Would the world have been better off if the Moors beat the Franks at Tours?

Question

If France were Arab, would there have been no Crusades, Spanish Reconquista or Inquisition, no Italian Renaissance, no anti-Semitism, no Louis XIV, no American, French, or Russian Revolution, no Hitler, Stalin, Napoleon, Karl Marx, Spanish, French, British, Portuguese, German, Russian, or Japanese Empire? Would there have been the United States or Texas?

Answer 1

Possibly it would have created a very liberal form of Islam. The great civilizations in Spain and India give merit to the theory that whenever political Islam got away from the fanatical vision of Arabia it blossomed. But honestly....The Moors that invaded France had so little interest in the country that they would have never conquered it. The battle of Tours was with half-hearted anyway.

Answer 2

Nice to speculate on the chaos of events that would follow, what if Mohammid the Great, in 1915, took over the world and decided to eliminate all catholics, and his scientists invented the a-bomb. Not only does he complete the genocide of european catholics but he enslaves half the world. His megolomania surpasses that of Hitler in the 'real' timeline.

Answer 3

Who knows, but one thing is for certain, most of us would be praying towards Mecca 5 times a day.

Answer 4

Let start with a few assumptions.

First assumption. At the time Islam took over the arab world there were huge Jewish populations in almost all of the Arab nations. The Nazis were downright inefficient when it came to killing Jews compared to the Arabs who completely anihalated or converted by the sword the majority of the Jews in the world. Only those who escaped to Europe and a few pockets that survived for a time in the Arab world were left. So the Inquisistions, Nazi concentration camps and other anti-semantic acts were mild in comparision. Though you are correct there would be no problems with Jews as they would no longer exist if Europe had fallen under Islamic sway.

Second people like Hitler and Stalin run modern Arab nations. Only the names would change. Hussian was a wanna be mass murderer. He only killed hundreds of thousands instead of the millions Stalin, Idi Amin, Pol Pot and Hitler killed. Personally I don't really see a distinction. Killing people for ethnic heritage or political opposisition is the same. Killing for sport even worse and all the above created systems that did just that. Secret police, unable to speak your mind. Hmm sounds like China today, or Jordan or Pakistan or Syria, you get the idea. So you do indeed achieve the same result. Since there would be no free nation nobody would know the difference between islamic tyranny or non-Islamic tyranny.

Very likely it would have been the Chinese to discover the America's. The story would have been pretty much the same. Just different conquerers. Without compitition between European agents the Chinese would have easily assimilated the entire new world rather quickly. Aftwards the Islamic nations would have been toast in short order.

Islamic nations were quick to adopt Western technology but very slow in adopting it. The Chinese invented gunpowder. It was Europeans who really made it a weapon of war. Chinese science is a slow steady science. So it would have likely taken 300-400 years more before modern weapons appeared but they would have. When they did, combined with the resources of the new world and the populations China could put forth Islam would have been erased by the 1700s. The entire world would by the 1800s be a Chinese province until Chinese cival wars redevided the world. So the world would not have been more peacefull. In fact it would have been bloodier still. Remember it was the west that codifed war and developed concepts such as surrender, sparing women and children in conquered areas and many of the other things that made peace possible. The Chinese while a very developed culture still have rather barbaric ideas as to what to do with conquered cities. Part of this was because the Chinese prefered to use mercs and barbarians as the bulk of their army.

Ok next assumption. That the devided Franks were really a that formidable. Niether the Franks nor the Islamics were all that cohesive. Both fought many fueds amongst themselves. El Cid during the early reconquests fought for Arab as often as Christian as an example of the politics that existed. In fact the Arab's first targeted Spain because they were invited in to help squabbling Christians against each other. Once they saw how devided the Spanish Christians were they decided to help themselves. In doing so they got caught up in the ancient fueds and were soon reduced to petty squabbling themselves.

So even if the Franks had been defeated there was a whole lot more of Europe to defeat. The reconquisition might have actually been accelerated had the Arabs gotten into France. True the Crusades would have likely not been necessary as the Arab invasion of Europe would have likely pulled Europeans together. Their squables would have been directed towards deviding up France, Spain and North Africa. The Crusades were a pre-text devised by a Pope to end the constant war between Christan nations which was crippling Europe. For the leaders of Europe it was never about religion. It was about gaining land, fortune and fame. For the Pope it was about gaining some respite for war torn Europe.

As for technology. Were the Arab nations somehow to defeat Europe and China then yes life would be simpler. Short, violent but simple. Technology ceased to advance in Arab nations depsite the fact they were the leaders in most arts and sciences at the time Islam came to be the main religion in Arab nations. There would be no computers to type on. We would live in huts and villages with primitive agriculture as the mainstay. We would pay tribute to Arab overlords who would watch us closely for the slightest sign of ambition, disloyalty or any lack of piety toward Islam. Were we to even be suspected of such we would be executed or forced into slave labor camps. Education would be for the leaders only. So few of us would be able to read even if we had paper to write with. Except for Egypt which was constantly in Western hands most of the last 1,000 years no Arab nation had even half the technology or science they had 1,000 years before much less where they were at when they converted to Islam. It is not until the last 100 years that they have been rediscovering technologies, some of which they invented themselves but were long lost in religious persecutions of their own people and ethnic/religious cleansings.

Women would have a single purpose in life. That was to raise children and tend to the house. Some Arab nations still practice a form of molding you could say the woman's privates to the husbands before the wedding night. So they would not even enjoy sex nor would they fit a larger man. Life would be even more harsh and short for women. If they were suspected of or even if they were taken by force by another group that woman was now impure and executed. Instead of divorce the husband would execute the wife. He had several others if he was wealthy so no loss to him as women are not valued in Arab society. They are not even considered quite human. That is reserved for men only.

Arab society is not peacefull so war would be constant. It'd just be less efficient and less prolonged. Mostly one chief against another. Blood fueds between various clans. Bandits and outlaws against traders and towns people. Murder would be quite legal. An example being upper caste Pakistanis litterally shooting low caste Pakistanis down in the streets in some areas without fear of reprisal. Another example is spouse executions. Who could kill and who wouldn't would all be a matter of birth and wealth. So where you were born would decide the rest of your life for most people. Who you were related too would be more important than who you were.

I am not sure where you got the idea Arab society is remotely peacefull. The best example I can think of is Iraq's long war with Iran where both Iraq and Iran sent unarmed Kurdish children into enemy machine guns to attempt to run them out of ammo. Arab nations have never been at peace with each other. In fact the whole reason the Crusades ever gained an acre of land was the deep divisions that existed between Arab nations. Same reasons the Arabs were able to conquer Spain. The Arab world is a story of war from day one to today. Empires came and went, both non-Arab and Arab conquering and reconquering the same bits of land time and time again.

So no the world would be MUCH worse off if Islamic society dominated. It is a society of extreme fuedalism. The same kind of oppression both European and Asian soceities threw off hundreds or thousands of years ago. It is a culture in it's terrible twos that has never grown out of them. Now it wants modern weapons and technology. This is like handing a 2 year old a loaded Uzi in a crowded mall. Somebody including the 2 year old is guarenteed to get hurt.

Answer 5

there would also be no playboy magazine, no charlie's angels (the original tv series), no porno internet sites, no pork chops, no bacon and eggs breakfirst, no Goofy or Porky, no Babe the lovable pig,