Editors Note: The following are excerpts of various articles written by an individual living and surviving in a current real SHTF (Sh*t Hitting The Fan) situation. Few Americans know about the collapse of the Argentinean economy back in 2001, or their ongoing struggles and continued slide down the ladder of prosperity. FerFAL (a pseudonym) has been graciously sharing his everyday struggles to survive on the Preparedness/Patriot website www.frugalsquirrels.com. Only minor editing has been done for the purpose of clarity and readability. What you are reading is essentially (99%) his words, and FerFAL's words speak volumes. Everyone should read this and his other entries to get clear insight into what we could and will be dealing with WHEN the SHTF. There are tons of insights and information to be gleaned from this man. Read and heed folks READ AND HEED!!
Thanks
FerFAL!
PART 1
(PAGE 1 OF 4)
Posted October 20,
2005 14:02 (04:02 PM)
My brother visited Argentina a few weeks ago. He’s
been living in Spain for a few years now. Within the first week, he got sick,
some kind of strong flu, even though climate isn’t that cold and he took care of
himself. Without a doubt he got sick because there are lots of new viruses in my
country that can’t be found in 1st world countries. The misery and famine lead
us to a situation where, even though you have food, shelter and health care,
most of others don’t, and therefore they get sick and spread the diseases all
over the region.
What got me started on this post is the fact that I
actually saw this coming, and posted on the subject here at Frugal’s, months
before the new viruses spread over the country and the news started talking
about this new, health emergency, which proves that talking, thinking and
sharing ideas with like minded people (you guys), does help to see things coming
and prepare for them with enough time. So I started thinking about several
issues, what I learned (either the hard way or thanks to this forum) after all
these years of living in a collapsed country that is trying to get out an
economical disaster and everything that comes along with it. Though my English
is limited, I hope I’m able to transmit the main ideas and concepts, giving you
a better image of what you may have to deal with some day, if the economy
collapses in your country. Here is what I have so far:
URBAN OR
COUNTRY?
Someone once asked me how did those that live in the country fare.
If they were better off than city dwellers. As always there are no simple
answers. Wish I could say country good, city bad, but I can’t, because if I have
to be completely honest, and I intend to be so, there are some issues that have
to be analyzed, especially security. Of course that those that live in the
country and have some land and animals were better prepared food-wise. No need
to have several acres full of crops. A few fruit trees, some animals, such as
chickens, cows and rabbits, and a small orchard was enough to be light years
ahead of those in the cities.
Chickens, eggs and rabbits would provide
the proteins, a cow or two for milk and cheese, some vegetables and fruit plants
covered the vegetable diet, and some eggs or a rabbit could be traded for flower
to make bread and pasta or sugar and salt.
Of course that there are
exceptions, for example, some provinces up north have desert climate, and it
almost never rains. It is almost impossible to live of the land, and animals
require food and water you have to buy. Those guys had it bad; no wonder the
Northern provinces suffer the most in my country. Those that live in cities,
well they have to manage as they can. Since food prices went up about 200%-300%.
People would cut expenses wherever they could so they could buy food. Some ate
whatever they could; they hunted birds or ate street dogs and cats, others
starved. When it comes to food, cities suck in a crisis. It is usually the lack
of food or the impossibility to acquire it that starts the rioting and looting
when TSHTF.
When it comes to security things get even more
complicated. Forget about shooting those that mean you harm from 300 yards away
with your MBR. Leave that notion to armchair commandos and 12 year old kids that
pretend to be grown ups on the internet.
Some facts:
1) Those that
want to harm you/steal from you don’t come with a pirate flag waving over their
heads.
2) Neither do they start shooting at you 200 yards away.
3) They
won’t come riding loud bikes or dressed with their orange, convict just escaped
from prison jump suits, so that you can identify them the better. Nor do they
all wear chains around their necks and leather jackets. If I had a dollar for
each time a person that got robbed told me “They looked like NORMAL people,
dressed better than we are”, honestly, I would have enough money for a nice gun.
There are exceptions, but don’t expect them to dress like in the movies.
4) A
man with a wife and two or three kids can’t set up a watch. I don’t care if you
are SEAL, SWAT or John Freaking Rambo, no 6th sense is going to tell you that
there is a guy pointing a gun at your back when you are trying to fix the water
pump that just broke, or carrying a big heavy bag of dried beans you bought that
morning.
The best alarm system anyone can have in a farm are dogs. But
dogs can get killed and poisoned. A friend of mine had all four dogs poisoned on
his farm one night, they all died. After all these years I learned that even
though the person that lives out in the country is safer when it comes to small
time robberies, that same person is more exposed to extremely violent home
robberies. Criminals know that they are isolated and their feeling of
invulnerability is boosted. When they assault a country home or farm, they will
usually stay there for hours or days torturing the owners. I heard it all: women
and children getting raped, people tied to the beds and tortured with
electricity, beatings, burned with acetylene torches. Big cities aren’t much
safer for the survivalist that decides to stay in the city. He will have to face
express kidnappings, robberies, and pretty much risking getting shot for what’s
in his pockets or even his clothes.
So, where to go? The concrete jungle
is dangerous and so is living away from it all, on your own. The solution is to
stay away from the cities but in groups, either by living in a small
town-community or sub division, or if you have friends or family that think as
you do, form your own small community. Some may think that having neighbors
within “shouting” distance means loosing your privacy and freedom, but it’s a
price that you have to pay if you want to have someone to help you if you ever
need it. To those that believe that they will never need help from anyone
because they will always have their rifle at hand, checking the horizon with
their scope every five minutes and a first aid kit on their back packs at all
times…. Grow up.
SERVICES
What ever sort of scenario you are dealing
with, services are more than likely to either suffer in quality or disappear all
together. Think ahead of time; analyze possible SHTF scenarios and which service
should be affected by it in your area. Think about the most likely scenario but
also think outside the box. What’s more likely? A tornado? But a terrorist
attack isn’t as crazy as you though it would be a few years ago, isn’t
it?
Also analyze the consequences of those services going down. If there
is no power then you need to do something about all that meat you have in the
fridge, you can dry it or can it. Think about the supplies you would need for
these tasks before you actually need them. You have a complete guide on how to
prepare the meat on you computer… how will you get it out of there if there is
no power? Print everything that you consider
important.
WATER
No one can last too long without water. The
urban survivalist may find that the water is of poor quality, in which case he
can make good use of a water filter, or that there is no water available at all.
When this happens, a large city were millions live will run out of bottled water
within minutes. In my case, tap water isn’t very good. I can see black little
particles and some other stuff that looks like dead algae. Taste isn’t that bad.
Not good but I know that there are parts of the country where it is much worse.
To be honest, a high percentage of the country has no potable water at all.
If you can build a well, do so, set it as your top of the list priority as a
survivalist. Water comes before firearms, medicines and even food. Save as much
water as you can. Use plastic bottles, refill soda bottles and place them in a
cool place, preferably inside a black garbage bag to protect it from sun light.
