One of those i am developing a sense of awareness of is community. If we have to have a gun to defend ourselves against our neighbors then how can it it be worthwhile to survive. Eventually our own families will turn against us.

I lack the skill of bargaining and bartering mainly because it is hard to find others that want to do this. I have long valued the concept of trading my goods and services for the goods and services of others.

from several years of combat training in the armed forces i have learned a few important facts that take away the romance of surviving a war or a nuclear attack. First the after effects of a nuclear attack will not be pleasant. I agree that the best place to be will be ant the center of the blast being instantly incinerated. The nuclear fallout will be terrible. If we escape radiation poisoning then the climate will be thrown completely off balance killing billions more worldwide but with slow agonizing deaths.

Then there is the effects of chemical and germ warfare. I have learned of how a person dies from its exposure. A horrifying thought. Many of us know of the germs that can and will be used against us such as the bubonick plague and many other deadly viruses. It is a reality.

Then there is the psychological and sociological aspects of warfare and martial law. Without government it is every man for himself. this means convicts and psychopaths of all kinds will roam the earth unscathed killing at will without discretion. We may live in community but gangs will from rogue armies that will roam the land raping looting and pillaging at will. If they are mobile they can escape the large cities and raise havoc on the communities nearby. Owning an assault rifle will be beneficial but remember that if you kill one of them they will remember it. You will scare them off for so long until one of them loses the fear and wants to take revenge on their lost comrade. Then they will come after you. The modern automatics and semi automatics are great but remember they are only effective weapons as long as you have ammo. when you run out you cannot shoot pebbles and rock salt. Then the ones you are trying to defend against also have these weapons and even more powerful weapons. They also have the skill and the attitude to kill indiscriminately. They just don’t care.

I agree with many of my Christian brothers and sisters that we should kill them with Gods love and kindness. But as i just said, some people just don’t care. They will not respond to any measure of love. I call them the walking dead. We need to defend against them. They are not only gangsters but they are in the Soviet and Red Army and the US Army as well. I have met some of them. The best skill we can learn is to develop a sense of community where we can trust one another and know how to deal with those who go astray. A strong community has the best chance of driving these killers away and surviving a holocaust even a terrorist holocaust.

I will continue learning my survival skills because it gives me satisfaction but the romanticism of surviving and restarting society is gone with me. I prefer to not be here but might be prepared if i am one of the unfortunate survivors.

First, HAPPY NEW YEAR and may joy and peace be yours!!!

I’m really old and moldy and have great-grandchildren of my own these days and your above observations lay at the very core of my survival books and teachings.

Although I never knew my grandparent or great grand parents, my mother and father lived through the turn of the 20th century. As a child I grew up on a self sufficient ranch and farm. I was hunting by age seven without supervision and taught how to butcher and cook my harvest.

My father had a credo that went like this right up to his dying day (1970’s) , “Save it. It may come in handy to throw away some day!” He always repaired something that broke or quit working, sometimes several times until it could be repaired no more. He had a shop and storage barn full of all sorts of things that could be re-purposed, cannibalized for parts or reinvented to something completely different.

Aside from being a master gunsmith, he was a blacksmith, auto mechanic, carpenter, plumber, electrician, musician, poet and best of all a master woodsman … no … he was more like a true mountainman.

Unfortunately, as you pointed out, I dropped the torch once I became an adult, moved to the city and began raising a modern family. With deep regret in my heart I have only retained a smattering of fathers mastered survival skills.

Still, I have 1,000 times the primitive and pioneer abilities of all but a handful of other old curmudgeons like me!

The way of life you described above is pretty much gone and the reasons are we’ve become totally electricity and technology dependent. Worse yet we have become a “disposable society” and that includes the production of our goods and products (they are intentionally not build to never be repaired; only replaced).

And, the real demise of that profoundly hardy way of life is the abandonment of our national Christian faith and morals within our society, which resulted in the almost complete demise of the natural, (man, woman) “nuclear family” that bonded us, one generation to another. We now rarely live in the same state, much less city as our children.

When we were all members of a close knit family, surrounded by other close knit families, traditions and skills were handed from one generation to another and shared or bartered with our neighbors that we trusted with all our hearts. Today, people don’t know who live right next door!

We have no brilliant, magic bullet answer here. We just know when this depended, self absorbed and instant gratification world collapses, only a few of us will have any chance of survival and becoming “pioneer self sufficient” once again.

God Save Us All and our Nation,
Orrin M. Knutson
Peace Officer Retired
Survival author and trainer