Book Review: Holding Their Own

Bottom Line Up Front - "Holding Their Own" good book,..I am waiting the publishing of the second book continuing the story. If you haven't read the book then don't read the remainder of the post,.....I don't want to ruin the story for you, .....as I am going to re-call some of the story line and using it as a lessons learned review.

The setup story of how the United States pluges into collapse and chaos is entirely plausible,....many of the factors in the book either exist in whole or are real and potential threats to this country.  In fact, the author said as much.

The main subjects in the book, Bishop and wife Teri, hunker down in their 'off the main path' suburb, organizing with their neighbors.  It is not only possible but necessary for a small community to organize to meet the threats. As the federal government starts to regain control and require people to rally at locations that will basically become camps to control the population, Bishop's community starts to unravel as people have different views on what is best for their family.  The situation of dimishing food stocks not to mention security concerns also impact on decisions to leave. This is probably what will happen when a community, organizing for survival, does so after the need becomes real and in their face, as you can't pick your neighbors.

Bishop and Teri, who had prepped to a small degree (mainly for Hurricanes) load their truck and start out for West Texas where Bishop owns some land and had a trailer pre-positioned in a remote area co-located next to a year round natural spring. So basically you had the situation where Bishop had a planned Bug Out location, with the scenario where Bishop waits, Bugging In, at his suburban home to wait and see if the situation will straighten out.  This is a probable scenario for most of us.  The trick is to Bug Out in an organized fashion and not under pressure or an environment that will make it too dangerous to get to our  pre-planned and or prepared Bug Out location.

It is human nature to stay where your home, belongings and friends are. Indeed the lesson here is to develop some factors or guidelines before hand that would trigger the Bug Out. As in Bishop's case they waited too long, expending precious food, water and fuel while Bugging In.

Fuel and water play a large issue in this story. To be fair, the story had Bishop stocking and rotating fuel pre-collapse, but he got lazy and the collapse found him with several empty five gallon fuel cans.

The water issue is huge as we simply can't live without out. The idea of having a once a week water service delivering a 5 gallon jug of water, and the one time order to ten additional jugs would give a urban/sub-urban household 50 gallons of drinking water at any time a collapse would hit. Smart people would combine this is additional storage including the main collapse event when municipal water sources are still probably flowing for a short time to come. Bathtub water bobs, spare jugs, 55 gallon barrels and even kitchen
pots now become storage.

I am going to end this review with storyline of Bishop and Teri transiting secondary roads across Texas, mainly at night using night vision goggles - all smart things to do, but a survival group or team, even a small one would have made the trip safer. The lone survivor concept just kind of freaks me out....there will be way too many of these individual or duos anyway.

Again, bottom line - good book. I look forward to the story continuing.

Survival Threat: Cultural-Religious Violence

I received a lot of comments and e-mails on the post about racial violence being a survival threat. Race or more properly ethnic group would be an obvious factor in a collapse scenario as people band together to address survival needs and threats. Utilmately, the lack of food and water would make strange bed fellows, perhaps causing people from many different ethnic groups to band together but I can't help but thinking this would be a thin, fragile union.

Some people say that "as goes Europe, goes America". This may not be more true concerning the financial collapse hovering over many country members of the European Union. But another aspect to be concerned about is the Islamification of Europe. Some sources say that with 25 years, some of the European countries may have a Muslim majority. And to be sure, a majority is not necessary to cause major trouble up to, and including anarchy or even plunge a country into border to border violence.

In the U.S. we have pockets of Muslims in high density. To be sure, many of these,...perhaps maybe even the majority, are peaceful Islam practioners. But that could easily change if the food supply dwindles and the lights goes out.

The test bed best suited for study as it applies to the U.S. for multi-culturalism may be England. How can separate religious groups exist when one groups believes anything and all things, such as the murder of innocents, is a valid tactic? The video below was produced by a young lady in England either trying to get some answers about Islam for herself or exposing the more radical Muslim agenda.

