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Originally Posted by tom the eldest
But arthedain and cardolan wereable to hold the witch king for hundreds of years,with cardolan and arthedain working together,they could prevent angmar from invading.they cant directly assault cardolan because arthedain can sent armies from weather hills and struck their flank and rear.angmar was forced to make all-out assault,with several armies to distract the defenses while the main one going to cardolan.this show that if angmar dont use such tactics,then earnil(ur?)couldarrive in time.
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Early on they were able to hold back the Witch-king for a while but they did have need of help. However, they were able to be invaded because they were fighting over territory, namely the Weather Hills. The Weather Hills were part of Arthedain territory and the other 2 wanted it and it bordered on their realms. Also the Kings of Arthedain were claiming lordship over the whole of Arnor since the other descendants of Isildur died out in the other 2 realms, which resisted this claim.
"In token of this claim all the kings of Arthedain, and the chieftains after them, take names with the prefix aran, ar(a) signifying 'high king'." [PoM-E; ch. 7, The Heirs of Elendil]
"In the days of Argeleb son of Malvegil, since no descendants of Isildur remained in the other kingdoms, the kings of Arthedain again claimed the lordship of all Arnor." [Appendix A., The North-kingdom and the Dúnedain]
(7) Argeleb l
(8) Arveleg l
(9) Araphor
(10) Argeleb
(11) Arvegil
(12) Arveleg ll
(13) Araval
(14) Araphant
(15) Arvedui
When the Dúnedain were fighting each other, Arthedain/Rhudaur over Weathertop, the latter had men in league with Angmar. "The Witch-king of Angmar taking advantage of war among the Dunedain comes down out of the North. He overruns Cardolan and Rhudaur." [PoM-E; ch. 7, The Heirs of Elendil] Cardolan did aid Arthedain, but Weathertop was overrun with a huge army from Angmar 50 years later. The people of Angmar chased and killed the remaining Dúnedain of Rhudaur and those of Cardolan took refuge at or by the Barrowdowns.
In the final assault that finally broke the last defense I believe there was ONLY Arthedain at this point. The other lands had long been ravaged and the Dúnedain too diminished at this point. When Arvedui came to Gondor to claim the kingship it was not Arnor that they saw as a small thing, "to most men in Gondor, the realm in Arthedain seemed a small thing" [Appendix A, Gondor and the Heirs of Anárion]. So there was no other Dúnedain kingdom left for the armies of Angmar to go through before assaulting Fornost in 1974. They were fighting the people of Angmar even before "the Witch-king was preparing a last stroke against it in 1973." Over 300 years before that in 1636 the Great Plague had wiped out the remaining Dúnedain of Cardolan. So for some time it was really Angmar vs. Arthedain and "King Araphant continued with dwindling strength to hold off the assaults of Agmar, and Arvedui when he succeeded did likewise;" it was in 1964 when Arvedui had become king.