[tc556guy]

TC556 - Only advice I can offer is simply to not expect to make logical ground with gunkid. Gunkid is who he is, and chooses to remain contentiously irrational regardless of simple, logical questions and/or observations. He "don't need no stinking logic"; he's the great and powerful gunkid. He's infallible. Just ask him.

{edit - gunkid, I forgot to ask; are those self-inflicted airsoft injuries healing up okay..?}

His rep preceeds him across much of the internet but thanks

 

[tc556guy]

so tell us all the historical perspectives about having nearly everyone be an inept pussy, of not having horsedrawn farm gear, of having all the seed be unable to reproduce (ie, hybrid) of having 80 million starving dogs, of having 10 million scumbag gangmembers, of being totally dependent upon something you can't GET (ie, gasoline, pesticides, herbicides) of having all your crops be unable to resist common pests and weeds. ? it's never happened before, and it's going to be an effing disaster so bad that most will commit suicide rather than face it.

I think you need to get off the internet for a while and look around you.
You're taking every worst case scenario the chest thumpers put out on the net about what SHTF would look like and taking it to heart that THAT is exactly what it would look like.
Yeah it's going to be bad, but its been bad before and civilization has pulled through. The Black Plague wiped out a good chunk of European society. Major wars in the 19th and 20th century increasingly took larger chunks of entire generations and wiped them out.
I believe that in the end we as a species and as a nation are more resilient than you give us credit for. Sure, the learning curve will be steep for a lot of people. It wont be easy. And in the end, I doubt that you will be one of the survivors despite all of your bombast on the net over much of the last 20 years.

 

[justme]

dream on. do you have a ****ing CLUE what 200 million dead, in a few months, will DO to this place? when there's no oil, no food, no water in the pipes, no electricity, no vehicles running? HAVE you spent years listening to gang bangers make their plans. Have YOU seen people sell out their spouses, etc, over not spending a mere weekend in jail? would YOU spend a weekend in jail, to save somebody else's secrets?

 

[justme]

what would you get out of staying on post, when nobody else is, hmm? who's protecting and providing for your family while you sit there, doing nothing? wtf is the food gonna come from? what will you tell all their friends (and THEIR families) when THEY want food and protection, hmm?

 

[BigBassMan]

"HAVE you spent years listening to gang bangers make their plans." Why would anyone even want to listen to a bunch of dopers in the first place? Are those kind your heros? Where are they now? Still there or dead?

 

[tc556guy]

dream on. do you have a ****ing CLUE what 200 million dead, in a few months, will DO to this place? when there's no oil, no food, no water in the pipes, no electricity, no vehicles running? HAVE you spent years listening to gang bangers make their plans. Have YOU seen people sell out their spouses, etc, over not spending a mere weekend in jail? would YOU spend a weekend in jail, to save somebody else's secrets?

I've spent 28 years in law enforcement.
Sure I know that some criminals are feral, more than the liberals who push for ATI programs and talk about the criminal class as just normal people who are "poor disadvantaged people with a drug problem" realize.
I know that a good number of them are nothing more than big talkers too.
I'm not saying that the criminal element wont be a problem, but if things break down enough to where the existing judicial system is unreliable, the country folk I know wont call me to solve their problem; they'll settle it on their own, and there's still a lot of empty land in my county where holes can be dug and forgotten about.

what would you get out of staying on post, when nobody else is, hmm? who's protecting and providing for your family while you sit there, doing nothing? wtf is the food gonna come from? what will you tell all their friends (and THEIR families) when THEY want food and protection, hmm?

