Posted on 09/06/2009 3:26:34 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
QUESTION: What mistakes do you think most people make preparing for what you and your countrymen have gone through?
I wouldn’t call them “mistakes”, I don’t hold the SHTF Bible so all I can give is my humble advice which may be correct or not, so all I can tell you is “ I wouldn’t do that if I were you”, and depending on how sure I am , add a smartass grin smiley.
There’s simply some preparations that make little sense if you think about it, others that I’ve seen that just wouldn’t work, in spite of all the speculations.
a) Maybe the one that rubs me the wrong way the most concerns retreats. It’s also something many survivalists consider the summit of their preparations. A self sufficient fortification-ranch, with the nearest neighbor several miles away.
Isolated farms or retreats are targeted and are often victims of robbery and in some cases extremely violent home invasions. You may have 6-10 able men you are counting on to defend it when TSHTF… “when TSHTF” …so they aren’t there right now? Then you don’t have them, nor will you have them when you need them, most likely. The isolation works to the attackers favor, who often take their time having their way with everything and everyone inside the house.
The “away from everything” theory just doesn’t work when taken to the field. Happens here and same happens in Africa where ranchers and farmers have to fight rebels, rogues or whatever they are calling them these days.
They’ll find you, they’ll know about you one way or the other. You cant hide simply by living a gas tank away from the city. If there’s a road that reaches your place, you are fair game, doesn’t matter if it’s a dirt road in poor condition. You get there with a car/truck? So can bad guys.
You are obviously safer from small time robberies or pickpocketers and snatchers, but you are more vulnerable to the worst kind of criminals. Not that living in a city or suburbs makes it MUCH safer, but I’d rather live here where I live now than in a farm house any day of the week. People can somehow organize to hire security, talk to the police. Yes, most people border idiotic and are pretty clueless, but it’s better than being alone with no chance of even trying to convince people.
I’m not talking about living in a large city being the best option, I’m talking about living in a small town or community, looking for safety in numbers but avoiding the problems of a metropolis.
I definitely would choose a house in a small town or subdivision near a city, rather than a far away retreat. Rather than looking for the ultimate self reliance retreat in the middle of nowhere, look for a subdivision where you have enough land, where you can keep a small orchard and some small critters if you want, a place with a basement where you can build a NBC shelter as time and money allows. That’s what I’d look forward to if living in US.
b) The barter items thing is also pretty strange. I don’t see how it could possibly be a smart idea to buy goods to sell or trade after a crisis, surely not in the quantities suggested by some people. Beats me, are they going to set up a shop in their garages and sell everything? Would you buy food an other supplies from a guy that sells it with no possible way of verifying the conditions under which the food was kept? How much of a profit could you possibly make , comparing to having saved that same amount of money in gold, for example? I don’t understand it and I don’t know of anyone that made a profit by doing this. Yet, people stock up on TP and many other cheap, easily obtainable items thinking that it will be “worth it’s weight in gold” after the crisis. Newsflash: if it’s cheap and easy to produce, it will keep being that way AFTER tshtf.
Some guys advice to “invest” in such goods, tools, food and supplies for after TSHTF. No, no , no. 200 or 500 bucks worth of tools rusting away in the shed is not an investment. Its’ 200 bucks worth of tools for which you don’t have any use. That’s not an investment. An investment generates money, while products rotting away in some basement does nothing for you.
c) Forgetting about their financial security. I’d worry about REAL investments. Buying real estate that will provide me with a steady income on the longer run, an investment portfolio divided in a couple of reliable ( or as reliable as any organization can be) that will slowly grow, most of it set on minimum and medium risk investments, and not falling for the promises of high risk ones.
Money is so important, I can't begin to explain it. When prices skyrocket beyond the limits of superinflation, money does not turn into toilet paper as many survival experts predict, it become cherished, more valuable to you than ever. You have to turn yourself into a discriminating shopper, always looking for the best possible price, sometimes shopping in different branches of supermarkets so as to find the better deals and avoid those “hot” items grocery chains slip without you even noticing.
