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| Matt Bracken's CW2 cube showing potential fracture-planes in society. |
Aesop at Raconteur Report wrote a couple of posts (One and Two) where he makes a case against the headlong rush toward the Us-vs-Them mentality that seems to be coalescing along the Rural-Urban divide (reference Bracken's CW2 Cube).
Three of Aesop's main points are:
- There are vast numbers of potential "rural" allies are in cities, even if their resources have been co-opted by goofy, sticky-fingered Progressives
- Cities are home to huge amounts of resources and in a straight-up military contest Mr Aesop contends the shear numbers of city dwellers would steam-roller Ma and Pa Kettle in Hinterboonies, Mi
- Cities are (essentially) Eternal and almost impossible to destroy.
Whether you agree with his points or not, he presents them with the economical use of words.
The point I have been gnawing on is the third point. To be completely fair to Mr Aesop, it barely counts as one of his main points, it was more of an off-hand observation on his part. Still, the statement intrigues me.
Distinction One
When a person says "City" do they mean the location? Do they mean the "name"? Do they mean the Charter and Articles of Organization? Do they mean the Political Soul of the Founders? Does a city remain a "city" if it falls in population and loses dominance?
Location
Populations may rise and fall but strategic importance of certain sites can last for a very, very long time.
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| Map courtesy of Google |
Excavations at Troy reveal the ruins of 9 "cities" like a stack of pancakes over a 4000 year time-frame. That suggests that the city was destroyed and rebuilt 9 times. The military and logistical importance of the site remained viable for 4000 years even if each the 9 incarnations were destroyed.
I am not sure if that proves-or-disproves Mr Aesop's point. If you were a citizen of any of the "Troys" when it was sacked, you might disagree with him. If you were one of the founders of the next incarnation you would probably agree with him.
Ultimately, there was no 10th Troy. The compelling strategic reasons for the city disappeared as commerce and politics and the technology of war evolved. If you look up "Ancient Troy" on Google, the cartographers wryly note "Permanently Closed".
Survivor Bias
Survivor bias is a heuristic whereby samples that became extinct are ignored because they are less "available" and sub-optimal conclusions are reached due to the skewed data.
For example, it was easy to look at Silicon Valley in 1999 and reach the conclusion "The only way to make money is to be invested in Technology." That conclusion failed to account for the tens-of-thousands of firms that failed for every "Apple" or "Google".
It is much easier to call-to-mind Athens and Rome and Jerusalem and Berlin and Baghdad than it is to call-to-mind Ankor Wat, Machu Picchu,
While Aesop makes some good points in his screed there, he makes some pretty poor assumptions
ReplyDelete.
He assumes that the resources will be evenly enough distributed that everyone will survive after a few weeks.
He assumes that the cities and their denizens will survive long enough to get it together to go after the rural folks...without energy, the cites will fail rapidly and the population will decline even faster.
He assumes that the transportation will be available for the city folks to travel to, take, and remove the resources from the rural folks. It likely won't be.
Further, he assumes that the non-liberal people living in cities are like rural people only less so...and that is only partially true.
That was my third attempt to write a post on this topic.
DeleteAesop invests his writing with a great deal of emotional engagement and I wanted to side-step as much of that as possible.
Some of that engagement is probably because humans like to think our life-decisions are beyond reproach and it pinches as events unfold that suggest that perhaps it is time to abandon things/beliefs/decisions that we hold dear.
Aesop?
ReplyDelete"he presents them with the economical use of words."
Are we talking about the same Aesop? World champion bloviator?
It's my presumption that supplies and resources would dwindle arithmetically faster in the cities than the rural areas and there would be far more chaos and panic.
OK, Aesop can be quirky and opinionated. I didn't want to spend a bunch of time snipping-and-pasting when I could just link to what he wrote. Doing that also eliminates the possibility that he would object to my mischaracterizing what he wrote.
DeleteThat aside, he raised a question that I considered worth thinking about for several days and being worth at least a few posts.
As Aesop himself lives within the city limits of LA County he does have life decisions about the nature of cities in a collapse scenario. He often enough speaks to being a warlord in the LA wastelands. Perhaps tongue in cheek but who can tell with Aesop the Marine.