Read my earlier posts.
When the system as we know it starts to unwind, I see command and control shifting to more of a decentralized model.
More like back in some of the earlier frontier days when more problems were solved on their own, or major offenses were handled in a different way than they are now
I see that if people in villages work together, there's more than enough manpower for the tasks at hand.
I know my neighbors, they know me.
The gardens will still grow, the farmers who are here now will still farm, although they'll have to adapt to the new limitations of transportation, markets, etc.
In other words, I have faith that in working together, the small villages that I know around here will thrive
In my area you look at the map and you see what are today barely registering little blips on the map that a century ago were self-sufficient little communities. Farmers went to town at the county seat once a month for business or to get stuff their little communities couldn't provide. Everything else they needed that they couldn't make on their own was available in the small commercial centers that are today nothing but bedroom communities and blips on the county map. The little blips on the map today, if things stop working, will I believe congeal back to little thriving self-reliant cells of humanity. Not quite a village, some of them, but they'll survive.
I'm talking long term here, not in the days after a collapse, but in the literally years after things fall apart.
Will things be hard? Sure. Will people die? Sure.
But I'll stay on my post because if there isn't a core group of people that doesn't try to bring order from chaos, guys like you who see only mayhem and disorder may wind up being right. My money is on having more faith on humanity in general being able to pull through hard times, even if the casualty list of individuals does stretch on a ways.
You can go ahead and be a naysayer and disbeliever and demand that it's not possible. Heck, your plan is probably to BE one of the ones picking on the less powerful than you to survive, even if you don't care to admit it here. Me, I'll surround myself with can-do people who think positive things can be done.

 

[BigBassMan]

Loaners with their canteen cup an spoon trying to dig a spider hole is hopeless, just cause it was on the internet, one or maybe even two people might believe that krap.
Knocked out with drugs, underground? Not the best idea in the world. Ranks right up there with wacking warlords. Or killing farmers cows. Get a life away from the computer games. Being caught going into a hole would be death in an instant.

 

[John in AR]

Loaners with their canteen cup an spoon trying to dig a spider hole is hopeless...

That's because you're not allowing for the force-multiplier effect that is afforded by the mighty credit-card axe:

As awesome as is when it comes from the factory, if you weld on some extra vanes on that bad boy, it's "big brother better watch out" time. :laugh:

 

[BigBassMan]

Mall ninjas standing in line to buy one of those.

 

[E in AZ]

Hey fellas,

I used to post here years ago as "krept" but it seems the account may have gone by the wayside as a mod and thus axed when the switchover happened.

Since I posted, it was conversations just like this that caused me to learn about high level emergency management, then do what I can to improve things within my sphere of influence. Before I post, just a forewarning that I am going off of memory even though google is certainly available; these words shouldn't be seen as Truth

Based off of the Katrina model, FEMA and the CDC basically predict a 40% workforce attrition rate during the two peaks we expect in a novel pandemic. I'm taking a huge stab in the dark and trying to remember... I think they are anticipated to be 4-6 weeks long each, with a similar gap of 4-6 weeks between them. Thus, figure that things will be sketchy for about 3 months. I use that word because of my background in biology, pandemics are naturally my phobia.

Unlike your typical threats (human-induced) or hazards (natural or technological accidents), pandemics really do not impact our infrastructure, as in facilities, electric grid, etc. Pandemics represent an impact to personnel, hence the salient question of the thread about who will still be at their post.

While we have the hard infrastructure in place, we also have the administrative infrastructure in place in the form of planning. At the national level, it's part of NIMS and pandemics are envisioned in the NRFs - National Response Framework and National Recovery Framework, both of which are found on FEMA's website. In particular, I believe this situation would either be the Public Health Emergency Support Function (ESF) or in a pandemic-specific annex.

States tend to mirror the NRFs with their own versions; local governments like counties, cities and tribes tend to roll up with agreements for mutual aid ie EMACs. For pandemics, CDC disseminates to state health, who typically have county health take the lead, with state actors tending to serve more as a liaison.

The "plans" at the granular level (i.e. individual entities) are Continuity of Operations (COOP) for government and Business Continuity Plans (BCPs) for business. Continuity plans, like the NRFs, are "all-hazard" and again, pandemic is envisioned because it represents the Omega of an impact to personnel, whereas an "Alpha" (or beginning) of a continuity plan would be someone in leadership being sick (i.e. "who is the successor? what are the limits to his or her authority and for how long?" and so on).

