Aftermath – Page 2

‘Thunderstorm Spiral’: Pentagon Trains for Underground War/Disaster In Densely-Populated MegaCities

March 16, 2016 by mac slavo

As populations grow into cities across the globe, and increasing majority of people will live in urban areas – places which quickly become very desperate and vulnerable during a major crisis.

Every prepper knows the dangers of being stuck in a major metropolitan city in the event of a major hurricane, a grid down scenario or civil unrest and societal collapse.

In such a situation, as every prepper knows, food, water and other vital resources will quickly become scarce or unavailable. The gridlock of survivors trying to get out, or get their hands on assets.

Increasingly, the Pentagon is looking at the likelihood – perhaps the inevitability – of war/conflict inside of a destabilized or decimated megacity urban center like New York.

According to the Daily Mail:

The Pentagon is calling for help from technological innovators to take on the future of warfare.

In the program titled ‘Thunderstorm Spiral,’ the US government solicits demonstrations to tackle the challenges of megacities and underground environments, which will become increasingly prevalent as populations continue to grow.

[…]

A megacity is defined as a city with more than 10 million residents. To put this in perspective, there are currently over 8 million people living in New York City.

As these numbers continue to grow within defined areas, infrastructure will have to adapt, pushing megacities toward the development of subterranean – or underground – environments.

In 2014, there were 23 megacities with ‘vast subterranean structures’; in 2025, it’s expected this number will reach 37.

To meet these needs, the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Emerging Capability and Prototyping, Rapid Reaction Technology Office (RRTO) Technology Demonstration Program is sponsoring the request for information (RFI) issued by the Pentagon.

‘As the world’s population grows, the probability of the U.S. needing to conduct combat and humanitarian assistance / disaster relief (HA/DR) operations within a megacity (defined as a city with more than 10 million residents) also grows,’ the solicitation states.

[…]

The ‘desired capabilities’ in focus of the program include GPS techniques for underground and dense urban environments along with intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance sensors for use in tunnels.

As major American, Asian and European cities grow with extreme rapidity, urban planners have been expanding large underground facilities. Increasingly, it is not just subway systems, but shopping malls, parking lots, utilities and perhaps even residential units that are being built underground.

While this may be practical to facilitate crowded above-ground conditions, it brings new dangers for populations who could be trapped underneath in the event of a bombing, terrorist attack or major natural disaster.

Inadequate design to accommodate flooding and allow evacuation for people underground is perhaps the biggest threat facing these quickly expanding facilities.

The United Nations University has studied many of the disaster scenarios that could occur in underground spaces, noting the rapid growth of underground facilities in mega-urban areas across the world:

The rapid and extensive underground expansion of mega-cities – for subways, malls, parking and public utilities – takes place often with too little knowledge of associated risks and too few plans to minimize the effects of a natural disaster, United Nations University experts warn.

With growing land pressures in cities (which contain about 50% of all people today, seen rising to 65% by 2030), creating new space underground becomes increasingly attractive. In many places, however, studies of potential natural disaster risks are often neglected, says Srikantha Herath, UNU Senior Academic Programme Officer.

While many underground shelters can withstand earthquakes and other disruptions, flooding stands as one of the biggest and untested underground disasters cities may face in the near future:

Modeling a variety of catastrophic events is essential for building contingencies into underground infrastructure designs, including evacuations and the emergency containment and transport of flood waters, for example.”

Via underground interconnections, water can travel considerable distances away from the flood source. However, there are often no subsurface maps; underground space is usually mapped in relation to a building overhead.

Strategic relocation expert Joel Skousen and other prepping experts have warned against allowing yourself to be trapped in a major city – particularly on the East Coast – where evacuation may be nigh impossible. Being trapped underground in such a megacity only adds another layer of disaster to that recipe.

If you have your own underground structure, make sure that its design has accounted for flooding, because the possibilities are all too real.

Strategic Relocation: Where To Go When It Hits the Fan (Full Movie)

How This Man Converted “Underground Shelter Using a 20 Ft. Shipping Container”

Elite Hiding in Bunkers to Escape War with China: “Intended Survivors Are Moving Underground”

SHTFplan and Mac Slavo www.shtfplan.com

Law Enforcement Turn to NSA Surveillance Data to Track Crime: “It Was Only A Matter of Time”

March 14, 2016 by contributing author

This article was written by Joshua Krause and originally published at The Daily Sheeple.