My father is visiting right now, handling business, and one thing he told me when I asked how did he see things going on here, he used the words “cheapskate” and “miserly”.
He said something like“ People count coins over and over, by the cent, and spend maybe 10 minutes thinking about spending every cent. They also look kind of shabby, untidy, I can’t explain it. Even the guys running around downtown with suits look bad”
I explained that his overall perception was indeed correct, mostly because the average person here uses clothes until they wear out, there’s not that much money left for looks, not getting haircuts as often as they should, shaving.
Yes, the fall on the purchasing power of people did affect the average person (at least most of them if not all) and you can see it on the streets.
d) Not all places are equal in terms of crime, but if something like this happens in US, I’d worry about being armed at all times, and learning how to use it to defend myself.
Again, not talking about waiting for the end of the world to bug in and pull the shotgun out of the firing ports, just go on with your life but do so armed.
Most people here don’t see things this way. The anti gun campaign is very strong here, and the majority of “sheep” see guns as evil objects, even though rape, crime and violence is smeared on their face every day. What can I say, most people are pretty stupid.
Those of us who go armed in this country are a reduced minority. After a few words, we recognize each other at the range or at gunshops with a knowing nod, knowing that most people, even among shooters , don’t share our opinions.
Even among “gun people” we have our important share of “Zumbos”, elitist hunters who think that firearms are hunting tools and shouldn’t be used by the lesser “civilians” for self defense.
e)Not trying to bore anyone to death here or anything, but going back to the issue of money. It’s so important to be financially set. Rather than spending tons of money on junk you wont ever use invest it smartly. Rich, unprepared people will suffer after TSHF… only in your wildest dreams. Money buys everything, including expensive food, medical care, security and relocation if needed.
When the economy collapses a big chunk of what used to be middle class (50% as minimum, more for sure) ends up being poor. It doesn’t matter how much guns you have, doesn’t matter if you can start a fire with a couple popsicles sticks or build an atomic bomb with a Snickers bar and a paper clip. Skills are of course important but you finances affect everything.
If you are middle class do everything you can to improve, climb way up the ladder. No I’m not talking about making more money than Bill Gates, I’m just talking about something every determined middle class person can achieve , no need to be a freaking financial genius. Make sure you climb your way up to the upper middle class, because once the pyramid starts sinking you don’t want to be below the 50%.
If you are really serious about financial security, diversify your real estate and other investments in different countries. My father did this and it made all the difference in the world. The man is my hero.
When you see serious trouble in the horizon and survivalists are thinking about bunkering in their cabins, you simply go on vacations to check out that little apartment or house you bought in Costa Rica for a bunch of pocket change a month. If Zombies take over or China invades, you can look for a job there, or live like a king thanks to the income you receive from that other apartment you have in France, a place in a small town near a major University, which you rent to students each year. 600 Euros a month will allow you to live comfortably in Costa Rica, and most countries in South America. And the best part of all this? If nothing EVER happens you just have a few properties here and there that are constantly generating money for you, in case you want to retire early or if you ever have a health problem or any other issue that puts you out of the job market. Again, a couple of properties here and there isn't such a big deal, most people can achieve that with a bit of effort, it's just a matter of priorities.
f)The lack of reality based preparations. Some people focus on preparing for something that will never happen, preparing for getting up one day and walking into Mad Max’s world. This is of course, not a smart idea. Not only are you forgetting about the other, more likely possibilities, but you also ignore that you’ll have to go through them before it reaches to a road warrior point, if it ever gets to that.
People that have thousands and thousands of dollars in tools, equipment, and maybe spent hundreds of thousands more building the ultimate retreat, but don’t have a penny invested anywhere. When asked they‘ll say that it will all be worth nothing when TSHTF.
Hopefully, this person will have several years worth of food along with all the other stuff he’ll rarely get to use, so at least he wont starve to death. But is eating all you aspire for in live? Not to mention what would happen if he got sick/robbed/place burns to the ground/hurricane/flood destroys it and suddenly needs the money he said he would never need.
