Battle of Yarmouk - Byzantine Counterattack

Byzantine Counterattack

Having seized Emesa, the Muslims were just a march away from Aleppo, a Byzantine stronghold, and Antioch, where Heraclius resided. Seriously alarmed by the series of setbacks, Heraclius prepared for a counterattack to reacquire the lost regions. In 635 Yazdegerd III, the Emperor of Persia, sought an alliance with the Byzantine Emperor. Heraclius married off his daughter (according to traditions, his grand daughter) Manyanh to Yazdegerd III, an old Roman tradition to cement the alliance. While Heraclius prepared for a major offensive in the Levant, Yazdegerd was to mount a simultaneous counterattack in Iraq, in what was meant to be a well-coordinated effort. When Heraclius launched his offensive in May 636, Yazdegerd could not coordinate with the maneuver—probably owing to the exhausted condition of his government—and what would have been a decisive plan missed the mark. Umar won a decisive victory against Heraclius at Yarmouk, and used great strategy to engage and entrap Yazdegerd. Three months later Yazdegerd lost his imperial army at the Battle of Qadisiyah in November 636, ending Sassanid control west of Persia.

Byzantine preparations began in late 635 and by May 636 Heraclius had a large force concentrated at Antioch in Northern Syria. The assembled army consisted of contingents of Byzantines, Slavs, Franks, Georgians, Armenians and Christian Arabs. This force was organized into five armies, the joint leader of which was Theodore Trithourios the Sakellarios. Vahan, an Armenian and the former garrison commander of Emesa, was made the overall field commander, and had under his command a purely Armenian army. Buccinator (Qanateer), a Slavic prince, commanded the Slavs and Jabalah ibn al-Aiham, king of the Ghassanid Arabs, commanded an exclusively Christian Arab force. The remaining contingents, all European, were placed under Gregory and Dairjan. Heraclius himself supervised the operation from Antioch. Byzantine sources mention Niketas, son of the Persian general Shahrbaraz, among the commanders, but it is not certain which army he commanded.

At that time, the Rashidun army was split into four groups: one under Amr in Palestine, one under Shurahbil in Jordan, one under Yazid in the Damascus-Caesarea region and the last one under Abu Ubaidah along with Khalid at Emesa. As the Muslim forces were geographically divided, Heraclius sought to exploit this situation and planned to attack. He did not wish to engage in a single pitched battle but rather to employ central position and fight the enemy in detail by concentrating large forces against each of the Muslim corps before they could consolidate their troops. By forcing the Muslims to retreat, or by destroying Muslim forces separately, he would fulfill his strategy of recapturing lost territory. Reinforcements were sent to Caesarea under Heraclius' son Constantine III probably to tie down Yazid's forces which were besieging the town. The Byzantine imperial army moved out from Antioch and Northern Syria sometime in the middle of June 636.

The Byzantine imperial army was to operate under the following plan:

• Jabalah's lightly armed Christian Arabs would march to Emesa from Aleppo via Hama and hold the main Muslim army at Emesa.
• Dairjan would make a flanking movement – moving between the coast and Aleppo's road – and approach Emesa from the west, striking at the Muslims' left flank while they were being held frontally by Jabalah.
• Gregory would strike the Muslims' right flank, approaching Emesa from the northeast via Mesopotamia.
• Qanateer would march along the coastal route and occupy Beirut, from where he was to attack weakly defended Damascus from the west to cut off the main Muslim army at Emesa.
• Vahan's corps would act as a reserve and would approach Emesa via Hama.