Initiated by Russian expansionist aims and intensified by Iranian resistance, the war witnessed significant military engagements, including the Battle of Ganja and Capture of Erivan.

However Russian reinforcements under the newly appointed General Ivan Paskevich turned the war decisively in Russia's favor, capturing the important city of Tabriz in northwestern Iran.

Per the terms of the treaty, Iran conceded to Russia the sultanates of Shamshadil, Qazzaq, Shuragol, and the khanates of Baku, Derbent, Ganja, Shakki, Quba, Shirvan, Karabakh, and the northern and central part of Talish.

[5] The treaty's territorial arrangements were unclear, for example, in Talish, where it was left up to the mutually appointed administrators to "determine what mountains, rivers, lakes, villages, and fields shall mark the line of frontier."

[6] In early 1825, the northern bank of Lake Gokcha, which the Iranians believed to be a part of their realm, was seized by the Russians under the orders of Aleksey Petrovich Yermolov, the governor of Georgia.

As a result, in December 1825, a group of young men, primarily military officers, staged the Decembrist Revolt in an attempt to force political concessions by obstructing Alexander's second younger brother Nicholas from succeeding to the throne.

[8] On 8 July, the Russians captured the town of Bash Aparan in the northern Erivan Khanate, deep within Iranian territory.

The state of the Muslim minority under Russian authority and, lastly, whether and to what extent Russia had been weakened as a result of its internal crises, were secondary concerns.

In general, the peace party feared the capability of the Russian Empire and wanted armed conflict to be avoided at all costs.

[12] Those who advocated for war were several prominent Islamic scholars led by Agha Sayyed Mohammad Esfahani; Fath-Ali Shah's new chief minister Asef al-Dowleh; Abbas Mirza's close advisor Abol-Qasem Qa'em-Maqam II; and some of the exiled khans of the Caucasus, who had either been driven away by the Treaty of Gulistan or had fled to Iran after the treaty.

Furthermore, the war party's interpretation of Russian events was more optimistic than realistic, arguing that Russia was weak overall, especially in the Caucasus due to Yermolov's recent defeats and the Decembrist revolt.

The peace party at Fath-Ali Shah's court was ultimately outmanoeuvred and the final decision was to launch full-scale warfare against the Russians.

[14] Despite Abbas Mirza's soldiers appearing to be unprepared for a large fight, Iran's entry into the war in the summer of 1826 started out successfully.

In Shirvan, Ganja, Talish, Shakki and Karabakh (aside from Shusha), the stationed Russian troops were either driven out by the rebels or Iranian forces, or withdrew themselves.

Abbas Mirza rejected the proposal by his maternal uncle Amir Khan Devellu-Qajar to attack Shusha's fortress, as he knew it would be a prolonged siege.

Colonel Iosif Reutt, the Russian commander of Shusha, disarmed the Muslims residing there, and then mounted an effective defense with the aid of the local Armenians.

[16] In a letter to Abbas Mirza, Amir Khan demanded additional cannons and five or six Nezam-e Jadid regiments in order to battle the Russian reinforcements led by Lieutenant General Valerian Madatov.

He was given explicit instructions by Abbas Mirza to collect the Russian weaponry and equipment that had been seized and to wait within the Ganja castle until he was done with Shusha.

A witness to the Battle of Ganja noted the following; "The action was at first well contested; and had Abbas Mirza possessed the talent of a commander, the Russian power in Georgia would have been at an end.

[22] On 2 February 1828, Abbas Mirza signed the Treaty of Turkmenchay, thus ceding Erivan and Nakhichevan as well as agreeing to significant war reparations and other concessions.

[22] The province of Azerbaijan and Abbas Mirza's personal fortune provided the majority of the money needed to pay for this; a minor portion came from the British, but none from the shah.

Mirza Masih Tehrani then issued a fatwa, which led to the slaughter of Griboyedov and all but one of the seventy-person personnel of the Russian embassy by an enraged crowd.

One contemporary Iranian historian states that; "When Crown Prince Abbas Mirza heard of the occurrence, he ordered all the soldiers and the nobles to put on black dress as a sign of mourning, all the bazaars to be closed for three days, and all the people to stop working."