The first step, a “slow,” was to meticulously prepare before any campaign, which the Mongols always did to the highest degree. (In planning for the attack on the shah, the Mongols learned of a guide who knew of a chain of oases across the Kizil Kum Desert. This man was captured and later led Genghis Khan’s army across the forbidding territory.) The second “slow” was a setup, which involved getting the enemy to lower its guard, lulling it into complacency. The Mongols, for example, deliberately lost the first battle in the Fergana Valley to feed the shah’s arrogance. Then came the first
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