The topic on retreats mentioned that castles were unable to withstand long sieges. This is only partially true. Once castle design was understood, a well stocked castle could withstand a siege indefinitely. Castle were designed so that the women, children, and old men who were left in a village after the fighting age men marched off to war, could defend the castle. If you examine the history of Europe you will see that castles fell to siege only infrequently; the majority of them either were betrayed from the inside or for whatever reason the stocks inside the castle (usually water) were not maintained. This is the primary reason why Europe was so divided through the middle ages; even kings could not raise a large enough army to overcome the castles of the local barons. (One of the few exceptions was King Richard who, if history is any judge, was either very lucky or had inside help in taking every castle he attacked.) That is until black powder cannons were developed and because of their cost (and the cost of the professionals who manned them) were only affordable to the kings or the larger holdings.
A good example of this would be the savage pounding that Monte Casino took in Italy, and the huge numbers of casualties that the Allies took to reduce it, even with modern weapons.
I would argue that even today, fortified construction has its place. While hidden retreats are preferable (avoid a fight if at all possible), it is still preferable to have some place that can shrug off small arms fire to retreat to. The trick is finding the right ground on which to build it. If you borrow from the great castle designs of history you will see that you need a place on the crest of a hill (so that the walls are enhanced by the height and angle of the slope), that has access to water inside the walls, and is generally hidden. But this also makes the site hard to live in. One of the small town in Belgium that was built this way (Dolheim) had fields that were an hours walk away downhill, and nearly two hours uphill. I don’t know about you, but after following the rear end of a mule all day the last thing I want to do is walk for two hours up a hill.
The fortified farms of the 1400s and on would probably be a better design choice for a retreat though — and many of these were either built on or following the design of Roman and Greek homes. In these designs the outside walls of the house, barn, and storage shed or stables, and the kitchen would not have any windows or doors on the first floor. All three or four sides would open into a spacious interior courtyard and the corners of the three or four structures would be joined with stout walls. Some of these structures, such as those found on the borders between Scotland and England, the walls were up to three feet thick. Since stone construction and tile or slate roofs were used, they were also fire resistant. Similar construction approaches can be seen in fortified farming villages in China (whose walls could withstand hits from black powder cannon), the Pueblo culture of the American Southwest, and fortified farms in Afghanistan that are in use even today. Yes, modern high explosives make these much harder to defend, but short of having a modern weapon like an anti-tank rocket (or a tank, as our Bosnian friend pointed out), these structures could and still do what they were designed to do: shrug off attacks from “bandits” and “raiders.” They were not designed to withstand a military siege but rather resist the depredations of fast moving quasi-criminal gangs who would move on to an easier target rather than slug it out with those inside.
Since the goal of longer term survival is to have productive locations and facilities to use, a farm with a fortified farm house is a much better model to base our modern retreat on. Now, I don’t know about you but the thought of giving up any farm animals to the depredations of a roving band does not sit well with me. While huddling inside the fortified farm is not the correct approach (aggressive patrols outside of it to spoil any attacks and move the bandits along), I also would much rather leave my wife and younger children inside something that they can defend for a while by themselves while I am out, than to simply expect them to hide and hope. – Dr. Hugh