Siege of Vienna - Aftermath

Aftermath

Some historians speculate that Suleiman's final assault wasn't necessarily intended to take the city but to cause as much damage as possible and weaken it for a later attack, a tactic he had employed at Buda in 1526. Suleiman would lead another campaign against Vienna in 1532, but it never truly materialised as his force was stalled by the Croatian Captain Nikola Jurišić during the Siege of Güns (Kőszeg). Nikola Jurišić with only 700-800 Croatian soldiers managed to delay his force until winter closed in. Charles V, now largely aware of Vienna's vulnerability and weakened state, assembled 80,000 troops to confront the Ottoman force. Instead of going ahead with a second siege attempt the Ottoman force turned back, laying waste to the south-eastern Austrian state of Styria in their retreat. The two Viennese campaigns in essence marked the extreme limit of Ottoman logistical capability to field large armies deep in central and western Europe at the time. The army made its way back to Istanbul (former Constantinople) where it was stationed for the winter, so that its troops could attend to their fiefdoms and recruit for the next year's campaigning.

The invasion and its climactic siege exacted a heavy toll upon both sides, with tens of thousands of soldiers and civilians left dead in its wake. However, it was a milestone which marked the end of Suleiman's expansion toward the centre of Europe and arguably the beginning of the stagnation and decline of the Ottoman Empire as the dominant power of the Renaissance world. The German historian Robert Adolf Kann remarked: "The delivery of Vienna by a brave garrison under Count Niklas Salm in 1529, was probably a greater though less spectacular achievement than the liberation five generations later brought about primarily by the efforts of a rather large army of combined imperial and Polish forces".

Suleiman's retreat however did not mark a complete failure. The campaign underlined and maintained Ottoman control of southern Pannonian Plain and left behind a trail of collateral damage in the neighbouring Habsburg Hungary and Austria that impaired Ferdinand's capacity to mount a sustained counter-attack. Suleiman's achievement was to consolidate the gains of 1526 and further establish the puppet kingdom of John Zápolya as a buffer state against the Holy Roman Empire. Ferdinand I erected a funeral monument for the German mercenary Niklas Graf Salm, head of the mercenary relief force dispatched to Vienna, as a token of appreciation to his efforts. Niklas survived the initial siege attempt but had been injured during the last Ottoman assault and died on 4 May 1530. The Renaissance sarcophagus is now on display in the baptistery of the Votivkirche cathedral in Vienna. Ferdinand's son, Maximilian II, later built the Castle of Neugebaeude on the spot where Suleiman is said to have pitched his tent during the siege.

Once the Ottoman empire's drive in Central Europe was checked, the Ottomans directed their efforts towards the Mediterranean. Having successfully forced out the Knights of Saint John from Rhodes in the Second Siege of Rhodes in 1522, the stage was set for a climatic battle in 1565 between the Christian forces of the Knights Hospitaller and the Maltese in the Siege of Malta.