Even Niall Ferguson, an apologist for the West’s colonial depredations, is forced to concede that the ‘decline of the West is ...

The Entente powers demanded that the Ottomans remain neutral. However, the latter were aware that the British in the East and the Russians in the North posed a serious threat to the Ottoman Empire.

After finally buying the property for their neighborhood – the first outside of Jaffa’s Ottoman ramparts – Tel Aviv would only be founded 43 years later, in 1909.

Former colonies such as Mali and Burkina Faso, both led by the military, have now turned against France because of perceived political interference they say is an example of neo-colonialism.

Ottoman Empire: Expanded into the Middle East, Africa, and Southeast Europe. Safavid Empire: Based in Persia, highly cultured, and a major rival to the Ottoman Turks.

Its colonies and other possessions border quite a few of the game's big nations - Great Britain, Prussia, even Brazil - while having a presence near smaller nations such as in North and West Africa.

The Ottoman Empire had always been a multi-ethnic state based on loyalty to the ruling dynasty, not on a shared national identity. The great marker of difference in the empire had been religion.

The Ottoman Empire had lost its bid for Europe and would never be able to reach America. Where it had once threatened to swallow the West, it began to decline and was never able to recover.