Framework of Preparedness

I’d like to review for you what my idea of preparedness is. I must put a disclaimer here. I have been involved in preparedness my entire life. Even my childhood was filled with my Mother canning and baking homemade bread to my Father teaching me self-sufficiency by learning carpentry and mechanical skills. My parents taught preparedness to all of us kids. So my idea of preparedness may not be the same as yours. My guess is my idea of preparedness may seem a little excessive to you. Unless you’re paranoid too! I’m not really paranoid but I like options. Preparedness gives you options. So don’t be overwhelmed by what I think preparedness should be. Start small and work your way to your goal. My preparedness has been over 40 years in the making! Survival Plan Bug In (or retreat): Retreat and home defense books for reference Know your neighbors and surroundings Immediate neighbors Identify key infrastructure Map your area Neighborhood awareness group Network with neighbors Share information Neighborhood protection plan Command and control Security responsibilities Designated evacuation area (Related to Bug out) Home defense plan Identify vulnerable areas Reinforced structures and defenses Steel doors Window bars or coverings Fighting positions Designated evacuation area (Related to Bug out) Bug Out: Bug out bag Financial Sanitation Energy Communication Protection Food Water Medical Identify areas Identify key infrastructure State/Local government facilities Military installations Natural and weather hazards Population density National parks Forestry lands State owned lands Family/Friends property Scout areas Practice bug out plan Fuel People Obstacles Medical Knowledge (Level 1) Medication Stored medications Prescription Pet medications (Knowledge connected to First Aid Kits) Every adult should know: Stabilize neck Treat fractures Treat chest wounds Treat cuts, Suture Control bleeding Open airways Treat shock Administer an IV Clinic Medical records Medical documents Bulk medical supplies (related to First Aid Kits) Reference materials (related to First Aid Kits) First aid kits Trauma kit IFAK (Individual first aid kit) Large kit Bulk medical supplies (related to Clinic) Reference materials (related to Clinic) Desired medical personnel Recruitment Networking Veterinarian EMT/Paramedic Doctor/Dentist Knowledge (Level 2) Advanced reference materials and medical equipment Protection State Laws Property protection laws Firearms restrictions Conceal carry laws Non-Lethal Stun gun Pepper/wasp spray Baton Lethal Blades Firearms –Rifles, Shotguns, Handguns Storage- Ammo cans, gun cabinets, burial vaults Ammunition Training- Range, Shooting drills, Courses Gear- Holsters, Carriers, Pouches, Slings Maintenance Cleaning supplies Lubricants Spare parts Reference materials Communication Security- Radio discipline, Call signs, Limit distance, Privacy (Codes, protocols) Long term plan Equipment HAM- Long range, can send data, expensive, license, technical CB- Cheap, anyone can use VHF- Common to marine industry (Requires energy) 2 way- Cheap, anyone can use, GMRS, FRS, FRS/GMRS (Requires energy) Other Emergency plan Weather radio Meeting place Corded phone- powered by utility AM/FM radio Police scanner E-mail Cell phone- Text messages may work Short wave Food Hunting, fishing, foraging Foraging-wild edibles, plant identification (take a guided trip), reference materials Hunting-Firearms, trapping, slingshot, bow/sling bow Hunting experience-Supporting equipment, field dressing Fishing-Know your area (fish species & seasonal patterns) Catching fish-Cast net/traps, trout/tree lines, rod and reel, survival kit Cleaning fish-preparation, preservation (connected to food storage) 72 hour food supply (bug out/emergency supply) 1 month food supply (long term emergency) 1 year food supply (long term) Gardening/Farming (water requirements for plants, irrigation, animals) Growing crops-Sprouting, seeds Hyrdoculture/hydroponics-infrastructure, tanks, pumps Small scale gardening-Management, rotation, seasons, fertilizer, pest Management, harvest Large scale-Land assessment, Management (same as small scale) Raising livestock Water Selecting livestock Animal husbandry Butchering Aquaculture Determining fish and plants This is but a general framework for your own prepareness plan. Remember to start small, don't go into debt, and don't get overwhelmed. Semper Paratus Check 6 Burn

