On Sat, 19 Jun 2004 22:47:28 -0700, The Independent wrote:




matt wrote:

Hey guys,

I was recomended this site by a mate, i don't have much in the way of
military training I was never allowed too join after being leveled by a
truck at 16. I've done a job or two under an old Pohm (Hard old *******s),
so I have a tendency too respect them a little more the most. Well hope too
hear from people soon.

Welcome aboard. The water or sometimes the lack of it is fine. I
wouldn't worry to much about lack of military experience as in most
cases the military prepares you to survive in the short term but does
little on nothing for preparation for survival for over a month or more.

I would pay more attention to places like bug out sites, alternate
sources of power, (water, wind, solar, geothermal) and then maybe
alternate sources of fuel, (wood gas, ethanol, biodiesel)

From time to time there are posts on wood working, metal working,
gardening, buying and storing bulk foods, storing water.

There will be an inordenant amount of posts on fire arms and I will say
(at the risk of receiving a whole lot of flame) that I wouldn't go out
and spend thousands of dollars for a survival arsenal. Just get a
couple of three good simple guns ( shot gun, small bore and large bore
rifles and maybe a medium caliber hand gun that are multi purpose and
spend you money on ammo and shooting to get competent with them.


There we go again: The key to defending your retreat is to get some
guns and ammo.

This is simplistic and naive.

Highly trained soldiers on full battle alert with modern weapons locked
and loaded, die all the time.

The real warriors (not cannonfodder/infantry) like the special forces,
spend only a small fraction of their training on weapons.

Both are being fully supported by a distant civilian population, which
post-collapse homesteaders will not be.

There is a LOT more to making war, and this is exactly what you are
talking about, than having weapons.

Most of the members of a military do not use weapons and that isn't
even counting all the people that grow and process their food, mine
and manufacture their weapons and vehicles, make their clothing and
electronics...

Only a large and prosperous retreat that can afford some kind of
reasonably sized standing armed force, well-trained and with a large,
dedicated support organization, can even consider using this approach
to retreat defenses.

No small retreat can hope to defend itself from organized groups of
bandits or large mobs of desperate refugees with nothing to lose,
with guns.

Another strategy MUST be found.

See my earlier post on this thread for some ideas:


A more detailed look at practical retreat defenses he

rthlink.net

Do not let these would-be cowboys, who can't tell real life from the movies,
lead you astray.

snip

AC