ABSTRACT
Before continuing the story of the transformation of theOttoman military, we have to return to Egypt, and understand how Mehmed Ali Pasha (1760s-1849) came to challenge his own sultan on the plains of Anatolia. That will be followed by a description of the events around the ‘Auspicious Occasion’, which was Mahmud II’s final confrontation with the Janissaries on the streets of Istanbul, and his general reforms that unfolded thereafter. A discussion of the RussianOttoman war of 1828-29, the first test of the new military organisation, will be followed by a brief assessment of the state of the empire before we move on to a description of the important Treaty of Adrianople, and the two campaigns against Mehmed Ali in Syria and Anatolia in the following chapter. The contest of the two titans of reform, one in Istanbul and one in Cairo, engendered a particular style of international intervention in Middle Eastern affairs that has persisted to the present.