Editor’s Comment: Once the system has tilted towards concentrated and unaccountable power, the abuses and tyranny become inevitable. Americans stood down as the NSA on the 4th Amendment and stoked terror threats in order to justify its wholesale cataloging of the American people.

From here, the data collection will only increase. The next wave of technology will do even more to read into our actions and behaviors, and the data on that will become part of the effort to track everything and create a dominion over the nation. Beware, things are going dark.

It’s Official: NSA Data Will Soon be Used by Domestic Law Enforcement

by Joshua Krause

If you’re reading this, then I’m willing to bet that you’ve been called many different names throughout your life. If I were to hazard a guess, I would say they were names like kook, paranoid, conspiracy theorist, alarmist, insane, or gullible. And after this week, you can go by a new name: Vindicated.

I’m of course talking about recent revelations from the NSA. Long before Edward Snowden came along, it was no secret that the NSA was spying on everyone without good cause. Anyone who believed that fact was called a conspiracy theorist, but their fears were eventually validated.

These same people also understood that the NSA’s surveillance powers would never be used exclusively against terrorists and hostile governments. The power they have is just too tempting for any government. If various government agencies weren’t using the NSA’s surveillance apparatus to solve domestic crimes, it was only a matter of time before it was used for just that.

And again, they called us conspiracy theorists for believing that. And again, we were right all long.

A while back, we noted a report showing that the “sneak-and-peek” provision of the Patriot Act that was alleged to be used only in national security and terrorism investigations has overwhelmingly been used in narcotics cases. Now the New York Times reports that National Security Agency data will be shared with other intelligence agencies like the FBI without first applying any screens for privacy. The ACLU of Massachusetts blog Privacy SOS explains why this is important:

What does this rule change mean for you? In short, domestic law enforcement officials now have access to huge troves of American communications, obtained without warrants, that they can use to put people in cages. FBI agents don’t need to have any “national security” related reason to plug your name, email address, phone number, or other “selector” into the NSA’s gargantuan data trove. They can simply poke around in your private information in the course of totally routine investigations. And if they find something that suggests, say, involvement in illegal drug activity, they can send that information to local or state police. That means information the NSA collects for purposes of so-called “national security” will be used by police to lock up ordinary Americans for routine crimes.

Anybody who knows anything about how governments work, should not surprised. You can’t give them any kind of power, and expect them to use it responsibly. You can’t give them any stipulations. Eventually they’ll find a legal loophole to work around any limitations that have been placed on them.

In other news, the Pentagon admitted this week that they’ve been deploying military drones over the United States for domestic surveillance purposes. Much like the NSA’s surveillance apparatus, we were assured that drones were for terrorists in faraway lands. Nothing so Orwellian would ever be used against ordinary American citizens at home. Yet here we are, with more to come.

Perhaps you’re beginning to see a pattern. Everything our government uses against foreign enemies, eventually makes its way back home. Every war is an opportunity to try out new technologies, before turning around and using them against American citizens. It just goes to show, that war really is the health of the state.

SHTFplan and Mac Slavo www.shtfplan.com

How to Dress to Avoid Suspicion, Blend In During a Crisis: “Be a Grey Man”

March 14, 2016 by mac slavo

Survival is all about blending in.

If you stand out, you could become like the unhammered nail, begging for unwanted attention.

Whether you are carrying concealed or attempting to negotiate your way through a post-apocalyptic SHTF scenario, take notice that you don’t appear “militaristic” or tactical, as it will work against you.

Mark Twain long ago observes that “clothes make the man” – and the last man you want to be in an emergency scenario is a conspiracy theorist, an obvious doomsday prepper or an overzealous gun-toting idiot who beams controversy and strange looks wherever he goes.

Camouflauge fatigues, “fishing” vests and militia-gear will all work against your efforts, and put an exclamation mark over you while interacting with whatever remains of society, and potentially put a spotlight on your prepping efforts, your stores or retreats, and deflate your hard work to survive.

The last thing you want to do is look like someone who wants a fight, someone who could be stolen from or someone who could become a target or mark.

