Power of the media


In today’s world it is easy to get fooled and think that all media is there for us, to help us, to keep us updated, to make life easier or whatever.

Some 20 years ago, I was lying in improvised shelter on side of the street, behind big iron garbage truck that was rolled over and full of holes. I waited for dark so I can move on.

I was not alone, me and my friend shared that small piece of cover from open view and snipers with three guys. I know one of them from before, but that did not actually meant anything.

When shooting started we all jumped there almost at the same time. After few minutes we agreed that we gonna share it until the night.

Some half hour later one of them pull out from his bag small fm radio, kinda that we called “pensioner radio”, for walking and listening sports events in normal world.

Actually it looked like he pulled from his bag some brown package and on it was radio taped. That brown package was some kind of homemade battery pack, made I guess from different batteries, 2 times bigger than radio. more

My Budget Bug Out Bag


lbug out bagYour bug out bag must have things that you KNOW how to use, so it is much better to have butterfly closures that you know how to use than full wound sewing kit without real knowledge about it (and without real need).

Some call it 72 hour bag, Get Out Of Dodge Bag, Get Back Home Bag or however. Making the perfect bug out bag definitely can mean difference between life and death, and there are many philosophies about what should be in it and what not. This is my take on it. It is a budget / cheap bug out bag and makes sense for me. I have some different products but tried to find most similar I could on Amazon because this is what most people have access to.

First lets start with some considerations before assembling it.

Do you need a bug out bag or survival bag?

A bug out bag is for bugging out and not living forever in woods. Survival bag is more for long term living outdoors. A bug out bag is smaller and light, a survival bag is big and has more stuff in it of course.

My philosophy for bug out bags is, you need to have things with you that gonna bring you to your desired location. Nothing less and nothing more. Traveling light is key here, not traveling comfortable. If you can do both – great, but if you need to choose then choose to travel light, fast and maneuverable. You are maybe gonna be forced to run, jump, duck, use weapon with that bag on your back.

I see long lists of things from people who seem to go on camping trip with their bug out bags. Makes no sense to me. You have survival bag or camping bag if you have no bug out location and plan to live in the woods. But before you head for the hills “to live off land” you better know what you do. Otherwise bugging in is better. Anyway, that is something for another article. But if you have a bug out location, getting there fast is most important.

Choosing the right backpack is matter of what you like, your items you carry and of course it must always matter that you keep low profile. So if you are bugging out from city you do not want to look like you are SWAT team member. Nobody survives because of style as well. If you have bug out bag at office then choose a bag that looks like laptop backpack. If you have bug out bag at home, choose a casual sports backpack in darker colors (and without any reflector).

How long are you bugging out?

You are making your bug out bag for bugging out to a safe location your bug out location and it takes you X days to get there. Depending how many days you gonna be there you gonna carry that many items.

It is great thing to have lot of useful things with you on your way to bug out location, but even better thing is to have some useful things and be able to move fast and efficiently.

Just take your perfect bug out bag and do some testing in real life, in some hard conditions, with bad weather.

Here is what I recommend for basic bug out bags.

1.Shelter

I carry  that you can also use inside your backpack to keep things dry and three . Here is higher  but watch out that it is not too heavy or takes too much space.I also sleep in shelter in form of . This is cheap poncho, you look unprepared with it and that is great if you are in city.If you are out of sight of people switch to a better one like  or if you have money to spend.Alternative could be to use a  of course.

2. Hygiene

I have toilet paper, hand sanitizer, and  (if you cant use it in your face or on skin use).

Perfect way to keep yourself clean or take care of small cuts in quick way. Some  is good to have too. Not brushing teeth for few days, bad breath is least of problems.

3.Food

Snacks are good enough. Some ,  and a  is all I have for food.Do not think about your way to bug out location as a picnic, or nature trip. It is gonna look more like dangerous escape from war zone, so you need to act like that. Most probably you are going to eat very fast and you need something simple or you are too tired to cook anyway.

4. Fire

Take many ways of starting a fire. Besides regular  I have , ,, ,  and vaseline soaked cotton balls with me.

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Todays urgent headlines

DARPA: New Terror Threats Demand New Technologies


DARPA: New Terror Threats Demand New Technologies
To deal with the complexities of modern warfare, DARPA seeks to develop integrated and layered systems that can continue to give the military a decisive edge. Examples of technologies that could increase in potency when used in this way include “adaptive electronic warfare,” manned and unmanned systems, tactical cyber capabilities, and advanced intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance. “Modern warfare may be too complex for a single new capability to deliver sustained superiority across a variety of scenarios,” according to the document, titled “Driving Technological Surprise: DARPA’s Mission In A Changing World.” The agency’s investment strategy is to use advanced, commercially available technologies where possible while encouraging new development at universities, government labs and private sector companies, as well as through…


DARPA Developing Guided Bullet With DEAD Reckoning Navigation: Not Only Has Your Name On It, But Address Too
DARPA’s director has announced that GPS is past its prime, and war-boffins have set out to create an alternative, or complementary, technology designed to be small enough to fit inside small-caliber ammunition. GPS is wonderfully ubiquitous, and a great gift from the US military to the rest of the world, but it’s not too accurate – and vulnerable to jamming. This is not even to mention that it only works with line of sight to the sky, all of which has prompted DARPA to come up with a better alternative squeezed into an 8mm cube. That model uses gyroscopes, accelerometers and an atomic clock (development of the latter having been kicked off in 2008) to navigate by dead reckoning. Assuming one knows the starting position, or at least where one wishes to be in relation to that point, then navigation is just a matter of knowing one’s speed and duration of travel – with suitable accuracy of course. Last we heard it was being slipped into…

Boston bombings: How surviving a bomb blast feels and what you can do to help survivors.


