BOOKS: ‘The Enemy at the Gate’

THE ENEMY AT THE GATE: HABSBURGS, OTTOMANS AND THE BATTLE FOR EUROPE
By Andrew Wheatcroft
Basic Books, $27.50, 268 pages
REVIEWED BY DAVID C. ACHESON

There are two stories here worth telling and well told: the blood-and-thunder tale of the heroic defense of Vienna against the Ottomans in 1683, the surge in morale after the Habsburg victory, and the war to recover Hungary and the Balkans from the Turks. The other story is of the obsessive fear and hatred of the Turks in Christian central Europe, exorcised by the Habsburg victory at Vienna, turning to revenge and reconquest led first by Duke Charles of Lorraine, then by the legendary Prince Eugene of Savoy, ending in exhausted and bankrupt stability.

The drama of the siege of Vienna in 1683 is well captured in Andrew Wheatcroft’s “The Enemy at the Gate.” A huge Ottoman army under the grand vizier Kara Mustafa approached Vienna in the summer, allowing time for the Emperor Leopold I and his court and government to abandon Vienna for the relative safety of Linz, 135 miles away. Leopold sought to raise allied forces to relieve the siege. The city was garrisoned by about 15,000 troops under Count von Starhemberg, who had ample supplies of ammunition and not much else. There had been some improvements to the defensive structures of the city; Starhemberg was a competent commander and saw that every possible mode of defense was enhanced.

Mr. Wheatcroft’s description of the opulence and enormous size of the Ottoman tent city outside the Vienna walls is evocative and fascinating. The Turkish attack was slow to start and gave the defenders hope of prevailing. Occasional sallies by the defenders to damage siege structures had limited success and high cost in lives. A Turkish effort to undermine the bastions and blow them up did not succeed, but considerable damage was done. After 40 days of siege, the defenses and the morale of the defenders had suffered heavily, but the Turks began to chafe at the stubborn defense.

On Sept. 8, a signal rocket from the city was answered by rockets from the emperor’s camp behind the Kahlenberg west of the city, signifying that help was on the way. Leopold had recruited powerful allies to relieve the siege. Bavaria brought more than 11,000 men. 6,000 infantry and 2,000 cavalry came from Franconia and Swabia; 7,000 musketeers, 2,000 cavalry and field artillery from Saxony. King John Sobieski of Poland, a proven warrior, brought 3,000 light cavalry, 2,000 hussars and 10,000 other forces under his personal command.

The plan of attack involved crossing the Kahlenberg height in the Vienna Woods where there was a Turkish outpost. Soldiers under the young Prince Eugene of Savoy attacked the outpost at night and killed the Turkish guard. In the early morning the allies moved over the Kahlenberg, down over difficult ground to positions where they could deploy. The first Mustafa knew of this was to see an army of 50,000, led by Polish heavy cavalry, arrayed for attack on the tent city. The terrified Ottomans broke and fled toward Hungary, pursued by King John Sobieski and Duke Charles of Lorraine.

The Habsburgs believed the time was ripe to reconquer Hungary and possibly Belgrade. Pursued by King John and Duke Charles the Turks rallied at Barkan and were defeated again, and again at Esztergom. Kara Mustafa fled to Belgrade, where he was executed on the Sultan’s orders. In 1685, Duke Charles smashed the Ottoman field army and invested Buda, demanded surrender, which was refused, took the city by storm and killed all the inhabitants.

An even more devastating chapter, from the Ottoman perspective, now ensued. Prince Eugene of Savoy was brought to the eastern front from the wars against Louis XIV. At a very young age he had become a legend. He was slight of build, energetic and aggressive with a keen strategic sense, organized, totally fearless, demanding and, rather like Horatio Nelson, driven by the philosophy of attack. He was brought up in the court of Louis XIV and had requested a commission from the king, but was refused. Without hesitation, he traveled to Vienna and put himself at the disposal of the emperor. In the end, he was the field marshal who, with the Duke of Marlborough, broke the power of King Louis. History does not record many mistakes as fateful as that early decision of the “Sun King.”

In August 1697, Sultan Mustafa III led 80,000 troops across the Danube to capture Bratislava and Vienna. Prince Eugene assembled an army of 50,000 with ample ammunition, obtained good intelligence, and set out to intercept Mustafa and fight him at his greatest disadvantage, the crossing of the Tisza River. Eugene caught Mustafa in midcrossing, attacked the bridgehead, and by evening 30,000 Ottomans were dead, and the remainder in flight. Eugene’s losses were about 300. Things were pretty quiet after that until 1715 when the grand vizier made one more effort, attacking the fort at Petrovaldin. Eugene trapped him between the fort and the Danube, destroying the Ottoman army and killing the grand vizier. That virtually completed the war of reconquest and reversed the long obsessive fear, which was now on the Turkish side.

Mr. Wheatcroft makes his story move along. While the battle detail may seem excessive to some, in my opinion it serves the purpose, to borrow from the operetta “The Mikado,” “to lend verisimilitude to an otherwise bald and unconvincing narrative.” It helps us understand Bosnia, Serbia, Kosovo and Macedonia. Mr. Wheatcroft makes an interesting point that I have not seen elsewhere. After 1715, the Habsburgs spent huge sums building and rebuilding fortresses in the empire’s eastern reaches well after the Ottoman threat had passed. Had the money been spent on defenses in the west against the French threat, the wars of Napoleon might have taken a different course.

• David C. Acheson is a retired foreign policy analyst in Washington.