[Kuruharan]

No. You offered very little support for your own argument.

I'm terribly sorry, but I don't understand what else there is to say in support of the argument about the supply lines. I find that, according to your theory, the Witch-king's were impossibly long. Compared to this the Gondorian were very short. These considerations weigh heavily against the idea that this encounter was a conventional siege.

Just because they are a river people does not mean there are inherent difficulties in hauling supplies over water.

One other point you might want to consider is that the river was still bridged at this point.

The relatively dry lands of Rhun are more easily crossed in general.

For every mile an army’s supplies must cross the “teeth to tail” ratio becomes ever more heavily weighted to tail. I think that even the process of moving the supplies across to Minas Ithil from Rhun would have been prohibitive in terms of manpower, especially if you are envisioning the supplies arriving on a frequent basis.

I will not say that weather and terrain problems cannot cause problems, but I find it highly unlikely that they could not be fixed. And especially by a people like the Easterlings, who would most likely be able to cope with such set-backs.

Yes, the Easterlings being the great pioneers in weather-control and terraforming technologies.

Rhun is vast, as is Mordor. It would not be hard to..."go around"...the obstacles.

Adding to the amount of time it would take the supplies to get where they are going.

I'm not saying they were naturally there. Once the siege starts, the Witch-King could easily dispatch units to the periphery of his theater of war to way-lay the Gondorians who would be attempting to reach Ithil. And if the Haradrim are part of this, all the easier to acquire good troops for this sort of action, as well as any supplies they bring to the table.

And for them to be able to do that against a major relief force (which I think it highly likely the Gondorians would have dispatched had they understood the situation as conforming to conventional norms) there would have to have been a major battle that we know nothing about.

I have never said that the Wiki created an army out of nothing, nor that he went unopposed. Easterlings, Haradrim, orcs...they do have other homes than just Mordor. It's not hard to see the Witch-King or Khamul conscripting these groups into combat. What I find hard to believe is that anyone would think that the Witch-King went into this without planning this out ahead of time.

I’m not saying that he could not have done this. I am saying that it does not fit the situation.

But, without any proper intelligence coming out of the city, it would be very difficult to gauge the strength of the enemy force.

Just as an aside, and this is not particularly directed at you, but isn’t it amazing how a palantir can at one moment be the most useful thing in the world and in the next moment serve no useful function whatsoever. Odd that…

Anyway…

Being the defender, they could not afford to make a mistake that could not only lose Ithil, but other important fortresses. While such a situation may not have happened, they would have to plan for it. Thus, they could not send the fullness of their might against the Wiki. Just one of many potential factors that may have hindered Gondor's response to the Ithil situation.

They could have thought this in the early months at most. Remember this siege lasted two years.