When we talk of great invaders, we must also note the weaknesses of the invaded kingdom at that time. When Genghis attacked China, it was not at its strength as an united nation. It was a quarreling collection of kingdoms with a weak leadership. Emperor Lizong of Southern Song dynasty had no leadership skills and helped Genghis win his arch rival - the Jin dynasty in northern China. He liked brothels more than courts and battlefields and had little idea that Genghis would be a Frankenstein monster and would attack him once northern China fell.
Again, when Alexander attacked Persia it was ruled by a very feeble emperor in Darius IIIwho got to the throne not for his qualities. When East India Company won India, the Mughal empire had already collapsed and it was a feuding collection of states. When Muhammad's armies won Middle East the region was already war weary from centuries of wars between Rome and Persia with the Western part of Roman empire already collapsed.
Almost all great invaders won against other civilizations at their weakest points. At the time Genghis came to India, India was ruled by a strong leader in Iltutmish. It is very hard for even the greatest of invaders to capture a strong leader heading a large empire. They eventually found easier targets to prey.
Quick collection of events: Genghiz Khan was at the bank of Indus in 1221 chasing Jalal ud-Din of Samarkhand, but he had a formidable ruler of Iltutmish to face in India if he attempted to go into Delhi. Few Indian towns on the periphery such as Multan and Lahore were attacked. The great Khan probably reasoned that he had a lot of lesser hanging fruits to take. So he pulled back his troops from the Indus valley. For the next century, Mongol troops would be strongly repulsed and defeated in 4 battles by Delhi Sultanates, until one of the Indian rulers got stupid enough to attempt to take over the Mongol territories.
As we will see with maps later, even the greatest conquerers were afraid of crossing the Indus when India had strong rulers.
India has a formidable geographical defense. The Himalayas, Hindukush and Arakans surround India with impassable mountains. The magnificient Indian ocean does the job on the south. Even the coasts are reasonably protected by Western & Eastern ghats. There are only a handful of crossings to get into the country - the most famous of which is the Khyber pass. Historically, strong Indian kings protected that pass.
Thus, whenever India had a strong leadership in Delhi it was an impossible land to conquer. As many conquerers such as Alexander discovered earlier, it was not easy to move a large army into India and withstand the hot and humid climate. At the time of Mongol Invasions, Ilututmish and later Alaudin Khilji were at the heights of their power.
The trick to conquer India is to travel light and wait for the Indian kingdoms to implode on their own.
Timur the Lame (a descendent of Genghiz Khan) did this. He attacked when Delhi Sultanates were disintegrating under the last of the Tuklaqs and traveled quite light.Babur (a descedent of Timur) did follow the same strategy. He attacked when Delhi was going through another decay under the last of the Lodhi dynasty. He quickly marched to Lahore and then Delhi and took over.East Indian company waited for the Mughal empire to die out. Then they slowly picked up the remanants.
In short, over 4000 years of history shows that it is almost impossible to conquer India whenever the nation had a stable, strong ruler. At the time of Genghiz Khan, India had strong rulers in Iltutmish and Alaudin Khilji.
1. Region of Darius - the most powerful of Achamenid/Persian rulers. Stops at the Indus river.
The Mongol Empire launched several invasions into the Indian subcontinent from 1221 to 1327, with many of the later raids made by the unruly Qaraunas of Mongol origin. The Mongols occupied parts of modern Pakistan and other parts of Punjab for decades. As the Mongols progressed into the Indian hinterland and reached the outskirts of Delhi, the Delhi Sultanate led a campaign against them in which the Mongol army inflicted huge losses on the rival army, but were beaten back nonetheless.
The Mughal Empire founded by Babur, however, successfully conquered most of the Indian subcontinent in the 16th and the 17th centuries.
Well the Mongols did invade India, just not under Genghis Khan. Like Mahmud of Ghazni, Mohammed Ghori and Alexander, they crossed the Hindukush into India. India was never invaded from the Himalayan route before 1948.
Here are some of the important "phases" in the Mongol invasion of India.
A Mongol attack on India during Genghis' lifetime was avoided when Iltumish refused to harbor the Khwarizm Shah in 1220 (in the aftermath of the Mongol invasion of Persia). Ala-ad din Mohammed, the Khwarizm Shah of Persia, got into Genghis' bad books by slaughtering a trade mission and later Mongol ambassadors. Genghis was so incensed that he paused his Chinese campaign and started what is often called a Holocaust of the Islamic world. Ala-ad Din died soon after the war started, but his son Jalal Ad-Din fled to India and while the Mongols were pursuing him (under their greatest general Subutai) sought refuge with Illtumish. Iltumish refused - if he had not, there is no doubt that Subutai, or if required Genghis himself, would have come marching into Northern India. As it happened, Subotai was more interested in heading to Europe, and Genghis himself was eager to go back to slaughtering the Chinese. It is possible that the Mongols were, at this time, a little weary of attacking the Delhi Sultanate. Not afraid, but there were other lower hanging fruit elsewhere.After Genghis' death, the Delhi Sultanate would face continuous Mongol assaults under Ogedei Khan and Mongke Khan. Later after the Mongol Empire broke up into various Khanates, the Chagatai Mongols would lead several attacks on India (in the 1290s and 1300s). At this time, Alauddin Khilji was successful in not just stopping the Mongols but also pushing them back (although he did lose Delhi for a brief period to the Mongols). The later Sultans including the Tughlaqs were less successful with military options and resorted to paying ransoms when possible. Eventually the Delhi Sultans established friendly ties with the Mongols.The Chagatai Khanates disintegrated and from the ashes rose Timurlane. Timur invaded India in 1398 after crossing the Hindukush mountains. Timur aimed to "restore the Mongol Empire of Genghis Khan", so you could say he was a Mongol at least in spirit. Timur conquered and ransacked Delhi. It was said that for three months after Timur left, no living thing moved in Delhi.After Timur's empire disintegrated, his descendant Babur, having inherited a small kindgom in Ferghana (present day Uzbekistan) and losing it, ended up as king of Kabul. With dreams of emulating Timur, and cannons which were gifted to him by the Ottomans, he invaded India, won at Panipat in 1526 and established the Mughal empire in Delhi. The word Mughal was what the Persian Shah referred to him as. It was used as a derogatory term. But it meant Mongol, and Babur decided to adopt that as the name for his dynasty. Babur was a Timurid (direct descendant of Timur), and his maternal grandmother was a direct descendant of Genghis Khan. Babur was much inspired by both Timur and Genghis.
TL;DR: So the Mongols did attack India, and if you account for the fact that the word Mughal was a Persian word for Mongol, India was home to one of the greatest "Mongol" empires.
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