This is what she says: "This is a CULTURE CLASH. The problem with this specific subpopulation of people is that their culture and beliefs never have, and never will, be in harmony with those values that are European. This is what this VERY RAPIDLY INCREASING subpopulation of the UK want for Britain....Sharia law, Sharia courts, death for gay men and women, death for adultery, death for unbelievers, death for apostasy, amputation for theft, subjugation of women, animal cruelty and child cruelty.

Brit comments on Urban Preparation for SHTF

”Hi there. I've been following your site from the UK. It's good. Over here there's a general feeling of unease. It's hard to say exactly what it is but things only ever seem to get worse as the years go by. Everyone seems to be out for themselves and I can only imagine what these people would turn into during a real crisis. I see you guys reviewing all the great gear on here and I think to myself ‘Wow, that looks really cool, I gotta have one'. However after a while I started to think 'If I have one, people will want it and probably take it'.

It's great to have the neatest gear but I think making yourself look like a walking outdoor store might be a bad idea. It may be different in the US but here in the UK , someone dressed for the outdoors in an urban environment is gonna stand out like a sore thumb.

I've read a few accounts from special forces guys who talk about being the 'gray' man. The one who doesn't attract attention and can go unnoticed.

With that in mind, I now carry a pair of dirty overalls and keep my walking boots dirty. My bug out bag, which is an unassuming consumer rucksack is also dirty. I still carry everything I need, but from the outside I'm just another guy who got caught out while at work, with nothing, and is trying to make his way home. No-one ever notices the workman. In an urban environment he's supposed to be there. It's the ultimate urban camo. Who's gonna stand out as the guy who has what you want, the guy with the urban camo assault vest and tactical bag full of goodies or the plumber on his way home from work?”


UrbanMan replies: UK reader thanks for your comments. Roger the “gray man” concept and your other points. I don't think I ever advised people to run around in military style uniforms and kit. In the last 38 years, one of the key rules of my work and life has been to "not draw attention to yourself".
Gear hogs are gear hogs, whether in the States or the U.K. Most of these people are “arm chair commandos”, and some will even have their gear taken away before they get a chance to use it.

While I have a lot of camouflaged uniforms and kit to outfit the eight family survival team I am associated with, as well as the expected straphangers, we get by with various jean pants.  I like 5.11 pants but in some environments I work in, you can't throw a rock without hitting a government type wearing 5.11 pants.  

Colored  jeans,....green, tan or brown levis or wrangler jeans, work well as does the Dickie type work pants.  I have a pair of blue Dickie type work pants and usually a pair of jeans rolled up in my supplemental BOB carried in the trunk of my car. 
We'll save the camouflage uniforms and gear for when the situation dictates.

Along with dressing non-descript your planning and decision making to mitigate your risks as well as your mannerisms/body language are all part of the process for non-drawing attention to yourself. It’s an art form to appear not important but not to also look like a target. All along while observing and being able to detect threats, and, prepared to act.

Back to gear, since that’s what you wrote about in the first place. My all-the-time Bug Out Bag is however, a military style, Coyote Brown in color, FRG bag stored in the trunk (what you would call a boot) of my car with a more civilian looking Cabela’s bag carried in the passenger compartment and which accompanies me inside the buildings I work in.  I call the FRG bag my supplemental BOB. 

Depending upon the environment, I carry a couple different types of handguns in several different fashions. A pocket .380 auto in my vest pocket sometimes when I can’t carry anything larger. I always have a Glock 19 (9x19mm) in my vehicle and sometimes will put a Remington 12 gauge pump action shotgun in my backseat or car trunk.  On occasion,...maybe three times in the last year, I have carried an M-4 or other rifle if I leaving the city by vehicle for a overnight or longer trip.  Sometimes your Spidy sense just tells you to do something.   

