Defending Minas Tirith a strategic error?

[Sandro]

Going back to the beginning, how to you propose to evactuate a city of thousands? Civilians travel slow and are easy targets. Sauron would find out that Minas Tirith had been evacuated and would send his army in fast pursuit. The walls were what saved the forces of Gondor. Without them, the army would have been slaughtered. The orcs would have no need for siege engines, and thus would move faster. Nazgul could harry the retreat. Depending on the time frame, saruman's forces could be a factor. Where do they retreat to? Edoras? Too small and lightly fortified. The Hornburg? They would be starved into submission. No, the descision to remain in the White City was the only choice available. Anything else would have resulted in untold destruction and death.

[Saurreg]

Originally Posted by Sandro

No, the descision to remain in the White City was the only choice available. Anything else would have resulted in untold destruction and death.

It depends on the level of supplies/rations that have been allocated in Minas Tirith by the authorities and who the recepients were. Remember that more supplies translate into longer holdout times for armed defenders. time-based attrition may meant nothing to the armies of Sauron, but the Gondorians were placing the ante on the arrival of the Rohirrim and the return of the King, every second bought was an added advantage.

The same can be said of the English garrison at Chateau Gaillard in Normandy. When Philip of France invaded in 1202, the English commander - Roger de Lacy could only hope to hold out as long as he could until King John arrived with reinforcements. A quick stock check of the castle's supplies showed that by rationing meagrely, the armed defenders could theoratically hold out for another one year or so. As such non-combatants were ruthlessly cast out of the castle walls and left to fend for themselves in no-man's land. Relief for the hapless innocents came only when Philip toured the siegeworks and gave them a escape route through the ranks of the French army to the rear and fed them.

In RoTK, Pippin joined the Gondorian Beregrond and the men of his watch in a meal that was rather generous but nevertheless rationed. I should suspect that as the siege drags on, rations would be more meagre and scarcer still. Who knows if Beregrond's copmpany had already compromised their allocated ration stocks by feeding a "halfling prince"? Feeding a city of civilians would be highly uneconomical and would sap the will of armed soldiers through inadequacy of rations or distractions. Housing civilians also meant that considerations such as hospital beds and field surgery must be provided to them in addition to physically protecting their bodies. And should the walls be breached, progressive street fighting strategies and tactics would be compromised because bridges can't be demolished in fears of isolating some non-combatants on the other end and apartment blocks cannot be converted into stronghouses because they were occupied and the occupants did not evacuate in time.

Evacuation of non-combatants was still the safer bet.

[Kuruharan]

Yes, but would a full one (guards and all) be stratigically superior? To abandon Minas Tirith would be to abandon the last line of defense against Mordor.

To be honest, I don't really have an opinion about which strategy would have been better. I can see benefits to withdrawing from Minas Tirith. However, I think it would be impossible to get Denethor to abandon the city.

From a storytelling perspective, Tolkien needed one big dramatic battle, not a long drawn out campaign of small skirmishes.

[Sandro]

True Kuruharan, it did work for the story.

Sauron's objective was to destroy Gondor's people by any means possible. If they evacuated only civilians, he would hunt them down. In the wilderness, fleeing from Sauron, feeding an entire city of people on the go, with no time to set up farms and a permanent abode would be worse for the people. Starvation would set in even faster outside the city as it would inside. At least they had food stores inside the White City.

Also there was a motive here that affected strategy grately. The whole point of holding out against a seige was to keep Sauron's gaze fixed on Gondor; giving Frodo and Sam enough time to destroy the Ring. If it worked, better to have lost a few civilians of starvation then to have a lot slaughtered by roving bands of Wargs and Orcs. If Frodo and Sam failed would it really matter if they were inside the White City or in Anorien? Either way, they would be screwed.

[Rimbaud]

As has been touched on above, abandoning your major population centre, strategic stronghold and most defensible proposition is rarely a victorious tactic.

In addition and in response to the above 'slash'n'burn' proposal, it is worth noting that this is a truly horrific tactic that any force controlled by a power with concern for the welfare of life and lands would avoid at all costs. To delve further into the example of the Russian withdrawal through these means during WWII, the scorching of the rich farmlands of the Ukraine and then-western-Russian provinces caused the death of, conservatively, several tens of millions of people, and plunged those lands into a cycle of poverty and hardship from which some areas have barely recovered. Some victories are not worth having.

[Tuor of Gondolin]

"One who cannot cast away a treasure at need is in fetters."
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There are obviously strong arguments for trying to hold Minas Tirith, both literary and strategic. The concept of a retreat and strategic withdrawal is more in the nature of "contingency plans" and leaving your options open. It would obviously be better to hold Minas Tirith but to stubbornly do so at all costs would be analagous to Stalin's insisting on holding forward front lines and then Kiev in 1941, rather then the flexible defense favored by his better generals. And recall that at Stalingrad the majority of the civilian polulation was withdrawn. Certainly Gondor did not anticipate the gate being destroyed, and if it hadn't a viable defense was possible (though not certain).
Denethor did (unlike PJ's characterization) make prudent preperations. One can imagine in the weeks and months preceding a possible attack evacuations of nonessential populations. And of intriguing interest to me is the use Gondor and Rohan could have made of pretty secure back links to each other and as a fairly safe area (even if in camps) for their populations in the Anfalas and Pinnath Gelin.
If the corsairs were repulsed the nature of the rivers in south Gondor and strongholds like Dol Amroth and Pelargir would have been substantial barriers to a divided Mordor force and given time for an even further withdrawal of refugees into Eriador, if necessary. And as it happened, with Aragorn destroying the corsairs and occupying south Gondor past Pelargir (and controlling the seas) a strong defensive stance. A costly, but possibly necessary, strategy, if the alternative was to stay in an untenable forward area subject to conquest, perhaps again like the Russian withdrawal of population, industry, etc. east. A very costly strategy, but what was the alternative, to be destroyed by a still superior wehrmacht?
Remember. in Rhovannion men and dwarves withdrew into Erebor, abndoning Laketown and thereby survived.

[Kuruharan]

I suppose that the question would ultimately rest on what the Gondorians thought they were fighting to protect. Were they fighting for themselves or for their land? If they were fighting for themselves then their lives and freedom were more important than any particular place and Minas Tirith could be sacrificed. If they were fighting for their land then losing Minas Tirith would be a grievous blow.