Like the sailor in They Were Expendable, wistfully imagining the battleship USS Arizona would soon be sailing into Manila Bay to throw the Japs out of the Philippines in late 1941, some of us would like to imagine that President Trump will swoop in and prevent Gropey Dopey and Sen. Kneepads from being sworn in on January 20th next.
I put it to you cogently and strenuously, that no matter how much you would wish it otherwise, you will be far better served, both here and hereafter, by coming to grips firmly with the reality that he probably won't do any such thing.
It's nice to dream (by which I mean it's free, pleasant, and makes one feel happy), but you aren't going to dream your way out of what's coming.
You can't dream your way out of socialism.
And history demonstrates, over and over, that you cannot vote your way out of it either.
So unless you're 10 years old, and planning on outliving it, eventually, when you're 95, the only way out of socialism is either to flee it (to where?), or to fight it.
Bummer, huh?
That's the cold, hard truth that some are doing anything but facing.
Unless you're planning on embracing your new communist overlords, in which case, you deserve everything that's coming, in spades. BTW, you'll get the spades too. When socialism shovels dirt on your face.
So if you, right now, and in every spare minute, aren't planning for anything and everything you can do to deal with, and in fact bring, the coming war on America that His Fraudulency, Sen. Kneepads, Alzheimer Nancy, and Any Obvious Communist have in store for you, you're wasting effort, and more importantly, time.
Neither of which we, and more importantly, you, have to spare.
What you should be working on:
Abilities.
More PT. Anything is better than nothing.
Picking up, or buffing up, any skillset you don't have, while you can do so.
We already covered moving.
So that leaves Shooting.
Communicating.
Medically treating.
Building and repairing.
And everything else.
You're going to be the next generation of renaissance man (and woman) jack-of-all-trades/master of none. Or you won't be coming out the other side of things. Suture self.
Commodities.
Food.
Money.
Weapons.
Money.
Ammunition.
Money.
Munitions.
Money.
Supplies.
Money.
Equipment.
Money.
Trade and barter items.
And oh, did we mention, money?
As an experienced propmaster in Hollywood told me once,
"This job is easy, you just have to have everything."
So, for Spicy Times, hard times, and all other times, what you need is simple.
Two more abilities you'd better have:
Flexability.
Those who've spent time in the dotMil get that things change.
Plans. Missions. The Word. Everything.
When inspections were coming in Uncle Sam's Misguided Children, back when shelter halves were a thing, they had a green (rainy, winter) side, and a brown (dry, summer) side. And invariably, which side was to be displayed changed 27 times, even the day of the inspection.
Which spawned this universal ditty, across five continents and four fleets:
Green Side Out!
Brown Side Out!
Run In Circles!
Scream And Shout!
Which was dead-on balls accurate, but unbeknownst to most of the minons at the little end of life, it served a very valuable purpose, and saved lives.
Because during "the fog of war", things aren't going to go like the London Symphony's 400th rehearsal of Beethoven's Fifth Symphony. They're going to go pear-shaped. Sideways.
Shit Show. Shit Circus. Even Shit Mardi Gras.
And the sooner you get used to dealing with that amount of flux and fecal material, instead of being flustered and stunned into senseless inaction (and then getting killed) by it, and instead learn to "embrace the suck",
the sooner you'll be able to deal with things, function, thrive, and prevail. Which is kind of important now, too.
It doesn't just work in the military. I've had some damned shitty days in the ED this year, and when it gets really bad, that's when I dig in and say "Throw more at me",
and miraculously (or not so) the day (night, in my case) gets better, and I CRUSH it. I've seen me do it, and I still can't explain it, except to note that you can always do more than your mind thinks it can. Learn to deal with adversity.
Availability.
If you don't do this, it isn't going to get done. Period.
No one is coming to save you. Not even President Trump.
So don't be one of 100,000 people in years to come, pissing and moaning in the camps, and echoing Solzhenitsyn's Lament.
In this, male or female doesn't matter. Half the WWII Resistance in France (a paltry 2-3% of the country) was women. Some of the best spies were too. Old and young doesn't matter. The less you look like a military-aged male, the less of a threat you appear to be.
You're going to have to do whatever you can, where you are, with what you've got.
But it isn't kicking off in five minutes. (I know that because I started typing this five minutes ago.) Probably not in five hours either. But five days? Or five months? Good luck calling that one. Make as big a pile of "what you've got" now as you possibly can. Next Year You will thank Today You, a year from now.
Work on those things, every day. You're goal is improvement, not perfection. But it only works if you start. The sooner you stop daydreaming, the sooner you can begin making actual progress.
14 comments:
Since you touched on medical in the post, I've been wondering if this band-aid-with-staples thing:
https://www.micromendskinclosure.com/product-overview.html
is useful, useless, or dangerous. I welcome your comments.
Opie Odd
You forgot the "Shit Festivus" for those who roll that way. Truly, things are waaay mor fucked than most realize. I grow weary of the "Trust in the Plan" from the Q trads (blogged aboot thet meselves) Your ideal is great, and preps -must be- maintained, however...Right now, with the exception of the Soros financed paramilitaries (why is that fuck NOT dead/in jail yet?) -everyone- has been and is currently trying to either not be the 'raised nail' that the feds would resolutely hammer without qualm, or is in a 'holding pattern'.
