Yes.
I don't know. No one can.
No warnings.
Yes.

 

I'm sure the survivors from Waco and Ruby Ridge could answer your question.

 

I dont see why not, this is one of the mean reasons i want a bol. Even if i was able to keep them out i think they would burn down my house in anger or drive/ push a semi over it. You can always hope they dont find out u have food:-D I think you will have some warning as they will scout your location.

 

Wouldn't be a siege type situation, the point being you have food and they don't. Since medieval times sieges were ways to starve a city/house into surrender. In the scenario you say, they would starve before you. If you are well armed likely they would move on to softer target. If they burn your house they burn the food.

 

People will case the location. No one goes in blind. Look for suspicious people then be on an even higher level of alertness from then on out, months even. If they slip your view and they come unnoticed you'd most likely be attacked from multiple fronts controlled into one area and negotiations would ensue, If they were after supplies. (Even bad guys use dialogue to a degree before just shooting, Information is valuable. Instead of getting 42 cans of peas and a 25lb bag of pinto beans they could also get hidden valuables and ammo you've hidden about with threats and coercion.)

If they just wanted you dead they could burn you out.

To many variables can come into play though. Are you defending right away? Are you caught off guard and they subdue you before you can defend?

If everyone was always armed and ready and you lived in constant readiness you may be able to not just defend but dominate your foe.

 

You can expect and anticipate virtually all scenarios. Whether they come to pass in your locale depends on a host of factors, including who the protagonists are, their resources, and whether someone is good at inciting others to action.

There is almost no one whose home can stand up to a siege. Even if that someone has food for a year, water for a year, and a way to get rid of waste, their home is still vulnerable. This is the best reason IMO for having allies among your neighbors.

Windows can be easily broken. Under siege, you can be burned out. Unless the structure is completely fireproof, and one can put shutters over the windows, and provide for an alternate source of ventilation (good luck if the attackers figure that out), it's a deathtrap.

Inevitably, a prepper under siege will face this ultimatum: If you won't share your food with us, you won't get to keep it either. And then the Molotov cocktails will start raining in.

 

I would recommend reading Sun Tsu's Art of War. It's not an easy read, but it talks about scenarios such as this. The original intent for the book was for 5th century BC Chinese warlords, but it has many applications.

From the perspective of the sieging army:
"If troops lay siege to a walled city, their strength will be exhausted."

"Therefore, the best warfare strategy is to attack the enemy's plans, next is to attack alliances, next is to attack the army, and the worst is to attack a walled city."

"Laying siege to a city is only done when other options are not available."

"If the general cannot control his temper and sends troops to swarm the walls, one third of them will be killed, and the city will still not be taken."

"Therefore, one who is skilled in warfare principles subdues the enemy without doing battle, takes the enemy's walled city without attacking, and overthrows the enemy quickly, without protracted warfare."

 

Given the perameters you said, your not under seige, your under attack in a defensive position. Your house/farm or what have you just became a bunker complex.

The idea of a seige is to force you to give up by eather starving you out or cutting off vital supplies such as water or help from others. They would try to surround your house/castle and put up defencive works to keep them safe wile the take pop shots at you just to harrass you. They are not looking for mass casualties, but your surrender and plunder of all your goods.
This type of warfare can only be done with a large well supplies army that has the time and means to do so, not by a band of idiot thugs.
Throughout history, a seige usually ended very badly for those under a seige. Think Mossada.

An attacking force of 10-20 armed thugs would most likely run out of ammo food and other needed supplies befor you do. As others have said, they will move on to softer targets of oppertunity. If they do attack you, it will be more of a raid type of attack where they hit/kill and run with what ever they can get. If they kill you all and take the spoils, all the better for them.

There is no way to fully seige proof your house/farm/castle, ever. Again, think Mossada.


Robie

 

Yes, thugs will always choose the weakest target, but the OP's assumption here was that 5-20 thugs would surround a house and place it under siege, whatever that means.

You give me 20 armed thugs and a gallon of gasoline, and I'll end that siege pronto.

Think you can defend from windows and firing slits? Not a chance. Think you can fight any fire while you yourself are under fire? Not a chance.

I always laugh when I see people planning on firing slits. I can put rounds from my M4 with crappy commercial Wolf ammo in a 3" circle at 100 yards. My own handloaded ammo can do the size of a quarter at 100 yards.

If someone is shooting from a firing slit, guess where I'm aiming if I want to take them out? And unless the walls to either side of that firing slit are armored, a few shots on either side and I've hit whomever is "hiding" behind those walls.

My home--and virtually all homes--is not defensible, period. It's one of the better arguments as to why one might wish to ally with one's neighbors, because then you can potentially create defense in depth, have decent 24/7 watches, and so on.

 

I'd say if everyone old enough was always armed wherever they went...whether gardening, chopping wood, washing clothes, fishing...whatever it will reduce the odds of your house being overcome by would be raiders.

If possible always have someone on the lookout, if you do not have enough people to have a sentry all the time, consider posting a lookout from 3AM to 6AM and rotate that job around to everyone. In a survival scenerio most people will be waking up at the crack of dawn anyway.

 

Just remember - if you make it to hard for someone to get in, it will be too hard for you to get out.

 

So you kick back with your rifle, food, water and shoot anything that moves.

They'll either bugger off or burn you out. I cant see it lasting long either way.

But before all that, you need to survive the initial attack. That would be the hard part.

 

i can see smaller towns wanting to form strong defensive perimeters ... i live in West Sussex and we have several castle / fort structures in are area

One being Arundel Castle

These things are designed for Siege warfare ...

Local could very easily defend this position using medieval tactic ...

Good luck their is plenty of room for livestock and farming inside the grounds ... a medium to large force of locals could successfully defend this indefinitely

 

That's an interesting concept.