The water will pick some plastic taste after a few months, but water that tastes
a little like plastic is far way better than no water at all. What ever the kind
of SHTF scenario you are dealing with, water will suffer. In my case the
economical crash created problems with the water company, that reduces the
maintenance and quality in order to reduce costs and keep their income in spite
of the high prices they have to pay for supplies and equipment, most of which
comes from abroad, and after the 2001 crash, costs 3 times more. As always, the
little guy gets to pay for it. Same would go for floods or chemical or
biological attacks. Water requires delicate care and it will suffer when TSHTF
in one way or another. In this case, when you still have tap water, a quality
filter is in order, as well as a pump if you can have one. A manual pump would
be ideal as well if possible. Estimate that you need one approximately a gallon
per person per day. Try to have at least two-four weeks worth of water. More
would be preferable.
POWER
I spent WAY to much time without power for
my own taste. Power has always been a problem in my country, even before the
2001 crisis. The real problem starts when you spend more than just a few hours
without light. Just after the SHTF in 2001 half the country went without power
for 3 days. Buenos Aires was one big dark grave. People got caught on elevators,
food rots; hospitals that only had a few hours worth of fuel for their
generators ran out of power. Without power, days get to be a lot shorter. Once
the sun sets there is not much you can do. I read under candle light and
flashlight light and your head starts to hurt after a while. You can work around
the house a little bit but only as long as you don’t need power tools. Crime
also increases once the lights go out, so whenever you have to go somewhere in a
black out, carry the flashlight on one hand and a handgun on the
other.
Summarizing, being in a city without light turn to be depressing
after a while. I spent my share of nights, alone, listening to the radio, eating
canned food and cleaning my guns under the light of my LED head lamp. Then I got
married, had a son, and found out that when you have loved ones around you black
outs are not as bad. The point is that family helps morale on these
situations.
A note on flashlights. Have two or three head LED lights.
They are not expensive and are worth their weight in gold. A powerful flashlight
is necessary, something like a big Maglite or better yet a SureFire, especially
when you have to check your property for intruders. But for more mundane stuff
like preparing food, going to the toilet or doing stuff around the house, the
LED headlamp is priceless. Try washing the dishes on the dark while holding a 60
lumen flashlight on one hand and you’ll know what I mean. LEDs also have the
advantage of lasting for almost an entire week of continuous use and the light
bulb lasts forever. Rechargeable batteries are a must or else you’ll end up
broke if lights go out often. Have a healthy amount of spare quality batteries
and try to standardize as much as you can. I have 12 Samsung NM 2500Mh AA and 8
AAA 800mh for the headlamps. I use D cell plastic adaptors in order to use AA
batteries on my 3 D cell Maglite. This turned out to work quite well, better
than I expected. I also keep about 2 or 3 packs of regular, Duracell batteries
just in case. These are supposed to expire around 2012, so I can forget about
them until I need them. Rechargeable NM batteries have the disadvantage of
loosing power after a period of time, so keep regular batteries as well and
check the rechargeable ones every once in a while.
After all these years of
problems with power, what two items I would love to have?
1) The obvious,
a generator. I carried my fridge food to my parent’s house way to many times on
the past. Too bad I can’t afford one right now.
2) A battery charger that
has both solar panel and a small crank. They are not available here. I saw that
they are relatively inexpensive in USA. Do yourself a favor and get one or two
of these. Even if they don’t charge as well as regular ones, I’m sure it will
put out enough power to charge batteries for LED lamps at
least.
GAS
Gas has decreased in quality as well, there is little
gas. Try to have an electric oven in case you have to do without it. If both
electricity and gas go down, one of those camping stoves can work as well, if
you keep a good supply of gas cans. The ones that work with liquid fuel seem to
be better on the long run, since they can use different types of fuel. You can
only store a limited amount of compressed gas and once you ran out of it, you
are on your own if stores are closed of they sold them out. Anyway, a city that
goes without gas and light for more than two weeks is a death trap, get out of
there before it’s too late.
A DIFFERENT MENTALITY
I was watching the
People & Art channel with my wife the other night. It was a show where they
film a couple for a given period of time and some people vote on who is the one
with the worst habits, the one they find more annoying. We were in our bed, and
this is when I usually fall asleep but since the guy was a firearms police
instructor I was interested and managed to stay awake. At one point the guy’s
wife said that she found annoying that her husband spent 500 dollars a month on
beauty products for himself. 500 USD on facial cream, special shampoo and
conditioner, as well as having his nails polished! If you are that guy and
happen to be reading this, or if you know him, I’m sorry, but what an idiot!!
“500 USD, that’s a small generator or a gun and a few boxes of ammo” I told my
wife. “That’s two months worth of food” she said. We were each thinking of a
practical use for that money, the money this guy was practically throwing away.
Once the SHTF, money is no longer measured in money, but you start seeing it as
the necessary goods it can buy. Stuff like food, medicine, gas, or the private
medical service bill. To me, spending 500 dollars on beauty products, and to
make it worse, on a guy? That’s simply not acceptable. The way I see it, someone
with that mentality can’t survive a week without a credit card, no use in even
considering a SHTF scenario. And this guy is a firearms instructor?… probably
the kind of guy that will say that a handgun is only used to fight his way to
his rifle… and his facial night cream…
Once you experience the lack of
stuff you took for granted, like food , medicines, your set of priorities change
all of a sudden. For example, I had two wisdom tooth removed last year. On both
occasions I was prescribed with antibiotics and strong Ibuprofen for the pain. I
took the antibiotics (though I did buy two boxes with the same recipe just to
keep one box just in case) but I didn’t use the Ibuprofen, I added it to my pile
of medicines. Why, because medicines are not always available and I’m not sure
if they will be available in the future. Sure, it hurt like hell, but pain alone
isn’t going to kill you, so I sucked it up. Good for building up character if
you ask me.
Make sacrifices so as to ensure a better future, that’s the
mentality you should have if you want to be prepared. There’s stuff that is
“nice to have” that has to be sacrificed to get the indispensable stuff. There’s
stuff that is not “basic need stuff” but it’s also important in one way or
another. My wife goes to the hairdresser once every month or two. It’s not life
or death, but it does make her feel better and it boosts her morale. I buy a
game for the Xbox or a movie to watch with my wife every once in awhile, just to
relax. 7 or 10 dollars a month are not going to burn a hole in my pocket.
Addictions such as alcohol, drugs or even cigarettes should be avoided by the
survivalist. They are bad for your health; cost a lot of money that could be
much better spent, and create an addiction to something that may not be
available in the future. Who will have to tolerate your grouchy mood when your
brand of smokes is no longer imported after TSHTF?
PART 2
(PAGE
1 OF 2)
GRAY/BLACK MARKET
Once the SHTF the black/gray market will
take no time to appear all around you. In my country, gray markets were even
accepted in the end. At first it was all about trading skills or craft products
for food. Districts and towns would form their own barter markets, and created
their own tickets, similar to money, that was used to trade. This didn’t last
long. Those tickets were easy to make on your home computer, there was no
control and eventually people went back to paper money.
These markets
were usually placed on warehouses or empty land, and were managed by some wise
guy and a few thugs or hired security. Anyone can go rent a kiosk inside these
markets for about 50-100 pesos (about 20-30 dollars) a day and sell his goods
and services. Peace within these markets is usually respected… lets just say
that these managers don’t call the police if someone tries anything funny, like
stealing, fighting or taking advantage of women. That’s not good for their
business and anyone that tries to mess with their business finds out how much
pain the human body can actually experiment or gets a free ticket to meet the
Lord. Sometimes even uniformed cops manage security on these markets, for a
small fee of course. As always, you still have to be careful. They may still try
to pick your pockets or even attack you once you leave the market. Once you
leave the market, you are on your own, as always.
