A siege is a military blockade of a city or fortress with the intent of conquering by attrition and/or assault. The term derives from the Latin word for "seat" or "sitting." A siege occurs when an attacker encounters a city or fortress that cannot be easily taken by a frontal assault and refuses to surrender. Sieges involve surrounding the target and blocking the reinforcement or escape of troops or provision of supplies (a tactic known as "investment" ), typically coupled with attempts to reduce the fortifications by means of siege engines, artillery bombardment, mining (also known as sapping), or the use of deception or treachery to bypass defenses. Failing a military outcome, sieges can often be decided by starvation, thirst or disease, which can afflict both the attacker or defender. Sieges probably predate the development of cities as large population centers. Ancient cities in the Middle East show archaeological evidence of having had fortified city walls. During the Warring States era of ancient China, there is both textual and archaeological evidence of prolonged sieges and siege machinery used against the defenders of city walls. Siege machinery was also a tradition of the ancient Greco-Roman world. During the Renaissance and the Early Modern period, siege warfare dominated the conduct of war in Europe. Leonardo da Vinci gained as much of his renown from the design of fortifications as from his artwork. Medieval campaigns were generally designed around a succession of sieges. In the Napoleonic era, increasing use of ever more powerful cannon reduced the value of fortifications. In modern times, trenches replaced walls, and bunkers replaced castles. In the 20th century, the significance of the classical siege declined. With the advent of mobile warfare, one single fortified stronghold is no longer as decisive as it once was. While sieges do still occur, they are not as common as they once were due to changes in modes of battle, principally the ease by which huge volumes of destructive power can be directed onto a static target. Sieges in present day are more commonly either smaller hostage, militant, or extreme resisting-arrest situations such as the Waco Siege. Generally speaking, siege warfare is a form of low-intensity warfare (until an assault takes place) characterized in that at least one party holds a strong defense position, it is highly static situation, the element of attrition is typically strong and there are plenty of opportunities for negotiations. (more)
Genres: politics, biology, science
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Mining (military):
Mining, or to undermine or undermining, was a siege method used since antiquity against a walled city, fortress or castle.
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Siege engine:
A siege engine is a device that is designed to break or circumvent city walls and other fortifications in siege warfare.
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Investment (military):
Investment is the military tactic of surrounding an enemy fort (or town) with armed forces to prevent entry or escape. A circumvallation is a line of fortifications, built by the attackers around the besieged fortification facing towards the enemy fo
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Mole (espionage):
A mole (also called a defector in place, an informant and in the Mafia a rat) is a spy who works for an enemy nation, but whose loyalty truly lies within his nation's government. In some usage, a mole differs from a defector in that a mole is a spy b
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Biological warfare:
Biological warfare (BW) — also known as a germ warfare, biological weapons and bioweaponry — is the use of any pathogen (bacterium, virus or other disease-causing organism) as a weapon of war. Using nonliving toxic products, even if produced by livin
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List of established military terms:
This is a list of established military terms which have been in use for at least 50 years. Technology has changed so not all of them are in current use, or they may have been superseded by more modern ones. However they are still in current use in ar
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Siege of Sarajevo:
The Siege of Sarajevo was the longest siege in the history of modern warfare, conducted by the Serb forces of self-proclaimed Republika Srpska and Yugoslav People's Army (later transformed to the Army of Serbia and Montenegro), lasting from April 5 1
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List of sieges:
A siege is a prolonged military assault and blockade on a city or fortress with the intent of conquering by force or attrition. What follows is a chronological list of sieges.
