a man cannot manage his own life, much less the lives of others,” he told them.”
“It will be easy,” he explained, “to forget your vision and purpose once you have fine clothes, fast horses, and beautiful women.” In that case, “you will be no better than a sale, and you will surely lose everything.”
“…you can conquer a nation only by conquering the hearts of the people.”
“People conquered on different sides of the lake should be ruled on different sides of the lake.”
Think this is a masterclass on acquisitions. You can’t forcibly assimilate cultures into some melting pot. Especially if the participants are unwilling. Such notions of ’strategic synergy’ rarely work out and most organizations should be left to their own devices. Decentralization is essential for most M&A strategies.
Khan died of internal injuries after being thrown off a skittish horse during a war campaign. He died a few days after they were victorious over the Tangut.
“He ascribed the fall of his enemies more to their own lack of ability than to his superior process: “I have not myself distinguished qualities.”"
“I wear the same clothing and eat the same food as at the cowherds and horseherders. We make the same sacrifices, we share the riches….I hate luxury…I exercise moderation.” / a Stoic approach to life per Khan.
As Khan stressed in his letters and his approach to conquest, it reminds me of Buffett and Munger’s advice to focus on “not being stupid.” It’s not superiority in intelligence or ability but more simple things of avoiding stupidity. Maintain a low cost lifestyle not reliant on many externalities. Understand that people like to do things the way they’ve been raised so either give them their freedom or win them over if you want them to follow you.
It seems to be a pattern among great rulers that their neglect of their own children becomes a point of regret. Such was the case with Khan whose focus on avoiding nepotism left his children ill-prepared to lead. Similar to Marcus Aurelius who left as the last great Roman emperor. Possibly similar to Buffett who built an amazing empire in Berkshire but noted how he regretted not focusing on his children. Such are the tradeoffs of great leaders of empires.
Ogodei Khan became the successor and immediately started fucking up what gave the Mongols their advantage by reverting into traditionalism and setting up a capital city with walls instead of the nomadic system of gers (tents). Setting up immobile cities with permanent populations formed constraints that used to hinder their enemies.
On religion, Christianity grew in popularity as Jesus (Yesu in Mongolian) sounded like their sacred number 9. It was also similar to Genghis Khan’s father’s name, Yesugei. Interesting how the Korean word for Jesus is also Yesu.
Within 8 years of Khan’s death, Ogodei had used up much of the wealth his father had accumulated.
The take rate of the Mongol empire to their vassal states was 10% of all goods/wealth. Think about how Apple’s App Store has a 30% take rate versus the <10% take rate of Substack, Patreon and other creator platforms.
While Ogodei continued a failing campaign against the Sung in China, Batu (Genghis Khan’s grandson) built out his own empire in Russia to become Tsar Batu in 1240 after taking over Kiev to end the Eastern European campaign. Batu sent Subodei (one of Khan’s loyal generals) out to the West to take over Germany, Poland, and Hungary. The Mongol’s speedy conquest was catalogued as lightning warfare (possibly inspiring Germany’s Blitzkreig in WW2). The Mongols had killed ~100k knights in Poland and Hungary, contributing to the end of feudalism and the Middle Ages. With minimal wealth in much of Western Europe and lack of pasture land (they needed open space for their military tactics to work), the Western Europe campaign ended at the borders of Germany. Most of the wealth during the European campaign came in the form of slaves the Mongols sold to Italians in Venice, forming a new trade alliance.
All four of Khan’s sons died within 14 years of his own death. They were all weak rules. The next generation of strong rulers came from his three grandsons (Mongke, Arike Boke, and Khubilai) from his youngest son (Tolui). The three pushed the empire to its maximal size conquering Persia, Baghdad, Syria, Turkey, Chinese Sung, Vietnam, Laos, and Burma while ending the Muslim cailph.
Genghis Khan had authorized the use of paper money backed by precious metals before his death. This was taken to extremes with paper money printing by his drunk sons. Mongke rectified this by set up a central bank to standardize the issuance of debt and paper money. He also backed the currency to a universal measure using silver ingots. He standardized the currency and started to monetize taxes instead of taking payment in goods.
Nizari Ismailis were a Muslim sect of Shiites known as the Assassins. The term comes from hashshashins. A term meaning “the hashish users” as the assassins were drugged with a steady supply of hashish to keep them obedient and fearless. Funny how the feared killers of high-ranking officials were highly trained drug addicts.
“The Mongol army had accomplished in mere two years what the European Crusaders from the West and Seljuk Turks from the East had failed to do in two centuries of sustained effort. They had conquered the heart of the Arab world. No other non-Muslim troops would conquer Baghdad or Iraq again until the arrival of the American and British forces in 2003."
Khubilai went on to rule China, Korea, Tibet, Manchuria and East Mongolia. He moved the capital city from Karakorum to Khanbalik (City of Khan), which is modern day Beijing.
The Mongol system of grip culpability evolved with Khubilai where criminals would get parole by working with law enforcement to use their knowledge of crime to help catch other criminals.
Khubilai formed a mosaic government by setting ethnic quotas to make a diverse administration of northern Chinese, souther Chinese, Persians, Turks, Europeans, etc…
The Mongol system of promoting low-ranking people to positions of administrations continued to foster growing loyalty towards the Mongol rulers in Khubilai’s China. They also introduced salaried employees in government to cease previous practices of extortion from civilians.