These markets evolved
and now a lot of different products are available. Today I visited my local
market, a warehouse that is fairly well set up and cleanly managed. They had
problems for selling stolen merchandise and fake Brand name clothes a few days
ago. What can be found at a local market? Mostly food and clothing, some have
more variety than others but cheese, canned food, spices, honey, eggs, fruits,
vegetables, beer, wine and cured meat are generally available, same as bakery
products and pasta. These are less expensive than those found at supermarkets.
Fresh fish is sometimes available but not always, people don’t much trust
products that need refrigeration and they get those at supermarkets
instead.
Clothes are also popular and you can find copies of brand name
clothes, imitations, or even original stolen new clothes, the same goes for
shoes and snickers. Children clothes, underwear, socks, sheets and towels are
all very popular. Some sell toys, but they are always China made, mostly poor
quality though there are some few exceptions. Others sell tools, also made in
China can be found as well, but they are of poor quality. Some offer their
services and repair stuff or offer work as handyman. You would be amazed of the
junk that these guys manage to fix: TVs, CD players, Power tools, etc. They even
manage to solder the small integrated circuits boards sometimes. Give one of
these guys a screw driver and a bar of chocolate and he will fix a nuclear
submarine.
After food and clothes, the 3rd most popular item has to be
CDs and DVDs, movies, music, play station 2 and Xbox games, programs, it all
ends up there just one or two days after the official release in USA. Seems that
they have a guy hidden under Bill Gate’s desk or something. Anyway, almost
everything can be found there, and if you want, you can ask around, talk to the
right guy and buy illegal stuff like drugs or black market guns and ammo. The
quality of the drugs is questionable, of course, and a lot of addicts die from
the mixtures these guys sell. Guns are mostly FM High Powers, Surplus 1911s and
Colt .45s, Sistemas, and old Colt Detective revolvers in 38 special that found
their way from police and military armories into the black market. Condition
isn’t very good but if you have money you’ll be amazed of what you can end up
with. Everything that is used by the military and police, including SMGs a,
Browning 50 BMG Machine guns, and even frag grenades, is available in the black
market, if the customer has the amount of money and a little patience, of
course. The big guns may take a while, but the handguns and grenades are readily
available.
GOLD!!
Someone hit me in the head please because I
messed up about the gold issue. Everyone wants to buy gold! “I buy gold. Pay
cash” signs are everywhere, even on TV! I can’t believe I’m that silly! I just
didn’t relate it to what I read here because they deal with junk gold, like
jewelry, either stolen or sold because they needed the money, not the gold coins
that you guys talk about. No one pays for the true value of the stuff, so big
WARNING! Sign on people that are buying gold coins. Since it is impossible to
determine the true mineral percentage of gold, small shops and dealers will pay
for it as regular jewelry gold. What I would do if I were you: Besides gold
coins, buy a lot of small gold rings and other jewelry. They should be less
expensive than gold coins, and if the SHTF bad, you’ll not be loosing money,
selling premium quality gold coins for the price of junk gold. If I could travel
back in time, I’d buy a small bag worth of gold rings.
Small time thieves
will snatch gold chains right out of your neck and sell them at these small
dealers found everywhere. This is VERY common at train stations, subways and
other crowded areas.
So, my advice, if you are preparing for a small
economical crisis, gold coins make sense. You will keep the value of the stuff
and be able to sell it for its actual cost to gold dealers or maybe other
survivalists that know the true value of the item. In my case, gold coins would
have been an excellent investment, saving me from loosing money when the local
economy crashed. Even though things are bad, I can go to a bank down town and
get paid for what a gold coin is truly worth, same goes for pure silver. But
where I live, in my local are small time dealers will only pay you the value of
junk gold, no matter what kind of gold you have. So, I’d have to say that if
TSHTF bad, gold jewelry is a better trade item than gold coins. Forgive me for
not talking about this before, but I didn’t realize this until today, when I
visited my local market warehouse and saw a “Buy Gold”
sign.
GUNS, AMMO AND OTHER GEAR
After TSHTF in 2001, only
the most narrow minded, brain washed, butterfly IQ level idiots believed that
the police would protect them from the crime wave that followed the collapse of
our economy. A lot of people that could have been considered antigun before, ran
to the gun shops, seeking advise on how to defend themselves and their families.
They would buy a 38 revolver, a box of ammo, and leave it in the closet,
probably believing that it would magically protect them from
intruders.
Oh, maybe you don’t think that firearms are really necessary
or your beliefs do not allow you to buy a tool designed to kill people. So you
probably ask yourself, is a gun really necessary when TSHTF? Will it truly make
a difference? Having gone through a shtf scenario myself, total economical
collapse in the year 2001, and still dealing with the consequences, 5 years
later, I feel I can answer that question. YES, you need a gun, pepper spray, a
machete, a battle axe, club with a rusty nail sticking out of it, or whatever
weapon you can get hold of.
A LOT has been written on survival weapons.
Everyone that is into armed survival has his or her own idea of the ideal gun
battery. Some more oriented to a hunting point of view, others only as self
defense means and others consider a little of both, and look for general purpose
weapons. Talking about guns, there is one special subject I want to rectify, and
it’s the point on what’s the primary weapon for the survivalist, specially a
urban survivalist that has to function in a society, yes, even after the SHTF.
The primary defensive weapon for the survivalist is his HANDGUN. It’s the weapon
that stays with him when he is doing his business around town of working on the
field. The survivalist IS NOT a soldier, even though you are a soldier or you
once were the meanest mother on the battle filed, your home town is not a
battlefield and it wont be, even if the SHTF. A LOT of water has to go under the
bridge until the situation gets to a point where you can calmly walk down the
street with a rifle on your shoulder. People, if you are interested in real
world SHTF situation, and you want to prepare for the real deal, then understand
that this isn’t black or white. You wake up one day and listen on the radio that
the economy collapsed and that the stock market closed indefinitely. What do you
do? You still have to go to the office/work/whatever. Kiss the wife good bye and
walk to the office with your AR across your back, or across your chest, Israeli
style, ready to shoot? You won’t get far. Someone will shoot you or throw you in
jail, or in a mental institution.
What I’m trying to explain, is that
it’s ok to prepare for China invading you country, Germans and UN or Martians.
That is the extreme, less likely worst case scenario. There is an infinity
spectrum of gray between the black and white. White being your average normal
day and black being total TEOTWAWKI, lizard men invading the planet. Rifles do
have a place in the survivalist’s arsenal, and a very important one. But you
have to understand that 90% of the time, the handgun will be the weapon you have
available when you need one. You can’t compare to a trooper in Iraq that has his
weapon with him at all times. I ask you how many soldiers do you know that keep
wearing cammo and totting their M4s around town when they return
home?
What works for war does not work for the survivalist, especially
the urban survivalist. Even if you live in a retreat far from town, you have to
work, don’t you? Or do you have employees that take care of all your mundane
tasks, leaving you all day to keep watch with your rifle ready? A soldier is
part of a huge machine; HIS job is to carry that rifle, while others take care
of other needs. A survivalist, one that is not part of a large survivalist
group, has no one to cover for him. When a new guy looks for advice on what to
get for defense, some will recommend a rifle or shotgun as a first defensive
weapon. Let’s say race riots start in this guy’s city. He still has to go to
work every day. What is he supposed to do? Shove his pump shotgun in his pocket?