Repost: No More "No More Mr. Nice Guy" and More

Years ago my Mother sent me all of my Dad’s military pictures from his time in the navy during WWII. I noticed that his ship was one of the many ships that went into Japan after the surrender and he had pictures of it. On the back of the pictures my Dad wrote comments about each picture. Moving a large ship into a harbor can be a dangerous thing. So, the Japanese put a soldier on board my Dad’s ship to help guide it into port. He had pictures of the soldier and on the back he describes the soldier as the “Nip soldier”. My Dad taught his children that calling anyone a name was wrong, but especially words that are racially offensive. When I asked him about it years before he said, “Son, it was war. In war you must demonize the enemy or you will be killing fathers and sons, good people who just want to live their lives.” Years later I am training to kill “rag heads”. It is something we must do as humans to justify killing a fellow human being.
I have the same feelings at times like the Alice Cooper song “No more Mr. Nice Guy”. Like the lyrics at the beginning of this post I consider myself a good guy. I consider myself a Christian trying to live a Christ-like life. As a Mormon, we try to emphasize Christ and His mission of atonement here on this earth. So how can I train to kill someone? That’s the exact opposite of Christ’s teachings. It does seem that Christ’s teachings center around peace, but He did understand the need for defense.
If you’ve ever trained in the military or with law enforcement, you know that everyone is a liar, a cheat, and would kill you for nothing. They are the enemy. That can turn a “sweet, sweet thing” into a not good guy.
You must fight this. You must be realistic and know that everyone out there is not trying to get you. It’s a form of paranoia. It can ruin your life or at the very least, relationships. Relationships with your spouse and your children are the most important relationships you can ever have. They are more important than the brotherhood relationships that you have with your “brothers in arms”. If you didn’t learn that quick, you could be in a world of hurt later on.
Training for self-defense is similar but not quite as intense. You are training to kill another human being. I’ve been to gun ranges that won’t let you shoot “human-like” targets. I think that’s a politically correct way of trying to keep liability off their doorstep. I guess they don’t think anyone is training to kill, even though defense is not necessarily killing. But if you have a hard time thinking that you may very well have to kill, don’t carry a gun. You will hesitate if there is a doubt that you can kill. You may be able to choose not to kill, and that’s what separates you from the animals. You can make a conscience effort to not become cold, and judgmental.
When I was a Bishop I had a counselor who worked in intell in Customs. Because of the nature of his work he was becoming a cold dude. I finally had to take him aside and tell him what he was becoming and what he was doing to his family and others. To his credit, he recognized his direction and changed it.
There is a quote from General James N. Mattis, Marine Commander of US CENTCOMM:
“Be polite, be professional, but have a plan to kill everybody you meet.”
That is our challenge. To not let our training, our job, our past experiences affect us as a father, a husband, a citizen, a priesthood holder, a Christian. But to be prepared.
If you are in combat that is very difficult. The same goes for law enforcement. Be extra vigilant if you are in these situations. As a concealed carry holder you may be faced with killing, but you are not duty bound to kill. You can run away if you want to. Combat and law enforcement won’t allow that.
My dog bit me on the leg today.
My cat clawed my eyes.
Ma's been thrown out of the social circle,
And Dad has to hide.
I went to church incognito.
When everybody rose, the Reverend Smith,
He recognized me,
And punched me in the nose, he said.
No more Mister Nice Guy,
No more Mister Clean,
No more Mister Nice Guy,
He said you're sick, you're obscene.
You can be prepared and still be a nice guy. The world is not as bleak as your training tells you. There are good people out there and not everyone is trying to harm others. But be vigilant, because Mr. Evil is out there. He would like more than anything for you to be asleep. A sheep.
It’s possible to be prepared to fight Mr. Evil and still be Mr. Good Guy. It takes effort and discipline. So don’t let No more Mr. Nice Guy take over your life. I've reprinted this for reasons of self-defense. This is what I do here, promote self-defense. But I also want to talk about being a "nice guy". What reason do you have to be a nice guy? Niceness is not a virtue or commandment. Kindness is. Patience is. Niceness in the men in the church is turning us into soft, less than resiliant, wimps. I'm not promoting meanness or being nasty and cantankerous, but nice is getting old! You don't have to explain why you can't be at an activity trying to justify your absence. You can say no. I'm also not promoting not being courteous. I'm talking about the icky, sweet niceness that is not very genuine. Men can be men. You can be kind and not nice at the same time! Men in the church should work at being good husbands and fathers. But not to the detriment of their masculinity. We should help at home and with our wives, but that doesn't mean we can't go to the shooting range occasionally. Or the golf course or the camp out or fishing trip or even Leggoland. The world would have us be subservient to our wives when the Lord teaches working together as husband and wife. The term "happy wife, happy life" is all kinds of silly! As husband and wife we should work hard to care for, love, and make the other happy. But not just a one-sided mess! There is give and take in a releationship. Wives stop forcing your husbands to do what they don't really want to do only to please you! Husbands stop being a selfish jerk and care for and love your wife! I am not saying that neither should ever give into the other and sacrifice, but it should be a two way street. Men stop trying to be "nice" and be yourself. Be this way: persuasive, long-suffering, gentle and meek, and by having love unfeigned; Be kind and have pure knowledge (I call this revelation), non hypocritical and have no guile. Have charity and faith and virtuous thoughts. And above all, have the Holy Ghost as your constant companion. (Paraphrased from D&C 121:41, 42, 45, 46) Let men be men and women be women. Each has roles. Sometimes those roles are moved around some. That is OK. As long as you are all trying to live Christ-like lives. Don't let Satan and the world fool you into anything else. No more Mr. Nice Guy. Semper Paratus Check 6 Burn

