Indeed. The Ottoman military were a bunch of degenerates, and so was the ottoman bureaucracy. The "Caliph" was just another powerless monarch playing in the hands of the ottoman corrupt elite.
Every country, kingdom, empire has its rise and fall, and the fall is often due to a rise in corruption and greed. The Ottomans are not an exception but it is irresponsible to throw out a statement like the Ottoman military were a bunch of degenerates given that they first and foremost expanded the borders of the Islamic world leading to Muslim majority countries in even Europe like Bosnia, Albania, Kosovo (even more than a third of Macedonians are Muslims).
They also single handedly held back the colonial powers from the Middle East all the way up to 1918 whilst the rest of the Islamic world was falling one by one like dominos to the European colonial powers by the 16/1700s.
Territories that the Ottomans lost prior to WW1 underwent an extensive cleansing campaign of Muslims (Balkans, Crimea, Greece, Caucasus etc). This trend would have continued into the Middle East as well had the Ottomans not held their ground all the way up to 1918. Ottoman and later Turkish efforts ensured a massive Armenia and Assyria were not carved out of Turkey, Syria and Iraq.
The Ottoman navy assisted South Asian and South East Asian Muslim nations to fight off the Portuguese in the Indian Ocean. The Portuguese were notorious for raiding boats carrying pilgrims to Makkah and Madina. Through battles like
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Diu_(1531) and alliances like
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ottoman_expedition_to_Aceh, they assisted Muslim nations.
Eventually the Ottomans lost which was only a question of time (the whole Muslim world needed to accept modernity) but the fact that they were able to extend Muslim rule over the Middle East another two centuries meant that colonial rule over the Middle East lasted a couple of decades at max in contrast to the 200 odd years for most of the Muslim world. Even then the Ottoman military performed admirably given the circumstances right till the end, defeating the global powers in battles such as Kut and Gallipoli (the latter battle laying the foundation stone from which Ataturk then continued to resist foreign incursions into Anatolia and Thrace resulting in the Turkish state which is today led by Erdogan.)
Yes the Ottomans had flaws and some rulers were better and others worse. Given however that they were at the doorstep of Europe and still managed to survive far longer than most Muslim powers means the "degenerate" title is unfair to say the least.
I agree it is the sad reality!
Though there were great generals, kings and leaders..But those who corrupted the word Khalifah dont really deserve to be praised as a Caliph! But rather as a great hero!
The Rashidin Khalifa were not monarchies! But anything after them sadly were...And that is why I dont dignify them with the Khalfiah title but call them great heroes/ kings/ leaders!
That is your opinion and we can agree to disagree, no issues. Given the logistics and reality of the time however i would argue a heredity khilafat was more or less the only option, especially as the border of the Muslim world expanded and the fact that the earlier phase of electing khalifas had resulted in great internal strife (fitnas) in the Islamic world. For the sake of stability it was a neccessary evil which is why I supppse the clergy throughout the centuries did not delve too much into this matter either.
. Ottomans did fight until the very end and saved Turks not to be colonised. The rest of the Islamic world can not be said
