Tactical Wisdom: Uncertain Times

Authored by my friend Joe Dolio and appears on his Tactical Wisdom blog. Get his books here.

With us all already on edge from the Russo-Ukrainian War, an impending Chinese blockade on Taiwan, and potential riots over Memphis, the weekend was bad enough. Then, out of nowhere, an “unknown party” launched a series of drone strikes across central and northern Iran with absolutely no warning. The attacks went on all night and, despite what the Iranians say, caused a lot of damage.

Just what we needed!

⁶ You will hear of wars and rumors of wars, but see to it that you are not alarmed. Such things must happen, but the end is still to come. ⁷ Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be famines and earthquakes in various places.

Matthew 24:6-7

Now, I imagine if your name is Jesus and your Dad is God, it’s pretty easy to not be alarmed. For the rest of us, it’s a bit harder. But let’s talk about this: Are we hearing of wars and rumors of wars? Is nation rising against nation? Are there famines and earthquakes in various places?

I’m not saying the end is near, but it is time for some concern. How can we help ourselves to be “not alarmed” as Jesus told the Disciples? We can prepare, but more than that, we can PLAN.

Many people are into preparedness, but do they all plan? Stockpiling gear and ammunition is not planning. It’s one thing to have a group of friends, all preparing with some general plan to meet up, but if the lights went out today, what is the plan? Most people in preparedness assume there will be a 3-7 day build up to a complete collapse or that it will be a partial collapse with some communications ability remaining to facilitate that link up.

If you haven’t thought of this, now is the time. We’re going to give some solid pointers here, but you need to meet with your people and write this down. The Contacts and Notes Notebook, TW-03A, is a great place to document these plans and methods of contact. Under stress, you might not remember specifics. Having them written down is a good idea.

With our over-reliance on electricity, planning for the grid to go down will be a great first place to start, no matter why it goes down. China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea all maintain a strong cyber capability that is a risk. The FBI tells us that those white supremacists (probably the FBI) are trying daily to take down the grid, and on the 26th, a bomb was found on a gas pipe in Pennsylvania. No matter what causes it, you need a plan NOW.

In TW-01 Baseline Training Manual, I point out that your first preparedness step should be developing a 14 day supply of PORTABLE emergency food. This should be long term storage food that needs either nothing else or just water to prepare. It should be something that can easily be carried in a backpack or bag. The above link to My Patriot Supply is to a 2 Week Supply of emergency food for $127. That’s a good start. The Dollar Tree is another good place to find low-cost individual sized portable food. Now, I’m not saying STOP at 2 weeks, I’m saying a 2-week supply is a minimum.

I keep a lot of dehydrated food on hand, as well as MRE’s (they’ve come a long way from the five fingers of death, IYKYK). You need to eat some of them every now and then to condition your GI system. Let me just tell you, that if you suddenly go to a week of eating just dehydrated foods, you are going to get diarrhea and put yourself at risk of dehydration. If you switch to MRE’s for a similar time period with no acclimatization, you will have the opposite problem. Train your body just as you would with anything else.

Keep this 14-day supply in a portable, ready-to-go fashion, so that you aren’t scrambling to pack. Do this even if you are planning on bugging in, something may happen that forces you to leave.

The next area to tend to is communications. I know, I talk about radios a lot, and everyone has a Baofeng that they took out of the box and saw how cool it looks on their chest rig, and that’s it. Get that radio out and PROGRAM it. Everyone in your group should have the radios programmed the same, so that you can say “go to 112” and everyone ends up on the same frequency. As a side note, ANTIFA and RevCom have started doing this, because we were intercepting their comms before (we still are). If you want to learn about it, invest in NC Scout’s book above.

Aside from just programming, you need a few more things in your protocol. Item one is calls signs. Using call signs instead of names gives a little security and authentication. Only your group will know your call signs. I have different call signs for different groups that identify me to them. I even have one with the State Department’s Diplomatic Security Service for work-related communications on certain assignments. I have a funny one assigned to me by Steven Crowder’s dad, but we can’t talk about that. Assign them to members of your group (stay away from things like COBRA and ASSASSIN, please).

You need a “lights out” protocol where everyone knows to turn on their radios and get to a certain frequency. They shouldn’t all start shouting for each other over the air, just monitor a common channel. There should be an automatic schedule for network check-ins. For example, if the lights go out, everyone turns on their radio and monitors a GMRS channel (of course, everyone will have a license, FCC or Sad Ham Narc). Then, at 7PM, a network check-in will happen where everyone will report their status and local conditions. You can then decide what to do.

This requires you to have ‘mapped out’ your communications. This means seeing who can reach who. You might need to have someone closer relay traffic to or from someone farther away. Having your own repeater that you can run from say a vehicle battery is a plus. Learn where you can toss up a taller antenna. Understand that HOA rules might have to be broken by tossing up a larger antenna.

This whole plan only works if everyone carries a radio all the time.

Have “get home routes” preplanned. You should know the “I have to walk home” route of everyone in your group, in case a search needs to be mounted for someone. Also, as we learned at a meet up recently, two members of your group might work near each other. If they both have a radio, they can link up, and walk out of the area together, improving their ability to protect each other.

Though one may be overpowered,
two can defend themselves.
A cord of three strands is not quickly broken.

Ecclesiates 4:12

Next, maintain a supply of cash. As people in Moore County, NC learned, the power being out means no ATMs, and no credit/debit card machines. Being the only person with cash in hand can get you food or gas when no one else can. On that note, I keep a siphon pump with a long hose in the car for just such an occasion. For metals, silver coins are far more spendable than gold.

The final point for today’s discussion is FILL UP YOU TANK. Uncertainty can lead to wild fluctuations in gas prices. Getting gas daily generally ends up costing you less than waiting until you MUST HAVE it. Also, if the power goes out overnight, you won’t be “just getting some tomorrow.” Make this an all-time discipline.

Thought of one more: Make sure all flashlights are charged or have fresh batteries.

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