Suleiman the Magnificent resumes the war against Hungary by attacking the city of Belgrade, the same settlement that had defied Mehmed II over half a century ago.

Despite strong resistance, the city falls to Suleiman.

In 1522 Suleiman takes his army to a strategically successful siege of Rhodes, allowing the Knights Hospital to evacuate for the fort.When Suleiman launches an invasion in 1526 the Grand Vizier constructesa great bridge ahead of the Sulta, allowing his army to march into Hungary.

Despite eighty days of marching and taking five days to cross the Danube River, the Ottomans meet no resistance from the Hungarians.

The original plan of Hungarian King Louis II had been to send a vanguard to hold the Danube where the Ottomans were expected to cross, yet the nobles of the Kingdom refuse to follow the King's deputy in battle, claiming that they do so out of zealous allegiance to the King (and will therefore only follow him).

Consequently, when King Louis II takes the field his army of twenty-six thousand men seems to be doomed to fail against the Ottomans' one hundred thousand.

[ At Mohác, the plains of Hungary allowe the heavier Christian knights to launch an effective charge.

As the Hungarian knights brush aside first the Akinjis, then the Sipahis, the Ottoman cavalry regroups and flanks the knights.

However, the Sultan places his Janissaries and cannon chained up as an effective last line of defense.

The Hungarian cavalry takes serious casualties from the skillfully handled Turkish artillery.

With the cavalry annihilated, the infantry suffers immense casualties as the weight of numbers of the Ottomans and their skill in battle takes their toll.

When Suleiman the Magnificent finds the body of the dead Louis II he is said to have been disappointed at cutting down the youth, who has no heirs.

John Zápolya, who had been instructed by Louis II to raid the enemy's supply lines, arrives at the battle too late and flees the scene.

Suleiman, however, is not ready to annex the Kingdom completely into the Ottoman realm, so Zápolya is installed as the vassal King of Hungary.

Meanwhile, at the Diet of Bratislava Archduke Ferdinand of Austria is declared King of Hungary.

The surviving nobles of Hungary now have to choose between pledging allegiance to a native vassal of Suleiman and a Christian "foreigner".