Prepare for a broad spectrum of possibilities. So you’ll have your food and supplies for short and medium periods of time where supermarkets may be closed due to looting, riots, lack of supply , etc and you have others plans in case things get worse or you are forced to get out of there.
Something like what happened here happening in US? Don’t go nuts, shooting the neighbor’s kid for crossing over to your yard to pick up his frizbee. Just adjust to the situation.
Once the first few weeks are over and people start calming down, just be more careful out there, don’t throw away money on stuff you don’t need and try to keep a generally low profile. It’s also important to do well at work, because people get fired like crazy during those times, companies trying to reduce expenses or not needing you any more for lack of production.
During these times is when your investments kick in. Not only do you have a place to exile to if things don’t go back to normal or they don’t fit what you expect in life anymore, you also have a form of income that is out of the circle of your local economy. Let’s say the dollar looses ½ it’s value, you still have your apartment in France or wherever the heck you want to invest, pumping in Euros that are now much more valuable, probably compensating for the local inflation, so whether you decide to leave or stay, you have the means to go either way.
Argentina only suffered a bad economy. It never went SHTF. Should the US go broke and civil unrest happen, everything ferfal and others say will not apply whatsoever. Argentina still had police and judges and civil authority. It was seriously criminal in nature but it was there.
It’s hard to say if all of the “stops” of civil order will be smashed or not. No doubt many of our urban areas will go totally out of control, and the fedgov will attempt to impose emergency measures, aka some form of martial law.
But will the situation just devolve straight to TSHTF/TEOTWAWKI, in short order? I’m not sure of that. It might stabilize at some “Argentina 2002” level, or slowly crumble from there to total permanent collapse. Even in the case of a slow collapse, there is very likely to be a period with “Argentina 2002” conditions. In that event, which I think is likely, the lessons in the book will prove invaluable.
I was in Beirut in 1983. That city, formerly “The Paris of the Middle East,” went through 15 years of bloody total civil war. Snipers, car bombs, etc. Yet, people still had to find work to eat, and had to get to work and so on, even as snipers fired 2 blocks away and car bombs went off in the area daily.
The one thing neither of those areas had against them is the US dragging down the world economy. Not to mention, we are not just upset about economics, we are ready for war concerning freedom.
Try as I might, I can't find an example of that outcome in the modern era, and I've tried.
Try as I might, I can't find an example of that outcome in the modern era, and I've tried.
While I totally agree that even in war people try to make do and be productive, I disagree with ferfal that things will in accordance with a civil government. If we go SHTF one of the goals will be to throw off those chains of government and get back to freedom and true civility.
I don’t see a Mad Max, either, on whole, but I do see significant distruptions in logistics. It is impressive the amount of goods transported every day just to keep cities like Denver alive. Even minor distruptions can produce civil disasters.
People talk of a barter society, even if it is short lived. I think it can happen in that a civil society might be without what they need for a short time, but they are civil. If so, they can barter. We did so throughout the Great West for decades in the early 1800’s, but only if we remain civil. If we were to go Mad Max, then barter can not happen. Some small places in the US will go Mad Max to some extent, but not as a norm. We all know where those places will be and who will be there.
We are a large country and this is a global problem. I think we will see dynamics this planet has not ever seen.
I am preparing for logistical distruption and a brief time where there is no controlling civil government. We Americans believe in a civil society and are willing to do what it takes to get it back.
Of course, you must add our unique American racial and other tensions to the mix.
Note that the demonstrators are not the typical black-mask-wearing anarchists we usually dismiss. THese are middle class folks going crazy.
Don't worry about the politics of HOW the debt was created, focus on the consequences of "Deuda Eterna," Eternal Debt, that they think can be rolled over forever.
Until it can't. Then comes the shock and the social earthquake, with banks closing, stores looted, and all the rest.
I think we will see this, AT LEAST, in the USA in the next few years.