Given the diversity of the Mongol empire, Khubilai tried to set up a single alphabet to be used by all in 1269 based on the Tibetan alphabet. However, he allowed everyone to use their own language of birth as well and didn’t force it upon them.
Khubilai attempted two invasions of Japan. Korea was set up as the shipbuilding factory. I wonder if this contributed to shipbuilding being a major factor for the Korean economy in modern times. The first campaign consisted of 900 ships and ~23k soldiers in 1274. This was the greatest armada in history that had crushed by a storm. The Japanese called this Kamikaze (divine wind). The second attempt was in 1279 with 3,500 ships and ~100k soldiers. They too got hit by a storm and died. Fascinating to think how Japan got so lucky with the two storms and how history might’ve changed if Japan had been invaded by Khubilai.
Khubilai’s empire is seen as forming the early formation of the Southeast Asian nations of Thailand and Vietnam as they brought in many Chinese into an area that was very Indian in culture. This formed the hybrid culture of Indo-Chinese.
By the 14th century, Khubilai turned the Mongol empire into the Mongol corporation. High-ranking Mongol officials received shares in the enterprise instead of a salary like the non-Mongol officials.
“Through their shares, the members of the Mongol royal family controlled much of the production throughout Eurasia, but they depended on the merchant class to transport and sell these wares. Mongols had turned from warriors into shareholders, but they had no skill or apparent desire to become merchants themselves.”
The Mongols continued to incentivize commerce by elevating merchants to a social class second only to government officials and above religion and professions. This upended the Chinese prejudice which viewed merchants only a step above robbers.
Khubilai set up medical centers by recruiting doctors from India, Middle East, China, and the West. The Mongols also brought in Indian and Arabic mathematicians to build on the simple mathematics of the Chinese and Europeans. This introduced the use of 0, negative numbers, and algebra to China. Algorithm comes from Al Khwarizm. The Khwarizm empire the centre for mathematic scholarship.
Printing, gunpowder, and the compass came to the West during the Mongol Empire era. The Mongol principles of international law, diplomatic immunity, paper money, and freedom of religion also came to influence much of Europe.
The bubonic plague (Black Death) spelled the end of the Mongol Empire. The plague originated from Southern China and as the empire was linked in the early forms fo globalization, the plague spread rapidly as China lost 1/2 to 2/3 of its population by 1351.
“One of the few effective measures was taken by the city of Milan. As soon as plague broke out in a house, officials raced to seal up the entire house with everyone - sick and well, friends and servants -sealed inside.”
It goes to show that the most effective way of containing plagues/pandemics is forced quarantine by the state. Not to make leeway for individual liberties but to take on the utilitarian approach where the state imposes strict laws.
The epidemic led to fear and the routine cause of blaming foreigners for things they didn’t understand. The church started a campaign of burning Jews alive by blaming them for the epidemic. In 1349, on Valentine’s Day, 2k Jews were burned alive in Strasbourg. This spread throughout Germany and Austria while in Spain they persecuted the Muslims for the disease.
Fascinating how much of the world prospers from the uniting of nations and the freedom of trade that results from globalization. This path continues and when the world realizes that prosperity comes at a cost, in the form of the widespread epidemic through the very channels that led to mutual prosperity…everyone starts blaming the foreigners. It’s as if people forget that everything in life comes with a tradeoff and they only think about receiving benefits without risking anything. An epidemic should be seen as an almost required cost for globalization. That’s what history tells us at least. The 2020 blaming of foreigners for the COVID pandemic and ruing the use of global trade is once again evidence of how short-sighted people are, how uneducated we are of history, and how predictable we are in our stupidity to desire prosperity without consequences.
As the epidemic destroyed commerce, the connection between the nations dissolved, and in the ashes of isolation, all that survived as a strong point was religion. I think such a demise of commerce and the prevalence of religion would’ve contributed to the halting or possible decline of progress in human society.
With the decline of the Mongol Empire, the trust people had in their paper currency cratered and the value of the metals like bronze and silver inflated as people reverted to the use of commodity as currency instead. Such is the case when a strong military no longer exists to enforce the trust of a currency.
“Whereas the Renaissance writers and explorers treated Genghis Khan and the Mongols with open adulation, the eighteenth-century Enlightenment in Europe produced a growing anti-Asian spirit that often focused on the Mongols, in particular, as the symbol of everything evil or defective in that massive continent.” / Such things don’t seem to have changed in the 21st century.
While the Germans had professors translate the Mongol’s Secret History archives to learn battle tactics like the blitzkrieg for WW2, the Soviets too used the tactic Subodei used to defeat them in 1223 to defeat the Germans in WW2 by drawing them in deeper into the Russian winterland to spread them thin and pick them off one by one.
“Just as the British executed the sons and grandsons of the last Moghul emperor of India in the nineteenth century, the Society purges the known descendants of Genghis Khan remaining in Mongolia in the twentieth century, marching whole families into the woods to be shot and buried in unmarked pits, exiling them into the gulag of Soviet camps across Siberia where they were worked to death….”