Mehmed Ali recruited Ottoman officers but risked losing his own to defection

Evidence

Of equal importance was the fact that both father and son saw senior positions in the army as rewards to be personally given to particular individuals who were flocking to their service from different corners of the Ottoman Empire. Besides prisoners of war, a number of senior officers in the Ottoman army approached Mehmed Ali requesting employment in his army. These were received with dignity, and medals and ceremonial uniforms were issued to them. However, as much as Mehmed Ali and his son were offering lucrative employment opportunities to potential defectors from the Ottoman army, if they were not careful with the manner in which they treated their own officers they stood the danger of losing them again to the Sultan’s service. — Khaled Fahmy, All the Pasha_s Men_ Mehmed Ali, his…, 1335

Categorization

• XREF: Reverse image of the mercenary-officer dynamic in 1336: both armies competed for the same mobile officer pool.