I know a guy who carries a handgun and some other kit in a thick mil plastic shopping bag. He said something to the effect that Fast Action Gun (FAG) bags gave the fact that you were carrying away. He cut down a padded gun envelope and included some dividers for a spare knife, flashlight and spare magazines. It’s been years since I saw it but I remember him telling me nobody gives him a second look when he carries in urban crowds, shopping malls, etc.

No, I don't think that it is absolutely necessary to be wearing an assault vest to prepared. One of the points you brought up was the workman and that "cover" would allow a person to be toting work or tool bags without undue scrutiny.

More Proof of the Coming Economic Collapse

ETF Daily, basically an investors information-financial intelligence site often produces excellent articles dealing with the U.S. and World financial situation. Not necessarily from a "gloom and doom, the collapse is coming" perspective, ETF Daily does provide some insight into the possiblities of a national and world wide economic spin downward and that of course is the economic collapse, one of many possible SHTF scenarios, that we have been prepping for.

I have copied some of a recent article by ETF concerning government created bubbles and major events that will cause them to burst and herefore bring the economic collapse closer to the surface if not
bubbling over and effecting life as we know it. Read the entire article here.

The Tech and Housing Bubbles That Created These Giant Failures Were SMALL in Comparison to the Greatest Bubble of All, Being Created RIGHT NOW! I’m talking about the massive growth of the federal government that we’ve seen over the past few years.

Not only is the government bubble the biggest of all time, but it is rapidly expanding in four separate ways:

First, we have an unprecedented Government Debt Bubble: Washington has spent a record $16.3 trillion since 2007 … has added $6.5 trillion to the national debt … and is CONTINUING to run up trillion-dollar-plus deficits every year.

Second, we are witnessing the Greatest Monetary Bubble in U.S. history: Just since 2008, the Federal Reserve has dumped more than $1.8 trillion newly-created U.S. dollars directly into the economy. Plus, the Fed is creating even MORE money by holding interest rates low in order to
increase loan demand. Never forget: When banks lend money, they effectively create new U.S. dollars out of thin air.

Third, we have a Government Employment Bubble. The Heritage Foundation reports that since December 2007, even while the private sector workforce has shrunk by 6.6%, shedding more than 7.5 million jobs … the federal government workforce has grown by 11.7%, adding 230,000 jobs.

Fourth, and most dangerous, there’s the Entitlement Bubble: Just consider the facts:

One in every five Americans now relies on federal assistance.

Nearly 46 million Americans need food stamps to keep body and soul together — 34% more than just two years ago.

The average recipient of federal aid collects $32,748 in benefits — about $300 more than the average tax-paying family gets in disposable income.

The biggest of all: The government’s obligations for Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid are now $65 trillion, nearly five times the value of all the goods and services produced by the entire country.


But Soon, Three Major Events Will Burst This Massive Bubble …

First, the U.S. government is going to lose its primary creditors — overseas investors. In fact, there’s abundant evidence that this deadly process has already begun. That’s why Lawrence Goodman a former Treasury official and president of the Center for Financial Stability, pointed out last week that major U.S. creditors like Japan and China, that once scooped up U.S. debt, are shunning it. Such foreign purchases of U.S. debt amounted to 6 percent of GDP and has since fallen by over eighty percent to a paltry 0.9 percent.

Second, that’s why the Federal Reserve has had no choice but to temporarily fill the gap. Last year the Fed used printed money to purchase a stunning 61% of the total net Treasury issuance, up from negligible amounts prior to the 2008 financial crisis. This raises the question: What happens when the Fed’s actions drive fuel, food and other prices through the roof? Treasury interest rates surge — the first sign that the government bubble is bursting.

Third, ultimately entitlements must be cut — just like they’re being cut in Europe. In Spain, Greece, Portugal and Italy, those cuts are taking massive amounts of money out of the economy and plunging them into deep recessions.

Imagine what will happen when the world’s largest government with the world’s largest entitlement obligations begins making similar kinds of cuts!

Make no mistake: This great government bubble — probably the greatest mankind has ever seen — is destined to burst. And when it does, blood will run hip deep down Wall Street and effect every aspect of our lives.