A handgun, even though less powerful, can be used for home defense AND go with
you wherever you need to go. If the place floods, he can still hop into an
evacuation boat without leaving his weapon behind. I’m sure no rescue team will
pick you if you are carrying a long arm. They’ll ask you to leave it behind for
sure. What if your government, realizing that TSHTF and that they lost control
of the events, bans all firearms indefinitely? Don’t know about you, but if
things are that bad, I’d like to be armed. You can hide a handgun under a
jacket. You can't hide a long arm under your clothes.
I think it was
Clint Smith who said that the handgun is only used to fight his way to his
rifle. Man! That sounds “macho”. I’d love to see him walking into Wal-Mart with
his tactical M4, taking the subway, visiting the doctor or going to the bank.
“Over here Mr. Smith, you can hang you M4 right next to my coat” I don’t think
so. Guys, unless you have your own shooting school, you do not get to carry your
rifle to work.
OK, now that I got that out of my chest lets
look at some options.
Handguns: Revolver or Pistol? Pistol ALL THE WAY!
Yes, I saw the video of the guy that accurately emptied his S&W in _ a
second. I also saw the shooting range and the crowd behind him, watching the
event. Can he shoot and reload that way if he is in his car, driving with one
hand and shooting with the other, while a bunch of scum bags in another car are
shooting at him? Hey, maybe he can. I know I can’t. Can you? Generally speaking,
the revolver is more difficult to master than the pistol. The double action is
hard and it affects speed and accuracy. It can be done, but I found that pistols
are easier, as did many shooters. Also, even though they seem to be more simple,
revolvers are not as rugged as service pistols, the mechanisms that cycles the
cylinder and cocks the hammer is both complicated and fragile compared to auto
pistols.
Before anyone starts casting evil voodoo spells at me for
insulting their prized S&W or Ruger: I own revolvers and like shooting them,
I just don’t think they are the best option for self defense, and I see that
everyone I talk to in my country who is worried about security as I am also
chooses pistols. Quality pistols resist sand, mud and dirt in general better
than revolvers, where a small pebble locked in the mechanism may render the
revolver inoperable.
I personally had a problem with a new stainless
steel Taurus Tracker .357 magnum. After shooting it a couple of times I reloaded
it and shot all 7 rounds as fast as I could and when I tried to empty it, I
found that the empties were stuck because they expanded because of the heat. I
had to wait until the gun cooled a little so I could empty the gun. Stuff like
this can get you killed, even more in a 7 round handgun. I once saw a man walk
into a gun store wanting to trade his 357 magnum revolver for a 9mm high
capacity pistol. He said he was driving when thugs from another car started
shooting at him. He was chased for a few blocks. He said that he pulled his
revolver and started shooting at them, and ran out of ammo real fast. He wanted
more capacity and fast reloading. I could not agree with him more. Some will
consider this “Spray and pray”, thinking that all rounds should hit the target
and if some don’t then it means that you need more time at the range. Those same
people will tell you that they intend to use bolt action rifles as defensive
rifles, making each shot count, without ever missing their target, one shot one
kill. I don’t agree with this. One shot one kill is ok for snipers, but the
survivalist should have other alternatives.
I don’t see anything wrong
with shooting four or five rounds at a chasing car. If those rounds make them
think twice about their intentions, they are rounds well spent in my book, even
if they don’t kill the attacker. Suppressive fire is possible if you have a high
capacity pistol. I wouldn’t doubt on using such a tactic if it serves my
purposes, or if it buys me time to get out of there. Also keep in mind that
criminals are cowards and therefore attack in groups. The survivalist should be
able to face more than just one attacker. Getting into a gunfight with two or
three armed men while packing a 6 round revolver is rather hard to deal with. A
high capacity pistol can load about 15 or 19 rounds, and that can certainly make
a difference in a gunfight where you are outnumbered.
A forensic doctor
that used to live in my neighborhood got killed last year. He was ambushed when
he exited a restaurant by 5 or 6 men. Even though they did kill him he managed
to kill 4 of them and severely injure another. He shot regularly and carried a
Glock .40. I’m sure he was lucky but I also think that his choice of weapon was
also important in the outcome. If anyone is wondering, people in my country that
are serious about self defense carry Glocks. Those that don’t have the money for
a Glock carry Bersas, FM High Powers or 1911 surplus .45s. At first I wasn’t
sure about the Bersa, but once I tried them I saw that they are very descent
guns. I now own two Bersas and am pleased with they performance.
The
caliber choice calls for endless debate and it is not my intention here. Lets
just say that 9mm , 40S&W and 45ACP are the obvious choices. 40S&W seem
to be the most adequate, both in FMJ and HP, while 9mm lacks some stopping power
and hollow points should be used if possible. Though the 9mm lacks power
compared to the 40S&W, it is more popular world wide, a factor to consider
seriously when choosing a handgun for SHTF. Besides, 9mm can also be used in a
number of carbines and SMG, another important fact to be considered.
SMGs
and carbines chambered for 40S&W and .45 ACP are also available, but they at
not nearly as popular as those chambered for 9mm. Whatever you choose keep 500
or better yet 1000 rounds of quality ammo for your handgun at all times. 100
rounds won’t last much if the crisis lasts long. Also consider that once the
balloon goes up, governments tend to restrict guns and
ammo.
PISTOL CALIBER CARBINES & SMG
If possible, I’d
choose a SMG reduced to semi auto (only if necessary, of course, full auto
selector is better if possible) or other kind of short, small, pistol caliber
carbine. The combination of a 9mm handgun and a 9mm carbine or SMG reduced to
semi auto or full auto class III has lots of advantages in my book and is a fine
combination. Some think that full auto is a waste of ammo. I don’t think so, not
if you know how to use your head, and use this feature wisely. If you can get a
short barrel and collapsible stock, you’ll also have a weapon that can be hidden
under a heavy coat. A red dot scope would enhance accuracy a lot. The advantage
of having the same ammo for long and small arm is not to be taken lightly. From
the logistical, survivalist point of you, this is one big thumbs up! Think about
cowboys and Americans that lived in the west, they also knew the value of using
the same ammo for rifle and handgun. They had single action handguns and lever
action handguns chambered for the same ammo, the modern survivalist can have the
same ammo for his auto pistol and his sub-rifle as well.
Some think that
a pistol caliber long arm is just one big clumsy pistol or a rifle sized gun
that delivers pistol power and accuracy. This is BS. Anyone that ever fired a
pistol caliber rifle or SMG knows that they are much more accurate, hitting
torso targets at 100 yards is easy, and a little more if you have a red dot
scope. Also, SMGs can manage hot ammo specially made for such guns, much more
powerful than the one for handguns. Even if you use regular handgun ammo, the
added barrel length adds a few extra feet per second making it more powerful.
Just check the information on boy armor. Body armor that is rated to stop 9mm,
for example, is not rated to stop the same 9mm ammo out of a SMG or carbine,
because the added speed will make that same round penetrate the vest. Anyway, +P
ammo is more than enough power out of a SMG or carbine; you don’t have to go
looking for special SMG ammunition.