Imagine this:

Last thing that you remember is that you were standing with few of your friends in street, now you are laying on ground and looking around you and there is blood running next to your leg, there is something in your throat and it suffocates you, you are trying to remove it with your fingers but nothing comes out, you are trying to swallow it but it is of no help, you are trying to scream but nothing comes out of your mouth. And thing that scare you most is that you notice blood on your pants in groin region, and you think that all future fun is gone.

Your friend gets you on your feet and his mouth are moving but you can not hear sh!t. With his hands he is explaining you that shell exploded some 50 meters from you and your friends.

You are (hopefully only temporary) deaf from blast, you can not talk because blood in your throat because you bite your tongue when that thing exploded. “Luckily” blood running next to your leg is not yours, it is your friends , he is seriously wounded.

And that wet stuff running down your legs and on your pants is not your blood, you just lost your bladder control when detonation happened. It happened unconsciously not because of fear, you did not have enough time even to feel fear.

And then (thanks God) you pass out. Everything starts to hurt later.

This all happened long time ago, but I still remember everything like it is happened yesterday, or like it is happening everyday. I feel very sorry for those innocent killed people in Boston.

I feel sorry for wounded too. Even when they recover they will be wounded for the rest of their lives.

Few times people told me that my experiences are war experiences and they are not applicable to some future SHTF scenarios. Horrible event in Boston clearly shows that you do not need to be at war to have civil victims because of explosions

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Three typical reactions to survival scenarios


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Dealing with everyday problems when SHTF meant that you have to face whole new set of situations, from how to „take shower“ with few liters of water to how to use pure violence when violence was not part of your life before.

As I mentioned many times people used to find all kind of solutions for that problems, actually some people found solutions, those who did not disappeared.

People mostly learned „on the job (of surviving)“ how to deal with that problems, instead of promotion or fancy certificate they got more time on this planet.

In reality lot of survivors did not solve all problems, some of the things and problems were „pushed under the carpet“. People have different ways to deal with situations.

When you wake up one morning in world where everything that you took for granted stopped to exist, just that can blow your mind almost like bullet in head, so people reacted in different ways. Here are most common reactions of people, divided in three groups.

1. King of the playground

SHTF, and there are no rules anymore, and you can go out and do whatever you want. You can use force in order to do whatever you want. You can fulfill your dreams. Everyone is gonna be scared but you are powerful and dangerous, you are the king of the playground. Something like character from your favorite movies, Mad Max maybe.

There were people like this of course, not too many but yea, and they ended up in two main ways:

A.) they ended with their head smashed in first week of SHTF, usually in some very stupid way, real example is they stole some cool car in first days of chaos, and went driving crazy and shooting at everybody till some group got them, pulled them out from the car and tore them apart.

B.) they had charisma, luck and brain. They formed group (gang), become leaders, very powerful people, masters of life and death. They could take or give (forgive) life with one hand move. If other powerful people did not kill them (mostly) they become rich, and they are still rich.

Example would be small time thief who suddenly realized that by showing big amount of guts / courage and will to do atrocities in front of the rioting mob can give him leadership over the people who want leader.

Those of them who survived everything years later very often committed suicide. PTSD catches up with folks, also those who “play hard”. Very important thing is that while I am reading different blogs and forums I can see and recognize lot of „survivalists“ and „preppers“ who are gonna belong to this first group when SHTF. World is gonna be playground for them when SHTF. Most of them gonna end up with heads smashed in first few days. Those few of them who survive beginning of collapse gonna be dangerous bastards. But calm hand and steady aim regulates things.

2. SHTF and what the f… am I going to do?

You wake up one morning and SHTF, you are devastated, waiting for electricity to come back to see on TV what is going on, while people outside demolishing local mall and taking home whatever is useful.

You are believing in government, law and order, „common sense“ and you simple do not understand preppers and all „conspiracy theorists“. Off course you do not believe in guns too, you think that everything can be solved in nice and civilized way. We are humans not animals and do not fight for food and survival with violence like animals do…

People from this group were in great numbers when SHTF in my time, and they will be in great numbers again when SHTF. No matter how much good information is on web, no matter how many bad things are happening around the world, and no matter how much proof is everywhere around us that everything is going to sh!t.

And people from this group ended up:

A.) dead and gone (mostly)

B.) as „soldiers“ of some gang, because they were easiest to „mobilize“ because this kind of folks always need someone to guide them and protect them. Today it is government and system, when SHTF it is gonna be local gang leader who is gonna give them protection, guidance in exchange for their loyalty.

Or they gonna be solo predators, killers and thieves, kinda like „shadowy“ enemy, guy who is gonna stab you in a back for bag of potatoes.

Important thing here is that for us preppers guys from this group (B) are problems because guys from this group are your first neighbor maybe, or your dentist, or your job colleague, or even your good friend. They stab you and then cry and say sorry while robbing you. Remember this: guys from this group are not gonna fall from the sky, they are all around us. They are „good decent and normal folks“ and they do not want to do what they do. So again think about what you are saying to who these days.

C.) they gonna join group of people or family in order to survive. They do whatever they need to protect their home, but they gonna try to stay good.

3. People who are prepared (preppers, survivalists…)

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