ReplyDeleteIn all his often-wordy Blog posts and comments at various blogs, he has often complained about how the "idiots" at Mc Donalds often fails to do his daily sandwich order correctly. Aesop never complains about long commutes to his large Hospital ER commute. When questioned about any sort of rural retreat his answer is how plump his OT driven Retreat Fund is doing.
Cities, like Empires have a lifecycle. They are created by good resources and die as those resources are used up or polluted beyond recovery, like a nuclear incident. See Chernobyl for example.
I've read both blog posts and the factors of mass destruction from raging mob actions seem missing? As the rule of 3's states lack of clean water is a death or wish that you were dead in about 3 days. Most cities like his lack safe water in volumes needed for mass exodus as human's are noted for soiling things as they flee.
While Rawles "Golden Horde" idea is unpopular, those that DO get out from the chaos of a burning city are not going to be the nicest folks you've met. The most violent generally do the best in chaos.
"Cities, like Empires have a lifecycle"
DeleteBaltimore, Detroit........
The biggest issue I have with his posts is the numbers he uses .
ReplyDeleteThe federal government has several definitions of "rural". The one he used is very restrictive and counts q very small number of people as rural.
For example, I live in a small town, 75 miles to the closest town of 20,000 and 200 miles from any town bigger than that. My county has a population density about 1 person per square mile - but using the census bureau definition, I am counted as urban.
I also agree with your concerns above. Urban areas store and manipulate lots of resources, but they produce very little. How many farms, oil wells, copper mines, etc are in cities?
Once cut off, they will go through what is stored quickly unless a ruthless government is in charge, and even then and even then it probably won't last long.
If urban people go into the countryside, they probably won't get far due to limits on fuel, road "problems", muscle power, etc unless they start doing it during the immediate transition when fuel is still abundant. Rawles says a tank of gas from the nearest city; I think a half tank distance will weed out almost everybody, and even a quarter tank will make a huge difference.
Jonathan
Some also seem to think that roads will remain passable
ReplyDeleteafter SHTF for the looters to use.
Trees + chainsaws. They're gonna have to walk.
While true friend, are you fully prepared to live without anything trucked in and grid electricity?
DeleteFully prepared as in not in your lifetime returning prepared?
Cities are placed where commerce occurred. All major highways and most bridge crossing involve cities.
All major grid lines run through them. Fuel pipelines and so on.
When the cities burn that's, all done.
US Population pre-grid 1860
31,443,321
US Population currently
341,804,624
In 1860 no grid, no birth control, large families were very common, plenty of food as we were an exporter of food (#1 export I think).
How do you expect the population to change after the cities burn? Disease and starvation are still #1 killers.
You can't block roads with trees if there aren't any, or if governments are doing sweeps to keep the roads open. If things get really bad, I wouldn't be surprised to see convoys, pass requirements or similar to use major roads. I could also see orders to fire on anyone not authorized to be nearby, regardless of how locals are affected.
DeleteWhile many major roads, bridges, pipelines, etc go through cities not all do, and quite a few cities have ring roads on the edge or even outside of them.
There are lots of variables involved, many of which are location dependent and some of which I'm sure we haven't thought of yet.
Jonathan
I'd think most of the trees in the city would be consumed fairly quickly as fuel or heating by residents. That was what occurred in Sarajevo Bosnia during the conflicts that nation had. Furniture, building framing, whatever it took. Especially in winter.
DeleteI think cities in the north where winter is long will be especially stressed. With no snow equipment to move snow, the roads will become limited to sleds and skis to move freight. Keeping water from freezing for consumption or cooking will also become burdened.
The survivors will have a lot of barter items to trade with their rural neighbors. Especially with metal materials. Municipalities with solar lighting will have those units scavenged and taken for lighting or energy gathering.
Cities come about 1st because of location, 2nd as a common place for commerce, and 3rd for defense, once you put a wall up.
ReplyDeleteWalls don't have much to do with today's cities but they did for thousands of years.
Carthage is an example of a city being very much not eternal. Also the plentiful, amazing cities in central and south America buried in the jungle, visible now with lidar. Cities die, and people forget that
ReplyDeletehttps://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2211558120 for example
DeleteNot having read Aesop's posts, here are my thoughts on urbanites and their ability to take over the rural areas.