If you can get full auto that’s one
nice feature to have, not worth it if you are on a tight budget, but if you can
get it, it may come in handy someday. Full auto SMG are giving police in my
country a lot of headaches. A criminal with little or no training will put 3 or
4 cops armed with pistols and shotguns on their toes, just because of the sheer
volume of fire these high capacity 9mm deliver. There was this case of a bad guy
standing in front of a patrol car full of cops on a red light stop, pulling a
9mm SMG out of his coat and emptying it on full auto. The cops didn’t have a
chance, he killed them all. The car looked like Swiss cheese with 40 9mm holes
all over the vehicle.
SOUND SUPPRESSORS
All I’m going to say on this
subject is: Have one if you can. That’s it. I’ll leave the rest of it to your
imagination, don’t make me say it. Today it may seem like a “nice to have”
feature… after the SHTF, it may be an “O God I’ve got to get a suppressor!!”
feature. I’d buy a good suppressor instead of a ultra high dollar scope like the
SOG. Buy a good quality scope, but don’t spend a fortune on it, and use the rest
of the money on a suppressor. If you are serious about preparing for SHTF,
you’ll thank me one day; just trust me on this one. 9mm and 45 suppress quite
well. Not as well as .22, but there is much more power on the big bore ammo.
Combined with a full auto SMG, the possibilities are much greater. Sometimes
it’s just better to go unnoticed, especially in a SHTF crisis.
BODY
ARMOR
Dear God! Buy body armor PLEASE!! It’s dirt cheep in USA. Preferably,
get the police concealable kind (class II) then continue to work on it and get
class III A military armor and some rifle plates, just as you do when you start
buying guns. You’ll end up with 2 or 3 sets of armor which are great to have for
family members and spares. Just so you know, I got so desperate about body armor
I ordered it from USA through internet (bulletproofme.com), I ended up paying a
total of nearly 600 USD for body armor that costs 200 USD in USA. Buy it while
you still can. When the SHTF you’ll end up wearing it, believe me. I don’t wear
mine all day long but I do wear it when I have to go some place dangerous, deal
with people I don’t trust, or when I have to go teach Architecture
Representation late at night, and must travel through a much dangerous road at
12 PM.
INTERLUDE
Studying the SHTF at the University: Dark
omens.
I forgot it! Darn, same as the gold stuff but worse, much worse. I’ve
never been good at remembering some things, like numbers and names of people I
meet, I forget those (instantly), they just flee my mind, uneventfully, but I do
remember some other things that don’t seem to be as important. I do remember
living in USA as a kid. I remember my school, Pierce School, Don’t remember
exactly were it was, because we lived some in Boston, Massachusetts and some in
New Hampshire. I remember my best friend, Freddy, and a girl (why is there
always a girl?) Samantha, Sam. She was red haired and tall, I had a picture of
her playing together but I lost it. Some time between the age of 3 and 26 I lost
that picture that was so dear to me. I remember the smell of an orange shaped
“scratch and smell” sticker my kindergarten teacher stuck in a small book we
made once. But I almost forgot this forever. This, this was important, a moment
where the life we once knew stopped existing, and a group of students, in a
class room that looked like and abandoned building, realized it, all 60 of us at
the same time.
It’s 1:06 AM over here. I just finished showering and my
wife and son are asleep. I was putting shampoo on my hair, thinking about what I
wrote today on this post, and remembered the exact moment when I realized along
with several other people, not only that TSHTF (that we all knew) but that the
world we once new no longer existed, and that this was not a hurricane, this was
an ice age period, it wouldn’t just go away.
We understood it the same
way a kid understands photosynthesis: Because a teacher coldly explained it to
us, even used graphics. I slept 5 hours yesterday, 2 hours the day before
yesterday. Saturday night I didn’t sleep at all. I’m already used to it.
Deadlines at the University, staying late at night, drawing in CAD 3D, waiting
until Renders are ready. It’s a competitive world out there, and no one
sympathizes with what you are going through, they just want you to perform as
expected, and the standard is always high. It happened 4 years ago, almost a
year after the December 2001 crisis. It was a social studies class and this
teacher, don’t remember if it was a he or a she, was explaining the different
kinds of social pyramids. God! Now I remember more! We even had a text book with
those darn, cruel pyramids! The first pyramid explained the basic society. A
pyramid with two horizontal lines, dividing those on top (high social class)
those in the middle (middle class) and the bottom of the pyramid (the poor,
proletarian). The teacher explained that the middle of the pyramid, the middle
class, acted as a cushion between the rich and the poor, taking care of the
social stress. The second pyramid had a big middle section, this was the pyramid
that represents 1st world countries. I which the bottom is very thin and arrows
show that there is a possibility to go from low to middle class, and from middle
to the top of the social pyramid. Our teacher explained that this was the
classic, democratic capitalist society, and that on countries such as Europeans
one, socialists, the pyramid was very similar but a little more flat, meaning
that here is a big middle section, middle class, and small high and low class.
There is little difference between the three of them.
The third pyramid
showed the communist society. Where arrows from the low and middle class tried
to reach the top but they bounced off the line. A small high society and one big
low society, cushioned by a minimal middle class section of pyramid. Then we
turned the page and saw the darned fourth pyramid. This one had arrows from the
middle class dropping to the low, poor class.
“What is this?” Some of us
asked.
The teacher looked at us, “This is us.”
“It’s the collapsed
country, a country that turns into 3rd world country like in pyramid five where
there is almost no middle class to speak, one huge low, poor class , and a very
small, very rich, top class.”
PART 4: PAGE
2
“What are those arrows that go from the middle to the bottom of the
pyramid?” Someone asked.
You could hear a pin drop. “That is middle class
turning into poor”.
I won’t lie, no one cried, though people rubbed their
faces, held their heads and their breath.
No one cried, but we all knew
at that very moment that all we thought, all we took for granted, simply was not
going to happen.
“You see, the income from the middle class is not enough
to function as middle class any more. Some from the top class fall to middle
class, but the vast majority of the middle class turns into poor” Said the
teacher.
I don’t know how many people in that room suddenly understood
that he/she was poor.
The teacher continued “You see, we have a middle
class that suddenly turns to poor, creating a society of basically poor people,
there is no more middle class to cushion tensions any more. Middle class
suddenly discovers that they are overqualified for the jobs they can find and
have to settle for anything they can obtain, there for unemployment sky rockets,
too much to offer, too little demand. You see they prepare, study for a job they
are not going to get. You kids, you are studying Architecture because you simply
wish to do so. Only 3 or 4 percent of you will actually find a job related to
architecture.”
We all sat there, letting it all sink in. After a few
months, it all proved to be true. Even the amount of students that dropped out
of college increased to at least 50%. They either so no point in studying
something that would not make much of a difference in their future salaries, had
no money to keep themselves in college, or simply had to drop college to work
and support their families.