Please watch the film. Note especially how the govt. assumes the private debt of the large banks. Ring a bell?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rH6_i8zuffs
P.S. If the currency of the dollar goes to pot, then barter os some kind is needed as there is no currency to use for trade. If the dollar gets shot to Hell, what else is there until the States or regions come up with something else. Argentina had the dollar to back up their international trade. We will have nothing.
As Ferfal says, you have to survive Argentina 2002, even to live to get to survive total SHTF.
Please watch the documentary above. The echos between Argentina 2001 and the USA 2009 are simply eerie.
"Eternal Debt" is exactly right. Until it can't be rolled over, and the fiat collapses.
You go to the market with 3 or 4 items, looking for your own 3 or 4 items that you need. But nobody wants what you have, in trade for exactly what you need. So the next step was the creation of "private money" to use at the barter markets. A store of value, to make trading less impossible. BUt that solution fell apart too, since it was so easy to counterfeit the "value coupons" on home computers. So despite the 4-1 devaluation of the Peso, and severe bank withdrawal restriction (the "corralito" or corral on your money), the Peso was still in demand. Of course, gold was better, and US$ were next best, but few had them. (Dollar accounts at parity with pesos were converted to pesos after the overnightdevaluation, and were subject to the same "corralito" restrictions on withdrawals. Try living next year on the equivalent of about US$100 a week, the max you were allowed to withdraw during most of 2002.) Anyway, I highly recommend study of the Argentine "lab experiment" as an alternative to pure hypothetical armchair prognostication. And I recommend his book.
bookmark for later
I think it is impossible to compare the U.S. to any other country in a “what if” situation; historically we have acted differently in response to things than citizens of other countries.
I personally already live isolated so whether that is good or bad remains to be seen if things go wrong. Just as many have friends or relatives in the country they could go to in a time of crisis I have friends and family in towns. I think the ability to adapt to the situation will be more important than any set plan as far as that goes.
Stocking up on supplies for your use and some extra for relatives or friends in tough times is always a good idea, but stocking up with the plan of running a store is a terrible idea. My grandfather had a ranch and a grocery store during the depression and he closed the store because people could not pay for the groceries, could not pay their bill if he let them charge, and he wasn’t able to deny groceries to neighbors and friends if they couldn’t pay~especially if they had families to feed.
Bartering will always work, in good times and bad trading works, but you have to have a wide variety of skills or things to trade, not just tools or toilet paper. The thing about trading to remember is if someone has something you need then you have to have something that particular person needs to make a trade~ they usually won’t trade for items they don’t need just because that is what you have a lot of.
As far as people stockpiling weapons and ammo~ to me it makes no sense to tell anyone you are doing it. I am amazed everytime someone posts about all the firearms and ammo they have. Hello that is a good way to advertise to the very people you may not want to know if things do fall apart.
If things fall apart the mentally tough people that can adapt to different situations will likely be the survivors. It is good to prepare of course, but your mindet is much more important than how much toilet paper you have in the garage.
Bartering itself is a skill far beyond just having things to trade. I am married to a man that is addicted to trading, he will literally make a trade just to make a trade. Nearly everything we own he either traded for or traded for something he could sell to raise the cash to buy. I have seen many times people have great items to trade and no idea how to trade so they can’t make it work. Actually most people are that way because they don’t even understand the fundamentals of trading.
My hubby has proved to me time after time that trading works in good times and bad, and I can say there is a lot more too it than most can imagine. Most think if you have things you can just trade for what you need; it doesn’t work that simply. Many times hubby has made multiple trades to end up with what he wants. As good as he is at trading I would not count on that as part of a survival plan- it is just not that predictable. We have always lived a little above our means because of his ability to trade and if things collapse we might live a smidgeon better that those that can’t trade. It’s a great skill, but only a part of the total means to survival.
In the early 70’s I lived in Turkey under martial law and went to the bizarres where barter and coin were in play. Worked great. The problem I saw with Argentina’s bartering was that few had much worth any value. Hub caps and old stoves weren’t needed. Food was needed. They had little of it. No one needs something inedible when they are hungry.
