“When the enemy’s advanced troops have been driven in and the preliminary reconnaissance has enabled the line of investment to be fixed, this line will be divided into sections, to which commanders will be appointed and troops allotted.... Outposts will be established as closely as possible round the fortress in order to cut it off from outside communication and to protect the operations in rear.[47] Machine guns should be allotted to these sections in proportion to their importance in the line of investment. The commander of the section should use them according to the circumstances of the situation, but as a rule a large proportion of the guns should be distributed to the outposts.... The duties of outposts in siege operations are even more important and exacting than they are in the field operations; in the case both of an investment and of a regular siege the brunt of the work throughout will fall upon the outposts.... They must therefore have greater power of resistance than outposts in field warfare in order to prevent the troops in rear from being disturbed by every skirmish. The outposts of a section which is maintaining a close investment should be about one quarter of the total infantry allotted to the section, together with a proportion of artillery, _machine guns, and engineers_.”[48] The positions for the machine guns should be along the _line of resistance_, which will usually be the piquet line. It will be necessary to provide bomb-proof emplacements for the machine guns, and alternative emplacements should be made for each gun. The temptation to engage in the fire fight must be resisted, and the machine guns should be solely employed for resisting attacks and their fire reserved till close range. Once they have been unmasked, it will be advisable to move them to a fresh position, leaving a dummy gun in the old position.