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The Achaemenids perhaps had one more great chance to defeat Alexander at the battle of Gaugamela near modern day Erbil. There, once again Alexander's tactics proved decisive where his forces formed a wedge-shaped attack that then tore into Darius' center, causing the king to likely flee the battle. With this battle secure, all of Mesopotamia fell to Alexander and the great city of Babylon was entered by Alexander without any need for combat. It is at Babylon that Alexander perhaps decided he would make the city his new capital of his now vast empire, as it would unit the Greek and Near Eastern worlds more closely. Alexander then went on to take Susa, the old capital of the Persians, and then the ceremonial capital of Persepolis, which was at least partially burned most likely by Alexander's troops.
Only one more major battle was fought against the Persians at the battle of the Persian Gates, a strategic crossing.<ref>For more on the Battles of Gaugamela and Alexander's later battles against the Persians, see: Wilcken, Ulrich, and Eugene N. Borza. 1967. Alexander the Great. Norton Library. New York: Norton, pg. 60. </ref> After this, Darius III was killed by one of his own generals and Achaemenid factions continued to lead a guerilla style war against Alexander, although they squabbled between themselves over the remains of their empire. This led Alexander to easily reach Central Asia with only minor resistance, where he founded many cities along the way that gained importance during the rise of the Silk Road. This included the city of Kandhar in Afghanistan and eventually reaching Tajikistan, almost near the edge of Tibet. His wars continued in Central Asia and India, where he initially encountered major resistance.<ref> For more on Alexander's campaigns in Central Asia and India, see: Roy, Kaushik. 2004. <i>India’s Historic Battles: From Alexander the Great to Kargil</i>. Delhi : Bangalore: Permanent Black ; Distributed by Orient Longman, pg. 29</ref>
Alexander's battles were the first where European armies had encountered war elephants, which likely caused great fear in his army before eventually overcoming them in battle. Nevertheless, the difficulty of long campaigning and undoubtedly loss of many men led to his men tiring of battle and eventually forcing Alexander to pull his forces back, eventually reaching once again Babylon. By the time Alexander finished campaigning, he had created the first empire that connected Europe with Central Asia (Figure 2).