Someone once said, in this forum, that if
this had happened in USA, the social unrest would have been much worse, because
people from S. America are stronger. At first, I told him that I didn’t think
so, I said that all humans adapt when they have no other choice. But now that I
consider it more, maybe he was right. Not that S. Americans are stronger, but
they are more used to adversities. Most of us are children from grandparents
that escaped civil war, either in Spain or dictators in Italy, our parents
survived the dirty war, even more dictators, and therefore their children are of
strong character too. Can USA citizens survive what we survived? Of course they
can, though I think that there are too many that are not like you, many that
don’t prepare, and take everything for granted. Those are the ones that will be
responsible for the increase in the social unrest once the SHTF, those that were
too lazy to take care of themselves before the SHTF, or that had gone soft
through out the years, believing that the government will “take care of them
because they pay their taxes”. But in the end, they will pull through. People
will adapt, they always do. You’d be surprised. And those that don’t want to
adapt to the new reality they live in, will die young, thus cleaning the gene
pool and ensuring the continuity of the specie. It’s been this way for thousands
of years.
Note: I’m sorry I took so long to continue this post.
I spent the last few days drawing on the computer; I have to present this sort
of thesis for the University, a school project, to a board of 4 teachers in 3
weeks.
PART 5
(PAGE 1 OF 8)
CRIME AND INSECURITY
Even
though crime has always been an issue in South America, my country was quite the
exception. It was dangerous, yes but nothing like after the 2001 economical
crisis. One used to be able to let kids play on the sidewalk, or walk back home
from a party, a few blocks, and be somewhat safe. This all changed now. There
are no kids playing on the sidewalks anymore. I should emphasize this a
little more. There are absolutely NO kids playing on the sidewalks at all, at
any time of the day. Maybe a kid rides his bike a few meters on the sidewalk,
but always under the supervision of an adult. A kid riding a bike on his own
will get that bike stolen in no time, probably get hurt in the process,
therefore no responsible parent leaves a kid alone on the street. Teenagers
present a greater problem. You can’t keep a 15 or 16 year old inside a house all
day long, and even though they are big enough to go out on their own, when the
sun goes down things get much worse.
This is when parents organize
themselves; either taking them to someone’s house or to a club and picking them
up at a certain time. Taxis and remises are used sometimes, but there have been
lots of cases of girls getting raped, so no parent worth a buck leaves his son
or daughter in hands of a stranger. After years of living like this, almost
everyone learned to be careful; sometimes they had to learn the hard way.
Practically no one leaves a door or window opened or unlocked. Nor do they hang
out in front of the house talking to friends. A bad guy might just see you
there, like a sitting duck, pull a gun on you and take you inside your
house.
There are no “bandit’s law” anymore. One used to hear people talk
about “You shouldn’t resist a robbery, give them what they want and they’ll go
away”. That holds true no more. These guys are under the influence of drugs,
epoxy glue, or just hate your guts so much, because you have a better life than
they ever dreamed of, because they were abused since the day they were born,
that they will hurt and humiliate you as much as they can. Letting a criminal
inside you house almost guaranties you that he will rape/beat/ torture and abuse
whoever they find inside. I personally drew a line a few years ago and decided,
after one long, serious conversation with my wife; that no one would be allowed
inside the house, no matter what. We figured that there are worse things than
death. Having decided that, I make sure I always have a weapon on me. They’ll
have to pay dearly for my life, plus interests.
By far, the most
dangerous moment of the day, is when I (or my wife) leave/enter my house. A
solid, secure house cannot be broken in easily, so criminals wait until you are
standing on front of the door with the keys on your hand to jump on you. This is
why we are extra alert when approaching our house, look all around us and if we
see anything strange, keep walking around the block or keep on driving. No door
is ever opened when there is a strange person around. Whenever someone knocks on
our door (and we don’t know him/her), they are answered from a second story
window. Criminals sometimes disguise as electric company guys or something like
that, saying that they have to fix something. NO! If there is something to be
fixed they can fix it on the sidewalk. Anything inside your house is your
responsibility and the company is not going to fix it for you. Either way, it’s
always better to play it safe. Better to be rude than dead.
On the
car/driving issue, that calls for an entire post dedicated to SHTF driving. For
now I’ll just say that windows and doors have to be closed at all times, a
weapon must be within arms reach, and that stop signs and traffic lights have a
hole new meaning once TSHTF. If your country ever falls as mine did, you’ll
remember me whenever you see a traffic light. You never stop at a red lights or
stop sign unless there is traffic, especially at night.
At first, police
would write you a ticket for not stopping at a red light if they saw you
(another way of saying that they will ask for a bribe if they see you pass a red
light), but after a few months they realized that nothing could be done, people
would rather risk a ticket than risking their lives, so they decided to turn
traffic lights to permanent yellow at night, after 8 or 9 PM. This is, of
course, very dangerous. Night car accidents are both frequent and brutal since
sometimes both cars hit each other at full speed.
PART
6
Employment in a post SHTF scenario:
I’d love to say that if you
specialize in X or Y trade you are safe from unemployment but that’s just not
true. Maybe an economical crisis in USA wouldn’t be as bad as it was here, but
if it gets as bad I’m sorry guys but it will be ugly. A person asked me the
other day ”you say that you don’t dare shoot a criminal 200 yards away, but that
the police does nothing to stop the criminals, did SHTF or not?” I got a little
mad and got all sarcastic, I’m sorry for that. I now see that what’s pretty
obvious to me isn’t as obvious when you live in a “real” country, where police
do actually investigate crimes, and services and institutions actually work as
the are supposed to, most of the time, at least.
Life isn’t fair in
general. But once the SHTF, it’s WORSE. Meaning? Meaning that no one will be
there to protect you but they’ll darn sure be there to sue you. Meaning that
even though you pay your taxes, you’ll also have to pay for private health
because the public health you pay for isn’t worth a band-aid. Meaning that you
might end up in jail, and even if innocent, you’ll have to spent two years in
jail until some drunk judge decides you deserve a fair trial and “Oops, guess
you where innocent after all”. And the same happens with jobs.
You might
be a very successful person, with a University degree and decades worth of
experience in some of the most renown corporations, world wide, and you’ll find
yourself unemployed by the time you are 50 years old. That happened to my
father, he was one of the finest managers in the country, he taught managing all
over the world. From South America to Japan, USA and UK. Yet he found himself
unemployed one day and moved to Spain, as did thousands of others, where someone
had offered him a job. Yes, there are careers and skills that have more jobs
than others. Doctors, welders, carpenters, accountants, managers, lawyers, they
can all find a job, though the lawyers, manager and accountants may go for
months or years before they can find a job that pays barely enough to
survive.
Keep in mind that unemployment here is about 20-25 %, even more
if you see the BS the gov. considers “employed people”. There are a lot of
skilled workers waiting in line, willing to work for peanuts. And also consider
that even by official numbers (which are favorably SUPER inflated) half the
employed country earns less that 500 pesos (less than 170 dollars) while a
person needs, AT LEAST 1000 pesos to survive. And I’m talking about barely
surviving; forget about having a car, private health, or a real education, 1000
pesos is barely enough to put a shabby roof over your head and poor quality food
on the table. If you want to have a normal standard of living, like a car,
internet access, live in a neighborhood that doesn’t look like Iraq, eat meat
every now and then, and have some sort of education, you are talking about
1500-2000 pesos per person.
So that’s why the situation in this country
is the one I describe, numbers just don’t compute, people don’t earn enough to
live like people should, most barely survive like animals. Only 3% of the
population makes more than 3000 pesos a month. The only way you have to live
like you do now in USA after TSHTF is owning your own company. Owning large
amounts of land and producing food products has kept high class society rich for
as long as I can remember, so it’s worth thinking about it.
