Trading Doomsday (Guest post by Remus)

Remus, proprietor of the now discontinued Woodpile Report presented me with a guest post to share with my readers.

Trading Doomsday

By ol' Remus

9-11, Boston and other mass murders say government can't defend us. 

By declining to inconvenience the criminal mobs which assaulted Ferguson and Baltimore, government showed they won't defend us. The attacks on military installations show government won't defend itself. The authorities have revealed themselves for what they are, gutless and spineless, promising what they can't, or won't, deliver and bullying the blameless for their failure. This is full-on "banana republic". The people have taken notice. Lesson learned. We'll rely on ourselves.

It's no mere coincidence gun sales routinely set new records, nearly doubling between 2010 - 2013 alone. Ammunition is in chronically short supply. Women, formerly reliable supporters of confiscatory gun laws, are arming themselves at a rate half again that of men, in fact, it's not unusual to see women at shooting ranges as instructors. Courses in self defense are increasingly popular, outright combat training isn't far behind, private ammo stockpiles are proliferating, reloading is becoming common and neighborhood alliances are forming. Survivalism is now mainstream. We're preparing for the worst.

As tensions increase any convenient division will serve as a fault line.  This is an image of ISIS violence

We pretty much know what the worst is too. Put in antiseptic terms it's economic and civil collapse, but it's really the murderous "can't happen here" bloody maelstroms we saw in Europe during much of the 1940s, again in the genocidal Yugoslav wars of the 1990s and currently in Syria and Ukraine. Some of us have seen the worst first hand, others in "viewer discretion is advised" video, in hi-def, at ground level where people actually live. Our 'worst' would be much the same, except without the subtitles.

So, what are all those guns and sweaty training exercises good for? Certainly not for taking on an armored division, say the hecklers, with a sneer. No indeed, nor for taking on any outfit with artillery or air support. They're good for what they've always been good for, taking out a bad guy with a gun. In case it needs saying, a good guy armed only with a first-rate argument for Jeffersonian self-rule will lose to a bad guy with a gun. That's what it comes down to. It always does. And there will be plenty of bad guys with guns.

The police will not respond to 911 calls because they have bigger issues to deal with.  Image of drug gang (cartel) violence.

Those who lived to tell about it say gangs are the main threat in a societal collapse, ethnic gangs being the worst. Think Crips and Bloods and MS13. Their competition won't be you, it will be gangs of opportunity made up of everyday criminals, perhaps some rogue military and police, all defending their turf and battling for more. Add fanatical partisans like ISIS. There's your basic bad guys with guns. It gets worse. Throw in freelance psychopaths—hobbyist torturers and recreational killers, mix with a steady influx of military grade weapons, RPGs and the like, then subtract any form of effective order. Everywhere outside your door, assuming you have a door, is a No Go Zone.

Arming yourself is necessary but not enough. The bad news is, you have to go into that zone because you still have to eat. There's no workaround. You won't buy your way out of it. Survivors of civil collapse tell us gold and silver are useful at the beginning, and for bribes in the short window of time when there are authorities to bribe. Afterward precious metals are wanted in quantities you're not likely to have, by people too far away to be relevant. It's not wanted by people who are picking at the cracks in their floors for every last crumb. Barter sets in quickly. The unvarying long-term demand is for high calorie food, especially canned meat. Rice and flavorings are popular as well. MREs are good as gold. Not far behind is comfort stuff, coffee in particular, and tobacco, cigarettes mainly, traded by ones and twos. Also near the top of the list are candles and batteries in common sizes. Oddly, medical supplies, guns and ammunition aren't often mentioned.

Not like this

The prudent trader doesn't go around in cammies and tactical gear, he becomes the "grey man", uninteresting, difficult to describe, easy to forget. He looks like a nobody with nothing of value. He presents himself as a guy who can get things, not as a guy who has things. He trades in small quantities as opportunities arise. His stuff is always as promised, the brand names middling-good. He prefers to meet at neutral locations and trades only a few times with the same person—the risk of ambush grows with each encounter. He may have a security partner shadowing him.

The survivalist may consider putting together a "grey man" kit. Such a kit would include plain, durable pants and shirts, in quiet browns or greens; a jacket, light but lined, with a rain hood and inside pockets, nondescript, in a subdued neutral color, with no graphics. Top it off with a plain baseball cap and a small backpack, the kind kids use for schoolbooks, in a dull color with no logo or gimmicks. Such a kit could get you in and out of a small town largely unnoticed, or a few blocks into a city and back, perhaps even past an unforeseen checkpoint.

The experiences of those who have survived the horrors and desperation of civil collapse are far more valuable than speculation by theorists and doomer novelists. Their best advice is worth keeping in mind: "don't be there when it happens." Going in, most were captivated by events and thought themselves merely observers. They stayed calm. They believed what they were told, it was just a rough spot, that the authorities would soon get things back to normal. Each new calamity seemed as bad as it could get. Then it got worse.

When they finally understood they were trapped in an unstoppable freefall, events moved faster than they could adapt. Absolute collapse overtook them. What they had—in their physical possession—was all they were going to have. There was no way out, and even if there were, they had nowhere safe to go. The lesson is to be prudent, be suspicious, trust your own senses, have a prepared bugout location and get there before self-evacuation becomes as dangerous as staying put—better a week too early than a minute too late. And stay away from crowds.