ReplyDeleteMost urbanites are in less-than-optimal physical condition. Most do not keep a full tank of gas in their vehicles; many don't even own a vehicle. That leaves them on foot somewhere from the urban center to the far suburbs.
I doubt if many urbanites have given a lot of thought about what supplies and gear they might need in the event they had to pick up, pack up and bail out. Of those that have, I'd bet many are Walmart Commandos.
I just have a hard time seeing any large amounts of urban dwellers making it into the far rural stretches of the US. Their feet are soft, their bodies are soft and in many cases, their brains are soft. Add in a lack of skill necessary for survival, such as water purification and fire-building, just to name two, and I expect you'll have a trail of dead bodies along every easy access route out of the cities.
The urbanites who do have gear and smarts and can successfully exit the death traps our modern cities are may well become problems we'll have to deal with.
The gangs will, for the most part, stay put, predating their neighbors and gang enemies, until they've stripped the local area bare. And I do mean bare--no resources, including liquid fuels. Then they'll go, on foot, to the next closest area they think they can loot. During this process, I expect a lot of attrition on both sides to go on.
DeleteEventually it will be down to the true survivors or the few who have been smart enough to stock up and not use everything they had saved. There will be some military-trained ones as well, but they're going to be on both sides. When those come out into the countryside, we'll need to deal with them. Such things have been discussed among a few trustworthy people. We have firm ideas for the three main groups we expect to see.
I think the biggest limiting factor for urban survival will be potable water. You would be shocked at how many people can't create drinking water out of even rainwater, more or less scummy green pond water. Even worse are the idiots who crap right where they drink--yes, they're still with us. I expect that within 14 days various water-borne diseases will be taking a large toll on the survivors.
No matter how we get there, if we get there, it will be bad or perhaps worse. We'd best pray for Divine Intervention.
I'm not certain the divisions will be between Black - White or Blue - Red. I think the fighting will be between Haves - Have Nots. Especially when it comes to food and/or water which can be purified for drinking. Neighborhoods near food warehouses will quickly learn to defend or get away from it - a lot of fighting over the contents will likely occur.
DeleteGaming the question of city longevity, when the pillars of life are eroded / removed, rarely includes a realistic portrait of rural people. This is especially short sighted for Southern rural people.
ReplyDeleteWhen word gets out that things are going to get hard, and some orcs from a city begin showing up (or even the rumor of them), the high trust social fabric that keep the rural man going suddenly shrinks to those he knows. Or those that he knows through one or two degrees of separation. Suddenly, Sir Names will matter even more.
There won't be any waiting for an orc to FAFO in the countryside. They will be dropped the moment they step off the road.
Now, a caveat. The millions of parasite / invaders in our rural communities are a wild card. But I suspect that will only factor in how long it takes to stabilize rural communities.
Cities are no more "eternal" than the forces which created them. Historically, cities have been constructed by means, and for motives, that have been relatively unchanged for thousands of years... historically.
ReplyDeleteModern cities were largely contructed by people who have never known a world without oil, and the "industrial revolution" it fomented. The technology that makes modern cities like Las Vegas even remotely possible, is relatively new, and increasingly appears short lived. The technology needed to produce the techology we rely upon is lost to us now, as no one living remembers exactly how it was done, once lost, to return it must be rediscovered. When it caves in, it will be a *long* time before it returns. Bootstrapping is slow... many generations, even when you know what's possible.
Modern cities rely on a "supply chain" that cannot exist without cheap energy, and an intelligent, educated, and motivated poplulation to maintain the technology to support them. All of this: the Intelligence, the Education, and the Motivation, are all under attack, and in decay.
These cities you mention being rebuilt multiple times at the same site, are due to the means and motivation for creating them persisting, yet they still *failed* and were subsequently rebuilt... though the means and motivation persisted, the cities did not.
We live on a disaster prone planet. There is no "steady state", there is "punctuated equilibrium".... and we are about to see "punctuation". Get out of cities, now. And, yes.... get *very* out of them, as they will drag you down with them when they die, if they can reach you.