TheOl1911 explains his philosophy on finding common and even “trendy” clothing with muted colors and enough style to pass the “sniff test” that also offers advantages for concealed carry and tactical preparedness. There’s no one right answer here – but there are certainly wrong ones.

Author Jeremiah Johnson recommends in his Green Beret’s Guide:

Cargo pants. These are preferred because of what you can stash in them. You can hold an infinite combination of gear in them…a polar-tech cap and a balaclava, a “drive-on” (do) rag – the o.g. Army cravat. You can carry shooting gloves (leather for all-weather) and ear plugs (radians do tell!). With all of these things in the cargoes, there is still plenty of room for the main function: when you change your mags or speed loaders, you can shove the empties in your cargo pockets.

Loosely fitting clothing will break up the outline of your body. Also, remember all of the caps and do-rags I mentioned before? A quick disguise is where you find it; need I say more. An old Russian saying: “Do not be a white crow among black crows or you’ll be pecked to death!” Make sure that you blend in as best as you can. Earth tones in your dress if you have to dee-dee into the woods. Balance your tones with the discretion of common sense. Do not try to be a walking Realtree monster right next to downtown city hall.

Blend in and be inconspicuous; be the “gray” man in the crowd.

Police and most trained marksmen know the techniques to spot someone carrying concealed, and otherwise looking shifty. Tell-tale signs of behavior, including subconsciously checking pockets, and changes in the gait, shifting weight to one side, or uneven clothing (from the weight of the weapon in a pocket) are all give away to the professionals. You’d do best to know them, too, so you can spot others, and avoid giving yourself away.

Be aware of how your behavior can give you away, and dress to blend in with the local population. The styles will change depending upon what part of the country you live in, and whether or not you live in or near a city, or out in the countryside.

Psychology of Survival- Gray Man Concept

Instead, you should have the “uniform” of average clothing and accessories for your area, so that no one would notice you in a crowd, and few would remember you after the fact based upon your demeanor and any “give away” actions.

Civil Unrest: You’re Pretty Much on Your Own If You Are Caught In a Riot or Other Violent Demonstration

A Green Beret’s Guide To Planning Your Personal Posture: “First Things First: Always Be Armed”

How Can You Tell If Someone is Hiding a Gun?

SHTFplan and Mac Slavo www.shtfplan.com

Gun Grabbers Don’t Get It. When The “Economy Falls Apart, Crime Increases.” That’s Why You Need Guns.

March 2, 2016 by contributing author

This article was written by Joshua Krause and originally published at The Daily Sheeple.

Editor’s Comment: The fundamentals of gun control are distorted into sideline debates over statistics compared with other European nations. The fact of the matter is that countries facing an influx of rapes and and an unwanted culture of fear wish they still had their rights to keep and bear.

Here in America, it will very likely be the last line of defense as the infrastructure crumbles and the economy bottoms out. People who lose everything lose control; and while they deserve better opportunities, turning to wanton acts of crime and threatening the life of your family is not acceptable. Only an armed populace can defend itself against a society that has abolished dignity and incited waves of crime in government and institutions, and on the streets. If you want to see gun control in action, just go to inner city Chicago and witness the worst scenes of violence in the entire country.

The Gun Grabbers Just Can’t Let Go of This Ridiculous Argument

by Joshua Krause

You have to give the gun grabbers credit where credit is due. They sure make a pretty compelling argument. Every country in the world that has strict gun ownership laws, also has lower crime rates when compared to countries with loose gun laws. And most importantly, mass killings are just about unheard of and murder rates are far lower in these places.

Oh sorry. I’m afraid I misspoke. These countries rarely have mass shootings and the number of gun crimes is also quite low.

People who support gun control love to make the same lame argument. It’s an argument that defies all logic, and somehow it just won’t die. After every mass shooting, they love to present some statistic that shows mass shootings are rare or nonexistent in countries with strict gun laws, or that gun crimes are also few and far between in those places. These statistics are more often than not, absolutely correct. They’re also completely irrelevant.

Isn’t the overall murder rate far more relevant than the number of murders committed with firearms? Not to the gun grabbers. I can only guess why they won’t let this argument die. Either they have some kind of mental deficiency, or they are willfully ignorant of these statistics, because it would shatter their world view. They simply refuse to see the bigger picture.

