"Horse Archers: How they fought & how to beat them" Topic

"The societies of Central Eurasia, or Inner Asia as some call it, are based around nomadism--the growing seasons are not that long, and the environment is not suited to intensive agriculture, so societies get their food by herding animals. They need horses to do this, and this dependence on the horse impacted how they formed their militaries--they were based around heavy and light horse archers, and heavy and light cavalry…."

YouTube link

Amicalement
Armand

How to beat horse archers?
A. Become horse archers. (Russians)
B. Organise proper national armies with gunpowder, really does the trick.
C. Live in a dense forest/jungle. (Vietnam)
D. Live across the big water with violent storms. (Japan)

Cut off horse archer supply baggage train. No arrows, no shooting.

…a battery of .50 cal. machine guns?

link

Massed foot archers.

Dude!… (smile)

Amicalement
Armand

Horse archers are very mobile and their baggage would be similarly mobile (horses and camels) and most likely decentralised with each clan/tribe having their own supplies with them.

You can't really defeat them while they are united (they will just keep evading you) but must wait until they disperse – which was the Byzantine response to raids into Anatolia for centuries. Once the sheep they each had slung across their horses were eaten, then, if they hadn't found other sources of food, they would have to retreat. Even more critically, if they couldn't locate suffieent grassland/fodder and,especially sources of water for themselves and their ponies, they simply had to disperse to find some and/or go home. Thats how the Crusaders responded – stand and defend the local water source on a position with secure flanks and rear until they were forced to disperse and go away.

Lots and lots of slingers. That's what Xenephon et al. did in the Anabasis when hounded by Persian cav.