which the empire could make great use of: he is interested in building, so he has been allowed to study that craft. This is an ideal chance for you also to learn the connection between destruction and construction.”
Bajica, on hearing this last sentence, looked at him oddly and blankly, so the pasha explained it to him, smiling in self-satisfaction all the while.
“I see you are wondering how to learn about building in the middle of a war that actually serves the opposite forces, with the intention to destroy things! Did you ever think about what the army must do before and after the destruction?”
Well, really. This had never crossed his mind.
“You see, the engineers often go ahead of the army before the attack and build roads, bridges, dikes, and ramparts. After the battle, it often happens that they find what they built in ruins, and so they have to fix it. It could be that the enemy destroys all of that, and they have to rebuild it, while we mainly destroy things, because we are conquering cities and fortifications. Most often, not much is left of them after we finish, but things have to be brought back into order for us to leave our soldiers and outposts in those fortifications once we move on or head back. We defend those fortifications from others. In truth, the engineers have nicer work in peace time: then they can build mosques, caravansaries, covered markets, fountains, minarets, hospitals and schools. And in wartime and in peacetime, they have to build graveyards.”
Then Ibrahim-pasha realised that he had got carried away, and so he let the two of them left them alone to continue the conversation.
Having met at that moment, Sinan and Mehmed did not part for a long time afterward.
Orhan Pamuk and I both came to our next session fully equipped: with chronicles, travelogues, notes, peripheral notes from German, French, Venetian, Hungarian, Serbian, Polish, and Turkish travellers, those from Dubrovnik as well, but also civil servants, explorers, emissaries, spies, educated slaves, merchants and all kinds of other people who found it worthwhile to leave behind a trace of their view on events in the Ottoman Empire.
We seemed amusing even to ourselves: like kids trading football cards, we almost began to taunt each other about who had the better collection! Pamuk first offered his own thoughts about Sokollu.
“At the critical moment, Sultan Selim figured out two important facts about his Grand Vizier, in this particular order. First, Mehmed-pasha showed exceptionally high moral standards, thereby looming over all the others around him, because he never referred again to his warning before entering the war and thereby not exploiting the chance to entice the (vulnerable and gullible) Sultan to expose the pasha’s opponents to punishment.”
I interjected, “There was a reason why they called him ‘the Tall one’”.17
“Well, that’s true. You know that the women at the court first noticed his physical appearance. Everyone spoke of his posture, saying that they had never seen such dignified carriage,” Pamuk added.
“It’s fortunate that he was also handsome, or as they would say back then – pleasing to the eye,” I tried to go on light-heartedly. But Pamuk became serious again,
“Second, without a moment’s hesitation, the vizier showed a steadiness, decisiveness and certainty in his proposals that they must take action immediately. The Sultan could not have wished for anything of greater use to the empire in the dangerous state of his own cowardice, and the general cowardice that prevailed. With his idea to build a new fleet immediately, the pasha did not mean to say that they should go straight back to war, but rather to make their enemies think twice about doing further battle. Above all, the message meant: the Ottoman Empire will not bow down!”
I had a commentary of my own.
“They also had a bit of luck. The Europeans, for their part, were ecstatic with their unexpected victory, and because of their similar feelings of unwarranted or overindulged security, they sent their ships back to their home ports, counting on finishing up the job the next year. In fact, it must be admitted, the winter had already set in, and all acts of war at sea were becoming harder and harder to carry out.”
“Yes. You’re right. Perhaps Mehmed-pasha, foreseeing such a course of action or knowing that it was certain, was actually able to insist on renovating the fleet. Although it became clear very quickly that their enemies would not attack the capital, the Grand Vizier rushed to put his ideas into action: it was necessary to show everyone, both at home and abroad, that the great power had once again become the centre of the world.”
It was true. History records that, through the exceptional organisation of the task, the Grand Vizier re-built the Ottoman fleet in just a few months! Mehmed-pasha first had several shipyards built which then proceeded to build a fleet of new ships, one hundred and fifty strong! All in the period from the end of 1571 to the beginning of 1572. In addition, when the Sultan wanted to praise and reward him personally, Sokolović said that they should not believe in him, but in the strength of the empire. What sultan would not want to have such a man beside him?
Truth be told, a part of his internal self-confidence (which he did not allow to surface in the presence of others often) actually came from the vizier’s earlier experience, when a quarter of a century before, as the high commander of the Ottoman navy, he had hundreds of new ships built. He was better at that task than at going to war at sea. That was why he let those with greater skill than his own lead the naval battles. During that same period, he built new arsenals for shipbuilding, all together forming a terribly powerful shipbuilding industry. At the same time, he executed a fundamental reform of the navy and made plans for the future conquests of territories in the Indian Ocean, north Africa, and the European parts of the Mediterranean. With his knowledge, his diplomatic skill, his sense of order, discipline and hierarchy, and with his realistic visions, he completely prepared the field for his commanders to turn his plans into their actions.
In the revival of the fleet after the defeat, Mehmed-pasha activated the entire country: there was not a class or a strategic entity that did not have to respond to the decrees in its own way. The vizier intentionally made such a far-reaching noise about it in order to motivate the demoralised citizens across the country by the breadth of the action, and to warn those outside the country that the Turkish Empire was indeed still to be reckoned with.
The vizier knew what he was doing. Immediately after the defeat, he was visited by the Venetian diplomat Mark-Antonio Barbaro, who had not left the Ottoman capital despite the war, so that he could somehow determine the further intentions of the empire. Mehmed-pasha, as an experienced politician, received him in a friendly but cynical atmosphere, “You’ve come to see if we’ve lost our courage after the defeat.” Then he surprised the diplomat with a comparison, “There’s a huge difference between your loss and ours. By snatching the Kingdom of Cyprus, we have cut off your hand; by battering our fleet, you have set our beard on fire. A hand cut off will never grow back, but a singed beard will grow back even thicker.”
He was right.
“But the Grand Vizier treated his own people the same,” I said to Pamuk when he told me these facts. “When the newly-appointed kapudan-derya, who was his most direct helper in the job of rebuilding the fleet, and who longed in every imaginable way to have a strong armada, began to doubt that the vizier’s plans and decrees would succeed, the crucial part of their conversation went like this, or so a chronicler says:
Kilij Ali: ‘It’s easy to build ships, but in such a short time it is impossible to obtain enough anchors, ropes and other equipment.’
Mehmed-pasha:
