Some thoughts on what I would call ‘modern warfare’ for citizen preppers. Some of this experience may pertain to urban areas, some perhaps pertinent overall.
Dimitri’s wife is grabbing her purse to go to the grocery store, when he casually says “it’s 5:45.” She just as ordinarily replies, “I’ve got cash.” Dimitri sees the slightly puzzled look on my face and flippantly notes, “they turn off the internet at six thirty now,” shrugs, and goes back to reading his paper.
Perhaps similar to London life during the blitz. Various municipal govts coordinated the shut down of lights and people wait. Others got about doing what they needed to do, sirens notwithstanding.
There is a familiar life amid modern drone warfare, and with the similar control of electricity comes the need to add internet.
When the drones are coming they turn off the internet.
As I contemplate the contrasts in social resilience, my most familiar reference point is life after a hurricane. In Florida when we are dealing with the aftermath of a hurricane, no power, no water, no internet, etc., you adapt to life without modern technological conveniences.
If you’ve ever lived amid the aftermath of natural disasters, you understand the need for a plan and quick adaptation. Do it a few times and adaption becomes ordinary. Horrible in ways, yes; awkward, certainly. But you take things in stride; overcome, figure out the optimal solution and keep moving. However, not everyone is prepared to consider a disruption an ‘inconvenience’ and many people who need consistency to retain stability end up in panic. I think long term readers well understand the reference.
As Dimitri goes back to the paper my mind shifts to stuff I’ve heard in bits and pieces but never given context before.
I think about this U.S. ‘Space Force’ thing, and now realize there are people who have gamed out modern warfare more than we discuss as a western technological society.
My mind also thinks about those reports I read a few years ago about various western govt offices concerned about the ability of Russia to target U.S. satellites. Suddenly I realize cell phone and telecommunication is not their concern.
There’s no internet; the problem is bigger than a temporary outage of Uber. I wonder how the commercial air traffic between Kazan, Moscow and St Petersburg is not disrupted. Old school stuff applies. Meanwhile, the kids, lots of them are playing outside as kids do – apparently life amid modern drone warfare is resilient. No one is staring at the sky.
It is very odd to see how quickly a non-technology driven society can adapt to no electricity and no internet as an ordinary part of daily life. An entire nation just figures out the optimal solution, in part because their time between analog and digital has been short. Russians have a totally different context of dependency.
I’m also starting to realize how the flexibility within a non-technological society is an asset in modern warfare. Turn off the internet in New York, Chicago, Los Angeles or any major metropolitan area – how would life be impacted?
I can only imagine the reactions from a generation who has never known life without wi-fi.
It would be a very good intellectual exercise to think carefully about what your life would be like without cell phone coverage or internet services. There are more than a few people who have never learned to read a clock with hands.
In Russia when the drones are coming they turn off the internet and sometimes the electricity. Stores stay open; people do the ordinary things people do, the trains still run, the busses stay on schedule and you can still get a hot coffee and a sandwich just about anywhere, albeit sans Starbucks. Private taxis, Uber equivalents, switch seamlessly to line up at pick-up points without issue. Try to duplicate that rapid on/off precision in Boston, Miami or St Louis… see my point?
Then extend those thoughts to Paris, Frankfurt, Warsaw or Helsinki. Dimitri is thinking about ordering a pizza, while I’m starting to realize why NATO countries are going bananas.
Can Russia beat Europe in modern warfare?
Well, turn off the electricity, turn off the internet and see what happens to social society in Prague, Rome or any region in Europe when the sirens start. Yeah, NATO is going bananas as Putin’s best non-discussed weapon just looms quietly.
Putin’s strongest weapon is essentially a social infrastructure akin to a nation full of people who can live in the aftermath of a hurricane without needing a digital screen to provide directions to the next six hours of their life.
Again, somewhere, in some office complex deep in the bowels of some agency or bureaucracy, someone has ran models of this and yet I cannot find a reference anywhere to ordinary people talking about it.
In the glovebox of every taxi in Russia you will find a paper map; when was the last time you saw one in the USA?
When the drones come, they always turn off the internet and sometimes the electricity.
How would we deal with that…
Think about it.
Heck, people can’t even deal with a four way stop sign in this country. I can’t imagine how they would deal without electricity or the internet.
Living in a fairly remote, rural area our neighbors are used to power outages, spotty internet and cell coverage. Big deal. 3 gun shots a pause and one more means come running. We’re not preppers, just more self sufficient and able to adapt better then most. Life will go on.
Not in your cities it won’t. And within hours they will come foraging for food in starving mobs.
Read the novel “One Second After”. A fictional but well-thought-out analysis of life without all the “essentials” people think they must have. The conclusion is that the “herd” is greatly thinned/reduced.
I read it over a decade ago? And never recovered. A Normie no more.
This is why you will no longer be a world power after any serious war with Russia. You will be back to a modest agrarian collection of God-fearing good neighbours. Which is what you should always have been. Being a World Power has fatally corrupted you far, far worse than it did the French or the British.
I don’t know if any of you have heard Royce White on RAV Saturday mornings before War Room. He has a saying he uses, “Convenience will be the death of freedom”. Reading Sundance’s post made me recall the White quote.
The vast majority of Americans are unprepared for anything catastrophic, particularly in the cities. Being in open spaces with neighbors a mile or more away gives you a buffer in so many ways.
Our ancestors settled this nation. It’s a shame so many of lost touch with the pioneering spirit that built this nation.
An excellent book that attempts to address this in a novel, is “One Second After” by John Matherson. As it opens, and EMP has just gone off wiping out the electrical grid, and all communications. This is not your standard prepper book. It was Matherson’s attempt to alert a nation to what will happen should such an event happen. It is well written, and deals with life as people wake up to zero conveniences. All but very old cars are dead because the EMP wiped out the Electronic Control Modules of cars.
There are four books in the series, but in keeping with Sundance’s topic, “One Second After” is an excellent start at rationally addressing life without our internet and electricity.
Thank you for the recommendation, much appreciated!
It is also far more engaging than I made it sound. You will likely end up reading all four of Matherson’s books.
What would solve that is making the Foxfire and Lost Ways books a major part of the school curriculum, as well as returning tech/trade skills, Home Ec, and life basics like practical math, budget math, paying bills, etc. This nation was built by men and women with 8th grade educations, college used to be only 5% (the upper crust, the scientifically minded, etc.)
Changing the wage and work laws so younger people could be involved again in society is a must. It used to be our schoolkids, mostly high schoolers, who did the harvest season, that’s what summer was for, and businessmen could hire at a training wage rate, meaning there was no need for illegals.
If the drones come to turn off the internet, the good old boys will have a skeet shoot.
Imagine a fleet of drone motherships loaded with a host of micro drones carrying a small explosive designed to disperse a dose of neurotoxin is a 20 ft radius….
I’d really rather not.
China unveils mosquito sized micro drone.
Exactly. All the 2A people always assume that nerve gas would never be used against them.
There would be thousands of people feeling nekked w/out being able to use their phone. Lots of air grabbing hands having to be retrained, even worse for the people that never allow their phones to leave their hand.
I know lots of people laughed, and probably because it was a Trump action, at having a Space Force. I have always thought it to be a smart move. Although I am still haunted by the first person appointed died by suicide.
Living w/out modern conveniences isn’t fun, but it can be done. Thankfully I grew up when I did. It is a drag going to bed early though.
Yes, to bed when the light is gone and up when it returns.
No running water or electrical where I spent my youth. Not looking forward to a return to that but I could do it.
Most can not. Long term 6 months + Will see mass die offs without electricity. Most Rural folks included. Many peppers are short term prepared 6 months is a hard hurdle, imo. It includes myself.
Psaki chortled at the words, “Space Force.”
A sad story, some of our older people in the military would have to read pen pal letters to the young ones because they could not read handwriting, they grew up reading computer.
Young ones can’t read cursive and that says a lot about our education system and its inadequacies.
Imagine not being able to read our founding documents as written. That is unfathomable to me.
That could be why Democrats like Crockett and AOC can’t read them.
You’re right, but it’s not inadequate. It was purposeful.
Inadequacies would be an unfortunate outcome of our failed schools, but the decision to stop teaching cursive was deliberate. Some claim it was so that the young crumb crunchers couldn’t read the founding documents. True or not, it’s a travesty that some School Districts are addressing and beginning to teach cursive again. The problem now, it not simply the education system, but the educator colleges that did not teach the teachers cursive. The education system is deliberately broken from top down.
Our education system is working very well for the Marxists.
I do not see how cursive is impossible to read if one knows the alphabet. Give me a break.
It’s real, I’ve had employees tell me they can’t read cursive notes left on sticky notes.
Had to carefully print each letter
If the internet goes off, make sure you’ve got a baby boomer close by. We know exactly how to cope without it, we had years of experience.
Our generation is the last one to know what it is like without an internet world. That is a little sad, I think.
I remember life in the eighties and early 90s before the Interwebs. It was Glorious.
It was, it was. We were men and women of the Golden Age.
Try the 50’s world’s away from now.Another planet.
Then try to live in the 1880s Too much lost knowledge
I remember life in the fifties.
Everyone was healthy. No one was autistic. There were no vaccines. There were no yearly checkups for kids or adults. No well visits. No dermatologists doing yearly checkups and no sun screen. No health insurance. Hmmm funny that.
And you had to flog you guys’ organs to death to finally get y’all to pass on! You lived to a ripe old age, stayed married through good times and bad, and got ‘er done! Respect.
Getting rid of cellphones and the internet of things (IOT) would in and of itself be a tremendous improvement for mankind.
Yea, maybe, but you couldn’t read or post here now could we?
Eternally cursed to wander the world, whispering, “Treeper,” with a pensive look on our faces in any crowd of people?
Now, that’s funny!
Letters to the Editor was the method then. Extended and lively exchanges took place, sometimes over months or years.
I always have an up to date atlas on road trips. Makes seeing the big picture easier. If you are in NA heading west, sun on the left shoulder, east sun on your right shoulder. Analog watch is your compass too.
Has run… not has ran.
The wise seeks context and tries to understand the importance of a message. The unengaged are distracted correcting the messenger’s grammar and spelling; so the meaning of the message is lost.
so we’ll all be speaking jive soon.
Just indicative of failed government education, even private education.
Grammar used to be important
All a peer competitor has to do to paralyze America-In-Name-Only is sabotage the EBT system. Formerly American cities will be ungovernable disaster zones with 48 hours. Systemic cascade failures will proceed from there.
You think we are all going to ‘pull together’ and gitR-done like after 9-11? Not a fracking chance … AINO is diverse. There is no ‘we’ anymore. Heritage Americans have been the only glue holding this trade zone together for at least 20 years. This little bit of glue is all dried out and not going to be sticky for the clown-trash transnational merchants ever again.
country ≠ nation ≠ people
I don’t care about saving ‘the country’, which is not American anymore. It is an international trade zone. I care about saving the nations (Virginians, Georgians, Arkansasians, New Yorkers, etc) who comprise the Heritage American people. We are a multi-ethnic European people like the British, who are made up of English, Welsh, Scotts, and Northern Irish, or the Swiss, who are comprised of French, German, Italian, and Romansh speaking ethnonational groups. The priority is people, not country, until we can once again get a country of our own.
Cloward – Piven strategy. Been underway for decades.
They gave us a look at their potential during COVID. I think cashiers and doctor’s office managers will be the first to go, in my considered opinion.
What a pack of fraud-meisters our “historians” have become
Deep State toadies like Doug and Doris still shill for their owners
Who will correct the record?
Check out this video from this search, terminator movie dream shepherds https://g.co/kgs/RK2BxuL
Check out this video from this search, patriot games satellites overhead https://g.co/kgs/dgV7XLp
This strongly suggests that the coastal communities have the upper leg in analog life survival where hurricane outages are just a part of life. Even my college age kids know the basics of life without electricity for 2+ weeks. They’re soft, but can adjust and lead if necessary. Those kids have been watching, learning from all the local leaders during those events even if we don’t think they were.
Daughter was in west Texas this weekend with plans to float one of the now-flooded rivers. I didn’t even think about the connection with the weather until midnight nearly 24 hrs after the nightmare started. After the initial anxiety spike, I calmly texted her to let me know when it was convenient that she was aware and had a safe plan. Went to sleep, no worries. Woke up to a humorous text about “watching my survival-obsessed daddy her whole life… head on a swivel, pay attention to details.” Test passed.
I’ve spent their university years looking for and subtly (and sometimes not so subtly) testing their survival instincts. They got it. Most important lesson was to control the emotions so you can think clearly. Daughter is very emotional on typical little things made into big things over principles, worried me for a decade. But she’s learned to get over the spike and think, demonstrated it every time req’d.
But just as Sundance indicates, the difference between purposeful learning and practice and suddenly shocked with no plan or prior thought… well, that’s kind of important.
I’m channeling Hank: A country boy will survive.”
Resiliency and self-sufficiency. Know how to do some sh1t. Know what others know how to do. Think before it’s needed.
Learned from my depression era raised mother; be prepared and how to make do.
My kids constantly roll their eyes but I know they too have absorbed the lessons.
As I was reading this, I remembered an experience I had about the importance of training. Back in ’89 when I was a recent college grad, I was confident bordering on cocky about my abilities under extreme stress. My party buddies rolled their eyes at me, suggested I should check that overconfidence at the door before I met up with them.
But I had reasons to think that. By this time, I’d had several auto accident rescue experiences, one of which failed and two college kids burned to death trapped in the car. I couldn’t save the kids, but I did save the distraught semi driver on the hood trying to break through the windshield literally 60 seconds before the tanks popped and the fire engulfed the car and semi. I heard the clock ticking, strangely similar to the on in my head when playing second base and knowing how much time I had to make the throw to first base. I didn’t know exactly how long before the tanks went, but I knew it would kill both of us if we didn’t get back fast in a hopeless rescue attempt.
Each of those times, my hyperactive mind went into quiet focus on the life/death task of the moment. Quiet, calm, thinking.
Then came the test in ’89 when the elderly lady went into “d-fib” during a work dinner at Pizza Hut. Passed out literally across from me after snorting and her eyes rolling up in her head. First thought was narcolepsy, but here eyes were open. Ran around the table, laid her on her back on the floor. Knew instantly to check for pulse and breathing… right into the CPR training. That CPR class was my freshman year in high school, ’78, 11 years earlier. Never thought of it since. But the training kicked in. And God provided me assurance with the nurse who was a wife of a coworker who happened to be there.
Once you’ve USED the training in critical situations, your confidence grows tremendously. And it changes how you look at dangerous and deadly events. You begin to ask, “What would I do in that situation?” And you begin to discuss that with peers, experts.
Sundance has consciously nailed this, called it out for us. Learn how the war game might go. Consider how you’d adapt, options available. Consider what affects the options available. Discuss it with others. That alone will make you better prepared than 99% of people. Then you can just work your plan and adapt… with calm confidence.
BTW, the semi driver was not at fault at all. The kid driver made a u-turn across 4 lanes of highway speed traffic at rush hour, slamming into the skidding flat bed semi. Impatient mistake by a young driver cost two people their life, plus likely caused the semi driver a lot of PTSD issues. Didn’t take but an instant to see the situation and recognize his emotional state. I’d already considered that I didn’t want to look into the car to see trapped people begging me to save them even though I could not. But it did make it very easy for me to see that semi driver felt responsible and wasn’t paying attention to HIS life-threatening circumstances…
Training and unemotional processing of a situation matter…
Reminds me of a comedian saying the U.S. has something no other country has – rednecks. They will come to our rescue if no one else does.
I keep a paper map in my car, I prefer it It never goes down and its always right. I have a rule in my house, NO CELL PHONES during a meal. Kinda nice to have a real conversation with people around the table. No one has died from it here. Its really sad that kids cannot function without their devices. They can’t get dirty, make up stuff to do OUTSIDE or have fun like we did. But our kids did do that, and they know how to do stuff. We both made sure of that.
“No one has died from it here.” So funny, so true!
Think bigger EMP!
In my mind if people have not thought about this something is wrong.
There are studies that say in one week 25 percent of USA population would be dead.
1 year 75 percent.
Personally myself if the grid went out I would be just fine.
Here’s another thought. Everything is digital now days these young kids would never be able to find a book to help them survive if you don’t know you better know someone.
But that Simone won’t want a bunch of don’t knows to carry.
I would suggest people watching videos on how to cure meat /fish with no salt etc .
How to filter water.
And how to make a fire.
Learn to hunt learn to fish . Have some seeds stored and life’s good.
Those things above are the majors. Have a hand cranked radio some batteries etc .
Last but not least as I said and this is huge . Everything is digital now days all books and knowledge will be gone eventually if the Internet goes out.
I believe it’s massively overlooked . These kids won’t know till it’s too late .
Spread your knowledge my Friend’s. Maybe make a notebook to leave behind for those ya love in the future.
That is definitely a sobering thought. I’ve seen people here and on other forums talking about how older generations know how to survive without internet. My thinking has always been along the line of how would modern man survive with automobiles? Would anyone, adult and young person, know how to survive if, all of a sudden, all automobiles became useless?
You can grow potatoes in seven to eight months.
You’re either ignorant or your sarcasm is not appreciated. My potatoes are ready in three months after the eye goes into the ground.
Purchase the entire collection of Foxfire books. That’s a start.
Watch and listen to the Mennonite and Amish. Get a real cookbook.
Before going to bed at night we switch OFF the Wi-Fi. Sometimes it stays off a few days, just because we forget. We can be conservative news junkies, so respites are necessary. We just spent 12 weeks raising six Cavalier puppies. Never once turned on the tv from weeks 4- 14. We belong to book clubs, and now that I’m down to one puppy, I can catch up on my reading. My point is, living a full life means not being glued to the tv or phone. I was On-Call for my jobs as a nurse for 25 + years. I vowed to not carry a pager or phone in retirement. I’ve kept my word to myself. In an emergency, everyone around me has a phone I can borrow.
