Backing the wrong heir in an imperial succession fractured diplomatic relations long after

Evidence

Manzade Husein returned to Turkey in 1659, and was thus present in India during part of the struggle for power at the end of the reign of Shah Jahan. Unfortunately his report on India is not available, though some allusions to it appear in Naima’s History. He was received in India by Murad Bakhsh, who accepted his letters and gifts, and replied to them as sovereign. It was shortly after this that Murad Bakhsh was overpowered by his brother Aurangzeb. The Ottoman ambassador had thus backed the wrong horse, and it may be for this reason that we hear of only one mission to India during the reign of Aurangzeb— and that one not very successful. In 1690 the Ottoman Sultan Suleyman II (1687–91), hard pressed by his enemies, sent a letter to the Mughal asking for support. According to Indian sources a reply was sent, but none has so far come to light in Ottoman chronicles or records. — Bernard Lewis, From Babel to Dragomans, 614

Categorization

• SEED: An essay angle: how a single misread of factional allegiance in a foreign court can freeze diplomacy for a century — the cost of betting on the wrong prince.
• DEEPTHINKING: The ‘backed the wrong horse’ cause-and-effect chain — a diplomatic blunder with a multi-decade after-life — is a clean, memorable causal mechanism about how reputation and alignment harden across regimes.