Farmers that own
large amounts of land will sure be rich after TSHTF if they know how to run
business. Small farmer will be swallowed y the big fish after some time. The
rest of the rich society in my country is either politicians, (we call those
thieves over here) Business men that found out how to profit out of the misery
of other like the fellow I described that own the paper recycling company (hey,
better them than me, right? If you can live with it, its an option) Or those
that knew how to manage their investments, like my father did, investing in
other countries, buying and selling properties, using the head to make his
saving “work” for him. The trick is not to stick to one country. Had he invested
in Argentina alone (he never invested much in this darn country anyway, whenever
he invested a penny here, he lost it) he would be on the street right now, and
so would I and the rest of my family.
No safe job guys, just the “weapon”
you have attached to your neck. Make as much money as you can in your current
line of work, have a “Skill”, that’s always useful, at least like a “hobby” (I’d
try mechanics, welding and fixing machines in general), and invest smartly as
much as you can. Don’t put all your eggs in the same basket. Have cash and gold,
and well, prepare as we learn to do here, the stuff we talk about all the
time.
The real gem, the real “golden egg chicken” when it comes to
survival would be this: Have a close friend or relative in another country that
you could count on if SHTF. As many have discovered and as I discovered, the
best, final solution to a country falling apart is moving to another country.
Don’t be afraid of doing so if needed. Maybe you are a patriot willing to “hold
the fort” till the end, I respect that. But when there is no solution, I’d
rather escape. “A soldier that runs away, lives to fight another day” as they
say. Maybe you are willing to die instead of leaving your country, are you
willing to sacrifice your children as well? Can you make that decision FOR
them?
Sorry, I got carried away.
Stuff to think
about.
FerFAL
GO TO PART 1 2 3 4 5 6
PART 7
Tea with Aunt Sheeply
“Why do you want to move to Spain? Here
you can live much, much better. Her you can afford 3 maids, and a gardener,
private school, private health and tennis lessons. You can live in what
Europeans would consider a mansion”.
The argument was an old one already.
My mother, my aunt and my grandmother where having tea in my parents living
room.
My mother was arguing with my aunt again. My father was gone before
it even started. He went to fix something in the house as he usually does when
my aunt is around. It’s been years since he last had the patience to withstand
even 5 minutes of the woman’s narrow minded, sheep mentality
ramble.
“Alicia, I don’t care about how many gardeners or maids I can
afford here. You can afford to have that many people working for you precisely
because there is so much misery that people will almost work for food. I’d
rather live in a country where I can safely walk the streets and not have a
maid. Don’t you see that the same reality that allows you to have 3 maids and a
gardener is the one that can get you killed every time you walk out of your
house?”
The argument went on and on, with my grandmother siding with my
aunt. Not because she thinks that the reality of this country is good, no, but
because she doesn’t want to see one of her two daughters leave to a country at
the other end of the world.
Most Spanish immigrants, like my
grandparents, hate to see the new generations, sons and grandsons, leave to the
country they once escaped from, because it promises greener pastures. They
escaped hunger, civil war, and now, 50 years later, they want to go
back?
Old folks just don’t understand that. They had to leave everything
behind, family, possessions, to give their family a better life. And in those
days you just didn’t take a plane, my grandparents had to spend a month in a
stinking boat to get here. They all remember that trip, and they just don’t get
used to the idea of, thanks to airplanes, being just 24 hours away.
For
all of them, moving to Spain means that their loved ones are a month in a
stinking boat away.
There are many like my aunt in this country. People
that, surprisingly, don’t fear SHTF, but actually look forward to it.
It
means cheaper workers, cheaper services, and new exploitation opportunities. And
I’m not only talking about locals, I’m talking about large international
corporations as well.
What locals seem to ignore, or simply don’t care
about, is that you still have to live WITH those that are in a much worse
position. Maybe you are incredibly wealthy, yes, but wherever you go you will
have to go with an armored car and bodyguards. You wont have freedom, not real
freedom at least.
As I said a number of times before, people will
surprise you by being incredibly resourceful and/or incredibly
stupid.
Most of the “Herd” will simply sail through life being happy that
their favorite soccer team won the finals and that they can go have a couple of
beers with their friends.
Notice that not much has changed since the ancient
Roman times, where the emperor claimed that you only have to give the population
“circus and wine” to keep them content and under control.
People like my
aunt, are the fools that love vacationing in Brazil, and think that Cuba’s
communism is the greatest creation right next to sliced bread. They will come
back from Cuba in love with the place. Oh! The resorts, the food, so many
cheerful people. They seem to forget that if Cubans don’t put a happy face they
get executed, and that they have a great time because they are tourists with
money that can afford to live like kings. Why don’t they move over there without
a penny, and live as Cubans really do? Let’s see if they like pimping their
wives and daughters to survive, lets see if they like living like rats. Of
course they don’t.
Another issue I want to point out. SHTF such as
political crisis or economical collapses take time to settle.
There won't
be a declared SHTF day. Yes, there are events that are like landmarks,
milestones in the course of history. But it will take time, society will change
little by little, until the new reality is assimilated and accepted, consciously
or not, by the entire population. After a few months, you’ll see people talking
about before and after a certain event that changed their world. For you it may
be 911, for me it’s life before and after the 1:1 (meaning the 1 dollar, 1 peso
conversion) or life before and after the 2001 crisis. People use it on their
daily conversations. “So, you’ve been to Hawaii?, wow!” , “Yes, yes but we went
back before the 1:1, now it’s impossible to pay for such a trip.” “ Yes, too
bad.”
This time of uncertainness, until people accept that the world
around them changed, takes time, months or even years, and it’s a SLOW decline,
slowly slipping down. One day you’ll start seeing more people begging, more
prostitutes, houses not painted, cars will start to look a little more shabby,
because people don’t have money to fix them, until one day you will tell
yourself “wow, this wasn’t like this 6-12 months ago.” Things do not get
accepted over night, a SHTF event may occur in a matter of seconds, but it takes
MONTHS to sink in.
That’s why you should keep an open, independent
mentality, and eyes and ears listening all around you, so as to stay ahead of
the herd.
Financial security, and the ability to move: The greatest
survival trait
Which brings me to my final consideration on survival, my
final conclusion concerning surviving mayor crisis.
Money.
Yes,
some paper money, gold, silver, but mostly money in accounts in a couple of
“safe” countries and money invested in real estate.
We had people going
from middle class to poor over here. We had people going through some terrible
situations, and it’s safe to say that those that fared better where those with
solid finances.
Our society runs on money, people. Not only paper money,
but accounts and virtual money. It would take a world wide collapse, practically
the end of humanity for money to be useless as a concept.
A country, or
several, even a continent can go down into misery, dragging it’s local paper
money with it, but the other end will rise proportionally. I truly believe this,
and history also shows that there are always losers and winners, conquered and
conquerors, the balance, the ying yang always remains.
A giant meteor
could destroy earth and little green men could enslave us, yes, but in the
infinite spectrum of possibilities, that scenario is the less likely one. I’d
rather prepare for those that are more likely. And it’s very likely that though
your country can go down with an economical collapse, suffer civil war or
natural disasters, you will probably have the possibility to escape to somewhere
safe greener pastures.
Hell!, that’s what thousands of Argentines
ultimately did, what my family did, and what I intend to do as soon as
possible.
Just last week my parents told me that they ran across some old
friends that recently moved to Spain. Bad guys broke into their home with them
inside, don’t know exactly what happened but it must have been ugly, so they got
fed up of the insecurity and moved to Spain with their daughter.
I
consider myself a citizen of the world, and have no problem moving if I must. I
strongly suggest you think about this, because it may be the ultimate survival
solution. While I do believe in the stronghold, retreat concept, I do not
believe it is possible to fight off an entire starved, crazed nation.
If
we are going to consider long term, permanent TEOTWAWKI, do consider moving to
another country, far away, and plan accordingly. This means, having money in
accounts, documents and passports ready, maybe even learn a second
language.
Now that I think of it, a solid financial situation and making
sure his kids had a worldly, ample mentality, was all my father did,
unconsciously or not, to make sure his family survived, and he sure did succeed
where millions of others failed. Considering he lived in a shack with earth
floor when his parents moved from Spain 50 years ago, he sure did better than
the rest.
My father’s “survival arsenal” ? A 22 semi auto, a .22 revolver
and a box of ammo, until I convinced him of buying a 1911. Still, we did okay.
Savings and investing was the key to our survival.
The survivalist that
has 5,000-10,000 bucks worth of weapons, years worth of food and a safe water
source but no money invested anywhere is not doing things right. Even if you
invest all you have on your retreat, and manage to get of the grid and live in
your retreat without the need of anything else, you are pinning yourself down to
one single point in the map, from which you can’t move.
Look to what
happened to an entire generation of Spanish. They fled Spain escaping civil war.
Look at what we are now doing over here. Moving to Spain, escaping from a
economical/political SHTF scenario. See a pattern here?
I know that some
refuse to leave their country because of patriotism, but you still CAN be a
patriot and still leave if you have to.
Many of the most dedicated
fighters had to leave my country during the “Dirty War” (civil war/dictatorship
in the 70’s). They where alive to come back and bring those dictators and
murderers to justice, while those that stayed and fought simply got executed.
Which would you rather be?
Save money, invest, travel, make new friends,
visit those long lost parents in the old continent, they will be happy to see
you, travel around and learn about different cultures, how to be flexible and
adapt to them. This is, by far, the best advice I can give you all when it comes
to bad, bad, SHTF.
Sometimes, you simply run out of options. Happened
here, happened before, and happened in several places. It can happen to
you.
A person is not a survivalist simply because he lives in the woods,
wears camo all day long, and always has a rifle hanging from his shoulder and
looking for trespassers to shoot. That is not what I want in life, and that is
not what I consider a flexible, adaptable person. In my humble opinion, the
survivalist can feel as comfortable in the woods as in a cocktail party
surrounded by sheep. He can play both games, he can adapt. He’s a person that
can smile back at those that think differently and keep his convictions to
himself if needed. A person that cannot tolerate the presence of others that are
not like him has a limited adaptation capability and therefore is limited when
it comes to survival. Maybe he’s great at wildlife survival, but not at the
real-world, society surviving. He’s good at the kind of survival required to
survive a plane cash in the Amazons, which is great, but he can't deal with
society and other people.
You have to get over the idea of the retreat
being the ultimate, final survival answer to a crisis. That’s incorrect. The
final, terminal solution is to leave the country or region. And that requires
some social skills and savings. Keep that in mind before you spend every single
penny you have on the ultimate retreat. Before anyone beats me in the head with
a cinder block, the retreat/bug in house is very important, yes, it’s the
semi-last solution, it’s the place that keeps you safe through small and medium
crisis (which are more likely than big time SHTF), and it’s also your home, the
place you are more than likely to spend the rest of your life in if nothing goes
WAY down the swage. But when TSHTF in a large scale, you have to get out, as
many of you advised me to do.
Final Thought: A Message of Hope
Finally, I want to give a message of hope to you all, and remind you and me
both that survival is about surviving, but not for the mere fact of living , but
to live happy, rich lives.
Prepare because it’s the smart thing to do,
and not because you are looking forward to SHTF and other disasters.
Do
not make the mistake of thinking that TSHTF will be a brand new start for you,
and that all your problems will just go away and you’ll have a new start in the
brave new world.
It doesn’t work that way. Quite the contrary, everything
will get worse, small problems will turn into bigger, more serious problems. If
you have drinking problems, you’ll drink more, if you can’t keep a job, you’ll
spend years unemployed, if you have a disease, you’ll see that it’s harder to
get attention and medications. Again everything gets WORSE.
Someone once
asked me, “How is it that you can't shoot a criminal 200 meters away, but police
don’t do anything to stop them?”.
SHTF, whatever type of crisis it may
be, isn’t fair. It will be absolutely unfair.
You’ll have good, honest
people starving, while corrupt ones make profit, you won't have a cop to protect
you but they sure will come after you when a criminal presses false charges
against you. That’s the way it works.
So, anyone looking forward to
TEOTWAWKI for a fresh start, better think again, and get your life straighten
out NOW.
Survivalists are often considered as dark fatalists, doomsday
worshipers. This is not so, the real survivalist should not be like
this.
Negative people will have a hard time dealing with a crisis. It
takes a positive, good natured person to make it through.
Know that there
are dangers, and situations you can not predict and prepare as best as you can
for them. But never forget to live life at it’s fullest.
You and I, we
don’t know how long we have on this Earth, so make the best out of it, each
passing minute.
A survivalist should not be a pessimist, he should always
be positive, happy and enjoying life more than anyone else because he
understands that each minute of peace we have is precious and unique, and he
never takes it for granted.
The way I see it, the survivalist is a vital,
fit, ever curious, good humored person. He’s fit because he takes care of his
body, and his body takes care of him, he’s curious, because he thinks that it’s
important to learn new things all the time, and he enjoys learning, he has a
good humor because he’s sure of himself, and treats others the way he wants to
be treated.
That’s how we should behave. Being a survivalist is 90%
mental attitude. And even if SHTF does not occur in our life, that attitude
makes our life more rich and fulfilling.
There are things in life we can
control and others we can’t, the survivalist way of thinking makes sure we
control those we can and accept those we can't.
So, if you have that
mentality, either by having a fully independent homestead or simply a few funds,
some supplies, a couple of weapons and bug out bags, set that chin a little
higher, walk a little bit straighter, no mater if you are a doctor or
accountant, trucker or plumber, be proud my friend, because you are a dyeing
breed.
You are, without a doubt, a better person.
FerFAL
The Saucepan
I know that many of you are asking themselves,
"What is this guy doing with such a pic?"
The saucepan is a symbol in my
country. It was used to remove one useless President after another, a total of 5
in one week. People would beat the pan in their homes and on the streets as a
sign of protest. The sound of MILLIONS of pans beating is… humbling, to say the
least. It’s like one giant vibration wave that no one could ignore, therefore
the president had to escape the government house through the roof in a
chopper.
It is also a symbol of hunger. Thousands of Argentines beat pans
like that one against the closed doors of the banks that refused to return them
their money.
The saucepan a powerful symbol indeed.
It only
proves that it’s not the weapon, M16, FAL, M1A, it’s the willpower that
matters.
A saucepan when every single Argentine beat it, the power
of all of them united was enough to remove a president, backed by an entire
army.
Not a shot fired, just the will of the people and a saucepan to be
heard7