As the tee- shirts I’ve worn for years say “Life is good” My grandchildren are very complimentary about these choices and I believe they will be able to emulate our behaviors, by choice or necessity, easily.
When the power goes out for long periods of time- people are supposed to meet 9am at the local library to share info.
I learned that growing up in miami.
Not sure how many Gen X’s still remember being told that by their parents after Hurricane Andrew.
It was the first thing I thought of when Covid shut California down.
I have quite the collection of paper maps – from decades of traveling in the US. Every time I cross a state border, I stop at the visitor center. Voila – paper maps of the entire state are there for free.
I like paper maps as long as I have my reading glasses. Folding them up again is another story.
I know that my comment is very late and will probably not be seen by anyone, however I am just now getting time to read this article and the Comments.
I noticed that several comments dealt with; stress, trauma, anxiety, and such in facing a difficult or challenging situation. All of which reminded me of something Doctor Jordan Peterson taught several years ago in dealing with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. He devoted an entire classroom lecture basically stating;
The Body Will Not Go Where The Mind Has Not Already Been!
Doctor Peterson then finished the lecture by saying that as the students left and went to their vehicles they should start right then imagining what would they do if; and he described several scenarios, i.e., someone jumped out from behind another vehicle and tried to attack them or something.
In the lecture he also described going into battle not knowing how to respond to various situations and not having visualized battle and such. He explained that the lack of that sort of mental training is the most common cause of PTSD.
One day I discussed the lecture of Doctor Jordan Peterson about;
The Body Will Not Go Where The Mind Has Not Been
and my friend totally, absolutely, 100% agreed.
I looked him square in his face and said;
My government has known that for more than 200 years and they Never told you. They never prepared you mentally for what they expected you to do. That is why I despise my government for what they did to your mind and body!
I have a friend who was in the United States Army, Calvary. He drove the vehicle on seventeen (17) QRF (Quick Reactionary Force) missions. They were somewhat like the 911 for combat forces that were in a gunfight that was going sideways in a bad way.
Now imagine what my friend has seen and what he has held in his arms. When he told me that for the first time his wife will patted him on his back and said; “Yes. That is why he is my little nut-job.”. Well!, Yeah! You would be too!
There is one more piece that goes with this discussion or rambling of mine.
Back in 2017 I attended a;
Sheepdog Seminar
in preparation for being a member of The Safety Team of our church.
In The State of Texas we legally do Not have Security Teams in or for a church. Legally they are referred to as a Safety Team.
During the seminar Lieutenant Colonel David Grossman explained that there is an extremely high probability that, the very first time a person is in a; Defensive / Offensive shooting, that person will lose control of their bowels or kidneys (for those living in Rio Linda, California that means that you could pee or crap yourself).
Now, piece this all together;
You need to visualize various scenarios that you might possibly face and visualize what you will do.
I would also suggest, if you are anything like me, a person who has Never wore any sort of uniform, take to or read articles or books on the subject and prepare yourself mentally.
Kill a few birds, detonate a small nuke and let the EMP take care of a major part of the power grid for more than a few hours. Or weeks. or months. Yup, vulnerable. NKor could do the EMP, although with some serious retaliation, which may or may not be enough of a deterrent.
Oh, almost forgot. WAYYY back a Russian mig fighter jet was, um, obtained by the US. They discovered that the Russkies were using antiquated technology in their electronics, miniature vacuum tubes, like they used in hearing aids before transistors became usable. The real story was that unlike modern solid state electronics, these tubes would survive an EMP. Good planning by the USSR.
Viktor Belenko and his Mig 25.
When computers are down, some doctors do not even have phone service, nor can they access patient’s phone numbers.
I remember a few years ago –a big storm knocked out all 8 TVA sub stations around Huntsville Alabama leaving the town and Red Stone Aresenal -the headquarters of MICOM down for a week. We didn’t need any foreign power to do it. We did it all by ourselves. And we made it through too.
Starvation would be the biggest and soonest disaster. No fuel available to run tractors and combines. No trucks to carry the produce to the processors. No trucks or railways to carry the products to the cities, no power to run the computers in a grocery store or the debit and credit card systems. No power for the banks to run anything including ATMs. No refrigeration, no electricity for cooking and no natural gas either, with all the computerized controls dead. No running water once the reservoirs are dry; imagine the fires!
And when people starve, they get violent. They will kill for food. Venezuela has been there. Your garden? Gone instantly. They would shoot you for it. An old car that still runs? They would shoot you for that, too. How would a prepper survive all that?