Modern weapons change the fight, though. If those inside do not have modern weaponry, grenades, sniper rifles, explosives, etc. and those outside do I could see a successful take over.

A few snipers could prevent any head that peeks above the wall from doing so again.

Those on the outside enjoy having the whole countryside to obtain neat things, like tanks, artillery and shells.

 

a real castle can't survive airstrikes either, but if I had one of those within a couple miles from me I'd at least consider it as an alternative (if not primary) BOL.

 

Now the Thugs have air support? lol

 

Gas attacks? Even tear gas..

 

A single family with just husband, wife, kids has little chance against a large group. Just standing guard 24/7 will do them in. If anything it points out the need to be part of a larger group yourself. IMHO the odds of a "siege" type attack are very low. As Somnophore points out most likely the attackers will lack the food to maintain the attack very long. Odds are high they will just wait till you walk out in the morning and shoot you dead.(Worked for the Indians)

If you fear this type of attack, the best response is to cache most of your supplies away from your house. Do your best to not put you and your family in a do or die situation.

 

I'd rather be on the outside looking in for such a huge target, myself.

There are homes everywhere. I don't see any sort of a draw to mine that others lack.

 

Siege warfare? Not bloody likely...

WHEN TSHTF, supplies will be almost as precious as life... Food, water, medicine, shelter- the whole nine yards, will be in such short supply, that only options for raiders/invaders, will to be to move fast, hit hard, and hope to overwhelm resistance. Failure, on either side, will mean death... Nobody on the OpFor will have the luxury of laying siege to anyone...

OA, out...

 

I guess siege will be a useful tool for anyone that wants to take on a stronger group.

I hear about homesteaders, and all i think about is how easy it would be to take them by attrition.

As long as they are under siege, even by a single person or small group. They cannot resume function as normal.. so they would have to give up their advantage of defense, and assault the siege.

A small group, could effectively shut down a Mag or homestead this way.

 

I dont necessarily agree, mostly because the moment you make such a large assumption about how things will be, you're already setting yourself up for disapointment. Anything can happen.

I'm not as worried about seiges because I feel I have a whole community I can fall back on. Not just one bunker. There is a good number of us, all well supplied. On top of that I still have a large trailer mounted ballista left over from shop class final project. They want a siege, I'll show em a siege weapon. how effective it will be is one thing, but once you start firing bowling balls least the bad-ass factor goes up.

 

. On top of that I still have a large trailer mounted ballista left over from shop class final project.

be interesting to see that go against someone with a rifle, spud gun and 'spuds' made of tannerite

 

seige warfare.... not to likely at first, because of the amount of stored ammo and weapons..... eventually yes.

IED's will remove a large amount of your 25 folks right at the onset... and the rest... hunt and remove them as you find them.... that is why I believe in a pre emptive strike... I do not intend to wait for them to come to me.

 

I can see a siege being used if the attacking force needs to keep a group pinned in their compound.

For example if I wanted to attack group A and they had a defense alliance with group B. I would need to find a way to keep Group B out of the fight, a siege would work for that.

I don't think a siege would be worth it for food or water, but if the attacking group is looking for non-consumables then it might be worth it. Think communications equipment, medical supplies, slaves.... whatever.

I think the level of organization needed for an effective siege will be beyond the leadership skills of your average raider. Now if an aggressive group organizes to the level to make a siege useful then we have big problems.

Respectfully Submitted
Darkwing

 

The solution to stopping/preventing any kind of siege, is to go proactive, and kill enemy leadership, and destroy their ability to survive... He who sits on his ass, will have it either barbecued, or handed to him...

Some smart Brits coined a wonderful motto, "Fortune favors the bold." Yep, that just about nails it...

OA, out...

 

Darkwing,

With all due respect, supplies will be meager at best. Mobility, shock power, and good intel will do much to offset either defenses, or numerically superior forces... A well placed salvo of sniper rounds could easily truncate an enemy's command structure... Take out the brain, the body dies... Oh, it may take a while, and perhaps more than one dose of "medicine," but the results should be final, and hopefully, pleasing...

OA, out...

 

Unless you already have well established trust in your community (and maybe not even then) your first group confrontation will be from your neighbors (if you're bugged in) ... who notice your kids aren't as skinny, there are lights on in your home after dark, and you seem less panicked than everyone else. You must have something ... and after 3 days little water, 3 weeks little food, the neighbor you trusted to watch your kids after school will turn feral.

Thank you for this thread by the way; it really does elevate awareness as the liability of a bug-in-only preparedness mindset. It doesn't even take armed thugs and a molotov cocktail to wipe out your stronghold. It could be the airplane affected by an EMP, or a grid surge, or a gas line rupture, or a fire that started miles away with no EMS to stop as it sweeps through your neighborhood. Regardless of how it happens, being as ready to leave as you are to stay is wise.

 

It's too late, but I think I should have said raid instead of siege.

But, if you Bug Out, don't you eventually have to Bug In...somewhere? And then you're right back where you started?

 

I'd do like Patton would do: Surround the building, keep it surrounded and move on to the next target. Eventually the people in the building or village will give up or die from starvation. Patton never fought a set battle to take a village or city unless there was a priority reason like needing a harbor or river crossing. His favorite action was to place infantry and some armor vehicles around the defended area and wait out the enemy. Make them come to you to try to break out. Make them throw themselves against your defenses and lose people. It worked well for him in WW2.

 

Read up on Patton and his 5th Infantry Divison at Metz. That didn't go down like your scenario suggests. A lot of good troops died and many more wounded. For a general who usually tried to spare his troops unneccessary casualties, Metz was horrific, especially the attacks on Ft Driant.