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human
[Lord of the Rings] Why did Saruman order the storming of Helm’s Deep? Wouldn’t a siege be a better (but less dramatic) choice?

Watching The Two Towers—

- It seems like there would be no strategic advantage to attacking Helm’s Deep. They say it’s a dead end, hard to storm—Saruman seems motivated more by agenda than strategy here.

- Based on what we see in the movie, a siege would almost certainly succeed, given the cramped, unsanitary conditions inside the walls, the lack of supply lines, and the fortress’ isolation.

- A siege line could effective bottle up Rohan’s defenders, removing them from the fight (King Theoden’s decision to move the population there seems like a grave error; it would result in thousands of deaths from disease or starvation if they were kept in there long enough). In this case, actually killing them is irrelevant—disease and starvation will do that, and the defenders can’t do anything but watch as Middle-Earth falls (real life examples of encirclement/blockade: Yorktown, Sedan, the British Blockade of Germany in WWI, bottling up the High Seas Fleet, Leningrad—without Soviet offensives or resupply, it may well have fallen)

- Rohan is undefended as the populace and army defend Helm’s Deep. Saruman’s armies can freely use its roads and resources to either deal with the other armies or link up with the forces of Mordor. Instead of wasting his precious Uruk-Hai and resources on a Pyrrhic victory, I feel he should’ve just let his eager orcs deal with the remaining riders or plunder another kingdom or something while leaving a siege force to deal with Helm’s Deep.
gpt
There are a few reasons why Saruman would have preferred to press the attack rather than wait out a siege. Think about it from Saruman's perspective. Here's the sequence of events from his view:

* His Uruks capture two Hobbits, and set out to bring them back to Isengard. Saruman believes one of them is likely the Ringbearer.
* Saruman learns that his company of Uruk-hai have been killed. This wasn't in the film, but in the books he also encounters Aragorn, Legolas and Gimli shortly after the skirmish near Fangorn. He must think that either the Hobbits escaped the attack with the Ring, or else they died, but the the remaining members of the Fellowship have retrieved the Ring. In either case, the Ring is now just out of reach.
* Saruman returns to Isengard, and a day or two later he sends out the entirety of his army. He was likely hoping to quickly crush Rohan before the Ring could escape him entirely. He's initially successful, scattering the Rohirrim at the fords before Theoden could arrive there with reinforcements. His forces chase down the bulk of the remaining forces of Rohan and trap them at Helm's Deep, along with (in his mind) the Ring.

Saruman would have a few concerns and mitigating factors here that would probably drive him to push the attack rather than wait it out. For one, he vastly outnumbered the defenders. Losing even half his forces in the attack would probably still have felt like a justifiable loss if it means he obtains the Ring. He'd still have a sizable force remaining, and a new weapon with which he could directly challenge Sauron. The urgency was provided by the fact that Gandalf was still at large, riding about rallying the scattered forces of Rohan as well as the mass of Huorns that the Ents sent south from Fangorn. If Saruman's forces didn't breach the Hornburg quickly, they would soon find themselves surrounded. Of course, in the end that's exactly what happened.

Time was really of the essence. In hindsight, Saruman really should have acted even more quickly than he did, invading with the entirety of his forces immediately after Theodred died at the First Battle of the Fords of Isen. Waiting out a siege would have been even worse than the course he ultimately opted to take.