Conversation between Survivalists

I spent a couple hours this past weekend talking with another like-minded survivalist,…I’ll call him “Greg”. We call ourselves that, rather than the term "preppers", as we are both getting on in years and the term survivalists is an older term. I was actually introduced to the concept circa 1979.

Greg stopped by to show me his surplus 7x57mm Mauser that he had just bought and also bought some 500 odd surplus rounds for it. I was a little surprised as I know him to own several modern rifles including M4 variants, M1A1 types and even a semi-auto AK or two. He said if for nothing more, he can use it for barter or trade, or equip any strap-hangers who he absorbs into his group. He also bought $150 worth of dehydrated food this month.

I asked him if something was telling him to step up his preparations and he said he may be compensating because both his daughter and son are going off to college and he may be trying to quiet his anxiety with them being gone by stocking more. We spent some time discussing potential for a collapse coming from economic collapse, terrorist attack, natural disasters including disease pandemics and general off shoots that would occur such as violence and anarchy initially along economically divided groups which may degenerate into violence along racial lines, sadly enough.

One of Greg’s points is that the population shifts on relative small economic factors. The media is fomenting a notion that the economy is getting better,…gas prices dropped a little,….and among the sheep population there is very little of a foreboding sense. What people fail to comprehend is the effects of the global economy on the U.S. Greece is having a hard time putting together a coalition government to address debt and spending reform. France just hired a socialist who vowed to tax the wealthy at 75%. The economies of Spain and Portugal are tanking and now even Germany is having problems. We may see the Euro go the way of the dinosaur.

All in all a depressing day actually. But one that caused me to re-visit the fact that I haven't done too much in the past couple of months, but caused me to head down to a hardware store on Monday afternoon and buy a 550 gallon hard impact plastic water blivet which looks strange as hell in the corner of my suburban back yard, but not as strange as the looks of one of my neighbors when a friend of mine and me off loaded it and worked it into the back yard over my fence. I plan to fill it with a garden hose and always keep it full, re-filling it as I use it for the garden, which incidentally I planted early because of the early Spring. I have egg plant, cucumber and squash all coming up now.

There are many of us out there preparing for a economic collapse within the United States. I am convinced that many of us could not really articulate the factors of an economic SHFT, or why this collapse is likely to occur. The video below is very sobering and a fairly non-partisan explanation of the Federal financial problem. It serves two purposes: 1 – to articulate the “why” of a probable collapse, 2 – scare the hell out of you that the problem(s) are not solvable therefore the economic collapse probable. The video explains that the U.S. debt is 32 times greater than Greece. While the U.S. obviously has much more means to re-pay debt, we also have much more discretionary obligations, read entitlements, that Greece doesn’t have. Without a dynamic course change the U.S. will see a substantial if not catastrophic economic collapse like Greece,......but the riots will not be like Greece. They will be much more wide spread and violent. While the economic problems in Greece did lead to a short duration food and commodities shortage, the shortage we’ll see here in the U.S. will be substantial. Like the video states, It’s when, not if, the U.S. will collapse from this soaring debt.

Possibility of World War III?

While most of us probably feel that a slow economic or even dyanmic economic collapse is a much more likely scenario for SHTF, nobody should discount conventional attack or attacks using Weapons of Mass Destruction/Effect by terrorists groups to either precipitate the collapse or to add speed and chaos to an already impending economic collapse. When you think about people on foot, or trucks or even ultra light aircraft bringing loads of narcotics across the U.S.-Mexican border each day, how hard would it be to bring in four pounds of a biological toxin?,.....or chemical weapons?,......or, God forbid, a small nuclear device? When you add the growing anger along socio-economic groups and what seems to be an agenda among many to divide us racially, we have a wide and immense catastophy sitting in front of us. The video below is long, but worth watching and it certainly gives us a lot to think about.

Reggie Bennett, Survival Instructor and High Tech Survival Tools

In my mind's eye I see a person surviving in the wilderness as a short term venture. A person spending all day working on survival tasks such as repairing or improving a lean to or dug out shelter; procuring fire wood; checking and setting traps and snares; maybe laying in fishing lines; repiaring gear or clothing; procuring edible or medicinal plants; constructing hunting weapons and tools.

Again, all of this is short range survival - very few people can do this for even weeks on end, let alone year in and year out, through all sesons and weather conditions. But this does not mean that the well prepared Survivor should discount these wilderness survival skills. Perhaps the main objective of these skills is to give a person confidence for all situations and to orient the survival mindset or what Reggie Bennett calls the positive mental attitude.

I stumbled across this article on Reggie Bennett, Virginia based wilderness survival instructor, from a Yahoo! article by Marc Istook:

If you want to learn survival skills, be it low or high tech, Reggie Bennett is the man. Friendly and unassuming, at first glance you may not realize that he is the quintessential survivalist. But with U.S. military training that taught him how to brave some of the globe's harshest conditions, and his time spent instructing Air Force pilots on how to survive, he is uniquely equipped to teach others at his Mountain Shepherd Wilderness Survival School in Catawba, Virginia.

On a sprawling 100 acres, Reggie and his wife Dina host everyone from housewives to schoolkids, CEOs to active-duty armed forces, and one lucky Yahoo! News host — yours truly. You don't mess around with Reggie.

The open spaces in Virginia make a great location for this kind of training. It's close enough to Roanoke that it's easy for guests to fly in. But it's remote enough that you feel at one with nature — even if that does mean I spent hours searching in vain for a cell phone signal. To sum up Reggie's vast knowledge in one training session would be impossible. So he makes his survival tips simple, boiling them down to seven key priorities. They involve the basics, like finding food, water and shelter.

A bit more complicated — starting a fire, signaling for help and providing first aid. But the most important aspect according to Reggie: maintaining a positive mental attitude. It's a perspective that's accessible to anyone braving the elements. And without it, he says, surviving becomes significantly more difficult. Reggie's training taught him how to make it out of the wilderness with nothing but the most primitive tools.

But with the help of a little technology, we can increase our odds of survival in almost any situation. Modern water purifiers use advanced filtration methods to keep us hydrated. Cell phone and GPS technology can help us find our way, or help rescuers locate us more quickly than ever. Today's compact, efficient batteries and solar power units keep our gadgets charged, long after the power — and cell phone signal - has gone out.

Don't forget to keep a positive mental attitude! Low tech or high tech, Reggie has found a way to make the idea of surviving fun. His school takes all comers, from those wanting to learn simple camping tips to mountain men looking to conquer the wild. I highly recommend meeting Reggie and checking out his survival school. Maybe I'll even see you there… just keep your eyes peeled for the slightly lost Yahoo! host, desperately seeking a cell phone signal.