The latest iteration of this argument comes from several researchers who sifted through 130 gun control studies from 10 different countries, to see what effect these laws had on the number of gun related crimes. Here’s what they found:

So what do Santaella-Tenorio et al. conclude? First, and most importantly, that gun violence declined after countries pass a raft of gun laws at the same time: “The simultaneous implementation of laws targeting multiple firearms restrictions is associated with reductions in firearm deaths,” the study finds.

This finding doesn’t highlight one specific law, like an assault weapon ban, in isolation. There were “so many different kinds of laws,” Santaella-Tenorio explains, that it was hard to make good international comparisons on every specific kind of gun restriction.

Rather, countries passed big packages of gun laws, which overhauled the nation’s firearm code fairly broadly, which all tended to share similar features. According to Santaella-Tenorio, they generally included:

Banning “weapons that are actually very powerful,” like automatic weapons.

“They all implemented background checks.”

“They all required permits and licenses for purchasing guns.”

South Africa’s comprehensive Firearm Control Act, passed in 2000, contained all these measures. One study found that firearm homicides in five major South African cities decreased by 13.6 percent per year for the next five years. “Reductions in nonfirearm homicides were also observed,” Santaella-Tenorio et al. note, “although not as pronounced as the ones observed for firearm homicides.”

Austria’s 1997 firearm law, similarly, required background checks, limited access to powerful firearms, and imposed rules about how gun owners had to store their guns. Santaella-Tenorio reviewed two studies on Austria’s 1997 law, both of which found evidence that the law had reduced deaths. According to one of them, firearm homicides went down by 4.8 percent, while suicides went down by 9.9 percent.

Australia and South Africa seem to be their best examples. The funny thing about those countries, is that while the research shows that gun deaths did indeed decline, the overall murder rate also declined. This fact comes with a few caveats however.

Take a look at the historical murder rates for both of those countries. In South Africa for instance, the murder rate really did decline after they instituted strict gun control laws. However, the murder rate was already falling for at least 5 years before the year 2000 (that’s as far back as that data goes) and it continues to decline to this very day despite no new legislation. And in Australia, the overall murder rate has also declined, but not until 8 years had passed since they started rounding up all the guns.

In other words, there is a strong correlation between gun laws and gun deaths, but almost no correlation between gun laws and the overall murder rate. Admittedly, it’s also a fact that many pro-gun advocates would also prefer to ignore.

What nobody wants to admit, is that we don’t really know what drives crime rates. In the US for instance, the national crime rate has been falling consistently for more than two decades, and nobody can figure out why. I’ve heard all kinds of theories to explain this, including higher incarceration rates, lower lead levels in the water, increased police presence, an aging population, roe vs wade, and even the proliferation of the internet and video games. None of them have been able to hold up to scrutiny, and it seems that the number of guns on our streets isn’t a factor either.

The truth is, the real drivers of crime are incredibly murky. The only thing we know for sure is that when the economy falls apart, crime often increases, but only most of the time. Crime rates continued to decrease in the US even during the Great Recession.

And perhaps that is why this argument that the gun grabbers are always trying to make, is so stupid. Like everyone else, they desperately want to find a single simplistic cause for all the murders that happen; a cause that fits their world view. But in the real world there isn’t just one reason, and if there were, it certainly wouldn’t be guns since there isn’t any convincing data.

Remember that the next time the gun grabbers go on about “decreasing gun murder rates.” What they’re really saying is, “give up your rights, even though it won’t benefit you or your community in any way.”

SHTFplan and Mac Slavo www.shtfplan.com

How This Man Converted “Underground Shelter Using a 20 Ft. Shipping Container”

February 24, 2016 by mac slavo

In a SHTF event, underground is exactly where many people plan to go to ride out the storm of whatever has descended upon society.

With brewing unrest and economic collapse, the elite have poured millions of dollars into luxury underground communities – many fitted to be more like five-star hotels than emergency bunkers. Even the Davos elite have expressed worry. Those with the means to do so hope to use private planes and helicopters to escape and hideaway. Continuity of Government (COG) operations have a parallel government structure in place buried in fortified mountains redoubts that can withstand all contingencies.

[Read more…]

SHTFplan and Mac Slavo www.shtfplan.com

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