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Infiltration tactics:
In warfare, infiltration tactics involve small, lightly-equipped infantry forces attacking enemy rear areas while bypassing enemy front-line strongpoints and isolating them for attack by follow-up troops with heavier weapons. These tactics were used
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Hostage crisis:
A Hostage crisis is where a one or more terrorists or criminals, surrounded by people, tries to hold off the authorities by force, it is considered a "barricaded suspect" situation. When those held against their will are hidden, it is kidnapping. A h
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Artillery:
Artillery (from French artillerie) is a type of military force which employs any apparātus, machine, an assortment of tools or instruments, a system or systems used as weapons for the discharge of large projectiles in combat. Over the course of milit
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Cannon:
A cannon is a type of artillery, usually large and tubular, that uses gunpowder or other explosive-based propellants to launch a projectile over a distance. Cannon vary in caliber, range, mobility, rate of fire, angle of fire, and firepower; differen
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Trench warfare:
Trench warfare is a form of warfare where both combatants have fortified positions and fighting lines are static. Trench warfare arose when there was a revolution in firepower without similar advances in mobility. The result was a slow and grueling f
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Defensive wall:
A defensive wall is a fortification used to defend a city or settlement from potential aggressors. In ancient to modern times, they were used to enclose settlements. Generally, these are referred to as city walls or town walls, although there were al
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Escalade:
Escalade is the act of scaling defensive walls or ramparts with the aid of ladders, and was a prominent feature of siege warfare in medieval times. It was one of the most direct options available for attacking a fortification, but was also one of the
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Iranian Embassy Siege:
The Iranian Embassy Siege of 1980 was a siege of the Iranian embassy in London after it had been taken over by Iranian Arab separatists. The siege was ended when British special forces, the Special Air Service (SAS), stormed the building in Operation
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Siege hook:
A siege hook is a weapon used to pull stones from a wall during a siege. The Greek historian Polybius, in his Histories, mentions the use of such weapons at the Roman siege of Ambracia:
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Siege of Khost:
The Siege of Khost: during the nine-year Soviet war in Afghanistan in the 1980s, the town of Khost was besieged for more than eleven years. Its airstrip's 3km runway served as a base for helicopter operations by Soviet forces. Operation Magistral was
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Siege of Sangin:
The Siege of Sangin lasted between June 2006 and April 2007, during which time Taliban insurgents besieged the district centre of Sangin District in Helmand Province, Afghanistan, occupied by British ISAF soldiers. During the siege, fighting became i
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Trojan War:
In Greek mythology, the Trojan War was waged against the city of Troy by the Achaeans after Paris of Troy stole Helen from her husband Menelaus, the king of Sparta. The war is among the most important events in Greek mythology, and was narrated in ma
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Siege of Petersburg:
The Richmond-Petersburg Campaign was a series of battles around Petersburg, Virginia, fought from June 15, 1864, to March 25, 1865, during the American Civil War. Although it is more popularly known as the Siege of Petersburg, it was not a classic mi
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Masada:
Masada (a romanisation of the Hebrew מצדה, Metzada, from מצודה, metzuda, "fortress") is the name for a site of ancient palaces and fortifications in the South District of Israel on top of an isolated rock plateau, or large mesa, on the eastern edge o
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Barbican:
A barbican (from mediæval Latin barbecana) is a fortified outpost or gateway, such as an outer defense to a city or castle, or any tower situated over a gate or bridge which was used for defensive purposes. Usually barbicans were situated outside the
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Myitkyina:
Myitkyina ( , in English, pronounced mitʃ ə nə ) is the capital city of Kachin State in Myanmar (formerly Burma), located 919 miles from Yangon, or 487 miles from Mandalay. In Burmese it means "near the big river", and in fact "Myitkyina" lies on the
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Battle of Dien Bien Phu:
The Battle of Dien Bien Phu (Bataille de Diên Biên Phu; Chiến dịch Điện Biên Phủ) was the climactic battle of the First Indochina War between French Union forces of the French Far East Expeditionary Corps, and Vietnamese Viet Minh communist revolutio
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Ballista:
The ballista (Latin, from Greek βαλλίστρα - ballistra, from - βάλλω ballō, "to throw"), plural ballistae, was a weapon developed from earlier Greek crossbows. It relied upon different mechanics using instead of a prod two levers with torsion springs
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Portcullis:
A portcullis is a grille or gate made of wood, metal or a combination of the two. Portcullises fortified the entrances to many medieval castles, acting as a last line of defence during time of attack or siege. Each portcullis was mounted in vertical
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Battle of Alesia:
The Battle of Alesia or Siege of Alesia (September, 52 BC) took place around the Gallic oppidum of Alesia, a major town centre and hill fort of the Mandubii tribe. It was fought by the army of the Roman Republic commanded by Julius Caesar, aided by c
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Siege tower:
A siege tower (or in the Middle Ages a belfry Castle: Stephen Biesty's Cross-Sections. Dorling Kindersley Pub (T); 1st American edition (September 1994). ISBN 978-1564584670 ) is a specialized siege engine, constructed to protect assailants and ladde
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Forlorn hope:
Forlorn hope is a military term that comes from the Dutch verloren hoop, which should be translated as "lost troop". The Dutch word hoop (in its sense of troop in English) is not cognate with English hope: this is an example of false folk etymology.
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Early thermal weapons:
Early thermal weapons were devices or substances used in warfare during the classical and medieval periods (approx 8th century BC until the mid-16th century AD) which used heat or burning action to destroy or damage enemy personnel, fortifications or
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Medieval fortification:
Medieval fortification is the military aspect of Medieval technology that covers the development of fortification construction and use in Europe roughly from the fall of the Western Roman Empire to the Renaissance. During this millennium, fortificati
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