Battle of Vienna - Prelude

Prelude

The capture of the city of Vienna had long been a strategic aspiration of the Ottoman Empire, due to its inter-locking control over Danubean (Black Sea-to-Western Europe) southern Europe, and the overland (Eastern Mediterranean-to-Germany) trade routes. During the years preceding the second siege (the first one was in 1529), under the auspices of grand viziers from the influential Köprülü family, the Ottoman Empire undertook extensive logistical preparations this time, including the repair and establishment of roads and bridges leading into the Holy Roman Empire and its logistical centers, as well as the forwarding of ammunition, cannon and other resources from all over the Ottoman Empire to these logistical centers and into the Balkans. Since 1679 the plague raged in Vienna.

On the political front, the Ottoman Empire had been providing military assistance to the Hungarians and to non-Catholic minorities in Habsburg-occupied portions of Hungary. There, in the years preceding the siege, widespread unrest had become open rebellion upon Leopold I's pursuit of Counter-Reformation principles and his desire to crush Protestantism. In 1681, Protestants and other anti-Habsburg Kuruc forces, led by Imre Thököly, were reinforced with a significant force from the Ottomans, who recognized Thököly as King of "Upper Hungary" (eastern part of today's Slovakia and parts of today's northeastern Hungary, which he had earlier taken by force of arms from the Habsburgs). This support went so far as explicitly promising the "Kingdom of Vienna" to the Hungarians if it fell into Ottoman hands. Yet, before the siege, a state of peace had existed for twenty years between the Holy Roman Empire and the Ottoman Empire, as a result of the Peace of Vasvár.

In 1681 and 1682, clashes between the forces of Imre Thököly and the Holy Roman Empire (of which the border was then northern Hungary) intensified, and the incursions of Habsburg forces into Central Hungary provided the crucial argument of Grand Vizier Kara Mustafa Pasha in convincing the Sultan, Mehmet IV and his Divan, to allow the movement of the Ottoman Army. Mehmet IV authorized Kara Mustafa Pasha to operate as far as Győr (the name during Ottoman period: Yanıkkale, German: Raab) and Komárom (Turkish: Komaron, German: Komorn) castles, both in northwestern Hungary, and to besiege them. The Ottoman Army was mobilized on 21 January 1682, and war was declared on 6 August 1682.

The logistics of the time meant that it would have been risky or impossible to launch an invasion in August or September 1682 (a three month campaign would have got the Ottomans to Vienna just as winter set in). However this 15 month gap between mobilization and the launch of a full-scale invasion allowed ample time for Vienna to prepare its defense and for Leopold to assemble troops from the Holy Roman Empire and to set up an alliance with Poland, Venice and Pope Innocent XI. Undoubtedly this contributed to the failure of the Ottoman campaign. The decisive alliance of the Holy Roman Empire with Poland concluded a treaty in which Leopold promised support to Sobieski if the Ottomans attacked Kraków; in return, the Polish Army would come to the relief of Vienna, if attacked.

On 31 March 1683 another declaration, sent by Kara Mustafa on behalf of Mehmet IV, arrived at the Imperial Court in Vienna. On the next day, the forward march of Ottoman army elements began from Edirne in Thrace. The troops reached Belgrade by early May, then moved toward the city of Vienna. About 40,000 Crimean Tatar forces arrived 40 km east of Vienna on 7 July, twice as many as the Imperial troops in that area. After initial fights, Leopold retreated to Linz with 80,000 inhabitants of Vienna.

The King of Poland Jan III Sobieski prepared a relief expedition to Vienna during the summer of 1683, honoring his obligations to the treaty. He went so far as to leave his own nation virtually undefended when departing from Kraków on 15 August. Sobieski covered this with a stern warning to Imre Thököly, the leader of Hungary, whom he threatened with destruction if he tried to take advantage of the situation — which Thököly tried to. Jan Kazimierz Sapieha the Younger delayed the march of the Lithuanian army, instead devastating the Hungarian Highlands (now Slovakia), and arrived in Vienna after it was relieved.

Immediately tensions rose between the Polish, various German states, and Austrians over the relief of the city. Payment of troops wages and supplies while marching was predominant among these. Sobieski demanded that he have to pay nothing for his march to Vienna since it was his efforts that would save the city. The Viennese government could not neglect the German troops marching as well. The Habsburg leadership scrambled to find as much funding as possible to pay for the troops, and arrange deals with the Polish to limit their costs.