This current dynamic is going to be the eventual undoing, in that people will not willing go into that long goodnight of a Insane Knee-padded Cocksucker corruptocrat issuing counter-constitutional diktats as per her Chinese comptrollers... Ostensibly, the pressure cooker that we've been forced to experience, between loss-of-wages, interminable lockdowns, and a broken 'system' that's 2/3ds "Just-Us" for them, and none for us, and mor infuriating, the "Do as I say, not as I do, and fuck you I'm in charge", is going to unleash a level of anger and a bloodbath of Iron Age proportions...
Posit: What comes next? The issue is the partitioning of the States, vis-à-vis: Do the FREEFOR opt to invest in the system that's done -nothing- for us for the past 30 years but harass, loot and tax out of existence? Agreeing that -some form- of Government IS necessary, do you wish to align with the potential future oppressors, or be Hostile Nonstate Actors who's entirety of scope is to bring death and destruction?
An interesting conundrum, in that ostensibly, the rubric of a formation of a neo-liberty oriented coalition of FREEFOR territories is interesting as fuck. It'd have to be damned near a combination of Anarchic elements, but based on a Purist view of the Constitution in an originalist format. YMMV but hey, thats just me talkin' out me arse.
Jes' Sayin'
@O.O.,
If you know when to close a wound, and when not to, anything can be useful.
If you don't know that, nothing is.
Except knowing where to find someone who does know.
@BCE,
It's all unknown territory at this point.
But I think that uncertainty is going to lend impetus to the eventual ROE of "When in doubt, commence firing, until the target changes shape or ignites/explodes."
The people pushing for secession seem to think 3000 tyrants a mile a way is a better form of government than 1 tyrant 3000 miles away.
Of course, they're both wrong; the point is to keep the government but get rid of the tyranny, as the Founders did. Once you do that, any government will work, but if you don't do that first, no form of government will work, which always leads to warlords and dictators.
Except for one time...
All I want for Christmas is.............a baker's dozen B-61s.....
Does this make me a bad person?
As they used to say in the army, "If you can't get out of it, get into it."
Our shelter halves were green all the way through, in germany circa 74-78.
Aesop, I have not labored under any illusions that all of this was going to turn out in any other sort of way. I think the only thing I might add to rather extensive list (picking up skills is never a bad thing, even if they seem obsolete in a world that is highly technologically driven) is the practice of "do not attract attention to yourself until you really need to". At least for myself, I am actively working on severing/curtailing/reducing my outer persona. Gray is not just a hair color.
"keep the government but get rid of the tyranny"
It must be fun, living in a dream world.
"as the Founders did"
That lasted, what, 85 years?
"3000 tyrants a mile a way is a better form of government than 1 tyrant 3000 miles away."
It's better not to base one's philosophy on the script from a Hollywood movie. If you are not fond of secession, then don't push it. But get out of the way of it happening; otherwise you may be run over.
The advantage of resuming PT is that it is helpful in working off the total pissed-offness feelings that resulted in having the presidential election being stolen. Doesn't get rid of the anger, don't misunderstand, but helps cool it down to a deep cold resolve to do what I can personally to decrease the effect the in-coming regime will try to have on our country.
So, yes, working each day to buff up the deficiencies and fill in the gaps in my personal inventory.
Thank you for the gentle smack up-side the head to get back on track and stay there.
I have made it a point over the past four years to study insurgencies, guerrilla warfare, and civil wars, that have happened in many time frames, all over the world. What's developing and coming has the potential to go on for forever and consume everyone in the US, including our domestic enemies. I've been learning. Once the supplies go, it's pretty much over. If you can get more, it goes on. If not, you're done. Think support and re-supply. Get and stay in shape. Always be working. And thanks Aesop, you're a daisy.
Your post brings to mind a (probably apocryphal) from a member of the WWII German OKW (General Staff)they posted at Air Ground Operations School when I went through:
The reason the American Army does so well in war is that war is chaos. And the American Army practices chaos on a daily basis.
If you're going to be in the shit anyway: Embrace the chaos. Use the chaos.
@Paul Bonneau,
1) If you think you can make anarchy function, show your work. Start with all the historical examples where that happened in the last 6000 years of human history, and work forward from that. Then tell the class who's really living in the dream world.
You'll get death and taxes no matter what happens.
2) Your Common Core history cred is really showing: the line went the other way around, and was, in fact, lifted from colonial history and put into a movie, not the other way around. Hollywood screenwriters aren't that clever.
You could even have looked it up, if you were as bright as you think you are.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mather_Byles
Thanks for playing, and we have some lovely parting gifts for you.
Embrace the suck! Throwing up on your own chest while shitting yourself at the same time. The smell of decaying human remnants wafting in the morning breeze. Slapping yourself to stay awake. Eating cold white beans with gubmint cheese washed down with Tang. Slicing blisters and ripping out rotten teeth with pliers. Burning barrels of shit. I can't wait for spicy time. Channel your inner Vlad.
I don't think Trump was expecting to fix this, even using .mil resources. I believe he expects us to do what is necessary. It's our Republic, after all, if we can keep it.
Yeh Knuck that's an apt description what it will be like on a good day LOL. people have no Idea what war torn third world conditions are like. many will not make it to the other side , survival will be in the gaps of the insanity that happens. In winter it will be worse think Stalingrad conditions .
Only your determination , preparations and whits will determine a positive outcome . Many think it cant happen here , the world is littered with the corpses of those people dont be one them. Adapt , Improvise and Overcome and never get on the Bus or Railcar.
Post a Comment