Don’t forget, Argentina was a $400 billion, 40 million person economy with 15 million employed at the time they went bust. Their bust also only went about 2 years but they had been a poor country and still are. Their government was and still is a brutal government, but they always had a government in control.
Prior to the collapse Argentina artificially held the Pesos to $1. Today is about 26 cents, where it really had been the whole time.
Argentina was also not an armed populace, they banged “soucepans” when they got angry, we’ll be banging rounds. I see Argentina as a lightweight event, nothing comparative to what we are facing. That country collapsing economically was not much more than Miami going under. It was a third-world economy and stayed that way. They had a few years of prosperity that the government took from them in the form of debt. Attempting to compare our society to theirs is not even a close comparison.
They also did not face a civil/revolutionary war as well. We are. We have Communists trying to take over and enslave us into government owned commerce and death plans. That is not even a stretch. The black racists are part of those communists and they feel if we whites are not giving them something then we are useless to them and should die. Obma’s DeathCare is all about killing babies, the sick, and the elderly, and keeping healthy people from getting treatments they need to prevent later death. Communism kills. There has never been a Communist regime that did not kill innocents that got in their way.
When Argentina went under in 2001, the planet was still a peaceful one, which gave them the ability to produce and trade and perhaps get out of their predicament. We probably won’t be so lucky.
I have a co-worker from Argentina. He just got back this week after several weeks visiting family in Buenos Aires. He said really nothing has changed since he was a kid growing up there. There are a few inner city places that are clean and civil and the rest you stay out of. I asked him of the collapse, and he said the middle class did fine but the poor were dumped on as they always had been. Another co-worker from Argentina is an account rep for our company there. He said the same things. To them, not much has changed. A rough road there from 1999-2003 but it wasn’t that far out of the usual.
I just don’t see that country as an example of ours or what we may face entirely. Some good examples are there to study, sure, but the results and playout I don’t think will be the same. We are a different people with a different history, different expectations, different values, different goals, different politics, different economics, different industry, different education, different everything. The entire dynamic from local areas to the global state of affairs is different.
I love ya man, but I think you’re putting to much emphasis into Argentina.
Damn mess huh........
Haven’t seen Appleseed for a loooong time here. Hope he’s Ok !
Stay Safe CCC !
I take the dog watch if you don’t want to singlehand that pearl....
I just hope I still have it and it’s ready if and when I ever need it.
I agree with most of that. Surely our consequences will be very different. BUt the part I keep coming back to is “eternal debt” suddenly leading to a rupture, overnight devaluation, bank closures, looting etc.
I totally think we can see that in the next couple of years. What comes after that will depend on many variables, and will also vary by region. Cali might turn into Beirut 1980, Alabama might turn into Alabama 1950. But the fedgov ain’t going to roll over or disappear. Hungry people will SCREAM for martial law and forced food distribution, even with the soft touch of the USSR in the 1920s if that’s what it takes.
So maybe we do get to a shooting CW2, or maybe Beirut 1980, or even eventually Mad Max. Or maybe, to Argentina 2005, after Argentina 2002. I think Ferfal’s book is worth reading, because it prepares the reader for another sort of semi-SHTF situation, other than the total SHTF biker zombie place most survivalists seem to foresee.
Even Beirut didn’t turn into Mad Max. People still went to work, even with bombs going off a block away. And there is a lesson in that. Argentina has basically one race and religion, and not as many private guns as the USA, but Beirut? That CW in several ways mirrored us, in that they had a vicious 3 or 4 way religious death struggle, where we will have a vicious racial struggle overlaid. And we have plenty of guns, like in Beirut.
And STILL, the economy choked and puttered along. People STILL went to work, a few blocks away from the war raging on the Green Line. Even with snipers and bombs exploding on their block.
The one type of bartering that I can see becoming more and more of a reality is the bartering of services.
“I’ll fix that plumbing problem for you in exchange for three months piano lessons for my kids.”
That sort of thing. I’ve seen this already happening more and more in businesses related to construction. For that reason alone it would be wise to learn and develop as many of these practical skills as possible now in order to have something of value to trade in the future.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.