Genghis Khan: Why He Was a Great Leader?

One Man, One Goal, Three Traits, Thirteen Million Miles: Genghis Khan

Genghis Khan was undoubtedly a leader, the question is, was he a great one? Khan, the leader of the Mongolian Empire, lead his people to the second largest empire in history(Staff 1). His role as the head of the Mongols matches the the literal definition of leadership, which is “The action of leading a group of people or an organization”(Leadership 1). But, did Khan embody the characteristics of a great leader? First of all, what makes a leader a great one? Is it their plunders, military strength, wealth, and land conquered? Or the happiness of the citizens and the stability of society? The answer is purely subjective, everyone could have a different opinion on what makes a leader a great one. While being a great leader is subject to opinion, it is irrefutable that Genghis Khan conquered huge amounts of land, and was unrivaled in terms of power for his time (Rogers, Johnson 1). Based off of accomplishment and expansion, not to mention his wit and progress within his own empire, he should be considered as great of a leader as any. The traits that allowed Khan to create such an empire, and made him an arguably great leader were his intellect, shown through his military promotion and strategy, his achievements, demonstrated by his determination and work ethic to be successful, and his ability to maximize his circumstances, when he rose to power and made his empire as successful as possible.

Khan used his intellect, demonstrated by his military savvy and promotion of war within his empire, to be so successful as a leader. The Mongols were known for their ruthlessness and genius in battle, as shown by Matthew Paris, a twelfth century monk and author, who called the Mongols a “detestable nation of Satan that poured out like devils from Tartarus so that they are rightly called Tartars”(Bawden 1). This tenacity, as well as the efficiency of the Mongols was largely due to Khan’s ingenious strategies in and outside of battle. During campaigns to conquer foreign places Khan deployed several ingenious strategies, such as his false withdrawal tactic, in which the Mongols would pretend to be weakened and defeated in battle, causing the enemy to chase after, and then would ambush and overwhelm the enemy (Bawden 3).

Khan also used effective siege tactics, such as his flag system, which caused a majority of his enemies to surrender very quickly. This strategy involved plundering and killing the conquered civilization with varying degrees of severity as more time passed, using a system of flags to mark the severity the Mongols would show on the besieged civilization. He also implemented clever strategies to effectively infiltrate besieged places that had defenses, such as catapults, ladders, fires and burning oil, and even makeshift dams to control river water (Bawden 4). These strategies were completely unique to the Mongols,