Government entities as well as Critical Infrastructure (elec, gas, telecom, etc.) are *REQUIRED* to have COOPs or BCPs. Templates are online and readily accessible.

Now, specific to pandemics, each entity listed as having an either direct or support role in a given ESF will have their own internal plans, policies and procedures for what they do. Typically these will just be EOPs, emergency operating procedures, not unlike what they'd do day-to-day... they just do the same thing under different circumstances. This is why continuity planning is also known as contingency planning, i.e. "plan b."

In a nutshell, the plan is for government and business to continue to function as close to normal as possible. My point in all this is that there is a lot more organization than many would think.

Think of old-world voyages across the ocean and the anxiety of not knowing what's on the other side, if anything at all. We have been through pandemics and know there is a pattern and know there is light at the end of the tunnel, so to speak... i.e. it's not going to be the apocalypse

cheers,

Erik

 

[justme]

such numbers are just a shot in the dark. Nobody can know how bad the epidemic might be, nor what panicked people will do, or what predator types will take advantage to do. They took PLENTY of advantage during Katrina, and that was just one area with the rest of the US to help out, run-to, etc, and nobody was scared to death of other people, as a pandemic will make most of the sheeple. When it looks like there's no public protection or punishment (and there won't be) then the hounds of hell are likely to be un-leashed. one can't risk not being ready for such, it only takes one to kill or ruin you or yours. Good to see you, Krept.

 

[justme]

apparently you're just stupid, Joe. I was mis-led all those years. The spider hole should be dug in ADVANCE of shtf, just as I've always said. I've ALSO always said that gear should be cached at the BOL, which certainly should include tools, such as a shovel, pick, axe, saw, etc.

 

[John in AR]

Once again, we're supposed to blindly accept the logic-disconnect of "nobody knows what will happen":

Nobody can know how bad the epidemic might be, nor what panicked people will do, or what predator types will take advantage to do...

followed in the same breath with "this is what will happen":

...scared to death of other people, as a pandemic will make most of the sheeple. When it looks like there's no public protection or punishment (and there won't be)....

Fwiw, I agree that nobody knows what will happen down the road. I'm just honest enough to admit that "nobody" includes me.

 

[E in AZ]

Honestly, if you are interested, there is a CPRI - Calculated Priority Risk Index used to quantify threats and impacts. While they do involve some subjectivity, research and plans based on them are quite vetted.

CPRIs feed into Hazard Mitigation Plans, i.e. the process used to prioritize and reduce or ideally eliminate risks. The rubber meets the road when we discuss things like buying an extra 500k medical countermeasures to stockpile in the unlikely event of a pandemic (which also have limited shelf life) or spend that same money on flood control, like repairing aging dams.

Of course, if we do both, that is "an increase in government spending" so there is always an opening through which stones and arrows can enter.

 

[E in AZ]

(blue emphasis is mine)

When it looks like there's no public protection or punishment (and there won't be)....

Exactly, and that's why we have National Essential Functions (here are the first 2 of 8):
"1. Ensuring the continued functioning of our form of government under the Constitution, including the functioning of the three separate branches of government

2. Providing leadership visible to the Nation and the world and maintaining the trust
and confidence of the American people; "

Here are OKs first two:
"Ensuring the continued functioning of our state government under the Oklahoma Constitution, including the functioning of the three separate branches of government. This SEF includes State executive branch functions that respect the roles and maintain the check and balance relationship among all three branches of the State Government. Figure 9

2. Providing leadership visible to the State and the Nation and maintaining the trust
and confidence of Oklahoma citizens. This SEF includes State department and agency
functions to demonstrate that the State Government is viable, functioning, and effectively
addressing any emergency."

I've linked OK's plan to implement COOP/COG above for additional reference to show these things are indeed contemplated. Often due to infosec, the actual plans are sheltered as FOUO from public records requests/FOIAs.