Faced with an ongoing confl ict with an expansionist Russia, Abbas Mirza was a fi rm believer that Iran needed an army with more modern arms drilled along European lines. His resolution was reinforced by his knowledge of European military exploits, including the British victories in India and the French defeat of the Egyptian Mamluks in 1798.
Abbas Mirza reasoned that if the Mamluks, with their renowned military prowess, were so easily defeated by Napoleon, then Iranian troops would suffer a similar fate if a European power invaded. According to a diplomatic envoy, Abbas Mirza lamented that it was in vain to fi ght the Russians without soldiers like theirs and without artillery. The crown prince even forced Russian prisoners of war to train his troops in European techniques and later created a Russian batt alion formed of Russian deserters and Armenian and Nestorian Christians. The Russian batt alion, which grew to 1,400 men in 1829, declined over time to a force of about 500 that formed a palace guard during the reigns of Fath Ali Shah and Muhammad Shah before being disbanded in 1839.
Although preceded by the British Malcolm mission of 1801, the French Gardanne mission of 1807 provided the fi rst systematic training for Qajar troops by European offi cers. After arriving in Tabriz, the French began drilling Abbas Mirza’s batt alions and erecting modern fortifications. Some of the French offi cers draft ed maps and translated treatises on military tactics and theories of fortification. They also helped to establish a cannon foundry and arsenal at Esfahan. The British returned with thirty military instructors and engineers as part of the small Brydges mission in 1808, which, working from the unratifi ed treaty signed by Malcolm to provide military equipment and training, drilled Abbas Mirza’s troops and held classes on surveying, mapping, and geography. The Brydges mission also delivered twenty pieces of artillery and forty wagons of cartridges to Iran. In 1829 an Iranian mission was sent to Austria to obtain information on the latest methods of warfare. More military instruction was provided by the British in 1836 and the French in 1839.
Aft er the French were replaced by the British in 1808, Abbas Mirza assembled a force of twelve thousand infantrymen in twelve batt alions of one thousand men each, twelve thousand cavalrymen, and an artillery force armed with the twenty British guns. The infantry and cavalry were given uniforms with vaguely French- style jackets to go with their traditional sheepskin hats and baggy trousers. The British mission had the artillerymen clothed in British style, but as good Muslims the Iranians ignored instructions for the gunners to be clean- shaven. When the crown prince witnessed an accident in which a soldier’s beard was ignited by a spark from a gun, however, he saw the policy’s wisdom and ordered his soldiers to shave. Abbas Mirza created a translation office for military and engineering manuals, and he established factories for cannon and muskets, but shortages of skilled manpower and equipment limited production. At Tehran, Fath Ali had his own army with regular infantry, cavalry, and horse artillery, but it was a token force that was less well trained and disciplined than the crown prince’s army and was always below strength.
Abbas Mirza called his Western-style armed force the Nezam-e Jadid, or the New Order. His efforts and those of the various French and British missions to get the Iranians to copy the Europeans were only a partial success because the Iranians lacked the command, management, logistical, and technical skills necessary to fight in a European style. As important, the Qajar soldiers lacked the discipline and confi dence of Western forces. Moreover, the Nezam-e Jadid was not based on correcting Iranian doctrinal and technological defi ciencies because the Iranians did not have a sense of fundamental inferiority to their enemies. Another major limitation was that the army could not be transformed in isolation without introducing changes in government administration and revenue generation.
Without adequate funds, the officer corps remained weak and corrupt, equipment was not maintained, and training, except when led by Europeans, was virtually nonexistent. The Nezam-e Jadid’s poor performance in the second Russo-Iranian war hurt its reputation and reduced Fath Ali’s support for additional costly reforms. Finally, Abbas Mirza died before his father, never became shah, and did not have an opportunity to bring his reform ideas to the entire Qajar military establishment. Abbas Mirza’s reforms’ longest- lasting impact was on the Persian language; sarbaz, a contemporary word for a Qajar enlisted man that means “he who is ready to lose his head,” now is a common word for “soldier” or “private.” It would be midcentury before the Iranians started to recognize that more general reforms were needed.
Shah Abbas I, Military Reforms and Armed Crises