LDS Gunsite Index for 2022

LDS Gunsite Index 2022 Happy New Year and Merry Christmas! 1/2/2022 Index For 2021 2/1/2022 BYU Introspection and Pass the Ammunition! 2/21/2022 Condition Yellow 2/21/2022 Homestead Security 5/13/2022 Learning Security From Scriptures 5/24/2022 Reprint From 2018: Do We Want Our Schools Secure, Or Not? 5/27/2022 Food Storage and Fires 6/14/2022 Spy Crap 9/2/2022 What A Combat Vet Would Share With You 9/4/2022 "Experts" (Reprint from Oct 14, 2016) 9/4/2022 Power and Alternatives 9/4/2022 Bishops and Security: Comment Reply 9/9/2022 Concealed Carry Myths (Reprint from May 21, 2014) 9/9/2022 Becoming A Danite (Updated DEC 2022) 9/29/2022 You Have A Right To Rights! 12/2/2022 Civilian Tactical Training 12/7/2022 Get Home Bag 12/13/2022 Becoming A Danite (Updated DEC 2022) 12/13/2022 Recommended: Has Big Pharma Hijacked Evidence-Based Medicine? By Dr. Joseph Mercola 12/13/2022 Magazine Storage: Loaded? or Unloaded? 12/21/2022 Semper Paratus Check 6 Burn

Magazine Storage: Loaded? or Unloaded?

Storing magazines full or empty. My opinion, regarding your question, comes from my direct experience in the military, as a competitive shooter and as an industry professional. When using quality magazines with quality ammunition, stored and maintained properly, you can leave them loaded as long as you want to without any reservation. GEORGE HARRIS, August 12, 2019, “Shooting Illustrated” De-formed followers, bad ammunition, problematic firearms, and user error are more often to blame for frequent malfunctions than worn magazine springs. Chris Baker, editor of Lucky Gunner Lounge, June 02, 2014 I’ve shot guns with magazines for over 4 decades. I have a lot of experience with good and bad magazines. I have considerably less experience with wheel guns. But I actually taught revolver shooting in the military in the days of yore. I have had a few magazine failures but not very many. When I competed I was paranoid about magazines. If a magazine was ever in question, it was replaced. I did not store my competition magazines with ammo in them for fear of that being a factor. I have changed. I store self-defense magazines full of ammo all the time. I’ve talked to manufacturers, I’ve talked to engineers, and I’ve talked to many other instructors, and the conclusion I have come to is, I’ll store ammo in magazines, but I will probably rotate the ammo and the magazines on a fairly regular basis. In his article in Shooting Illustrated, George Harris said: I thought it fitting to contact some of my friends in the industry, both from an engineering and customer-service perspective. As I suspected, the answers I received were as varied as the number of people to whom I talked. “I called four different people in four different departments at one of the major manufacturers with whom I have a close relationship and received four different answers. They ranged from the magazine could remain loaded indefinitely and still function fine when and if the time came to use them, to a long, complicated regimen of exercising the spring by partially downloading the magazine periodically to different levels so the spring wouldn’t take a set to a specific position because of the number of rounds loaded in the magazine.” I’ve heard similar answers to the above so I adopted my own regime of storing magazines loaded, but rotating the ammunition at least annually, but just as often as not, 3 to 6 months. Some magazines are not used very often so that annual thing has not happened. I know I have some .25 caliber magazines that have not been changed out in a while. Probably a few years. I’ve started to put a post-it note with each magazine stored with a date it was put into storage to get a better idea of how long it has been. Some guns are not shot often and this simple note will at least tell me how old the ammo is. I’m not here to answer the question, “Should I store magazines loaded or not?” I’m here to shed light on the reality of storing and keeping guns functioning and keeping sanity. I’m probably the pickiest about my carry guns and other self-defense guns, but in my experience and for me, I store magazines loaded mostly. Depends on the gun. I have many AR15 magazines and all of them are not full all the time. But I have some guns that have only 4 magazines and I store those full. Unless it is an odd caliber that I don’t shoot much. So you see, the answer to this question is not really a definitive “loaded” or “unloaded”. The only time I’ve wanted all magazines always full was in combat. Otherwise, it’s a case by case basis. I’m glad to have cleared that up…. Semper Paratus Check 6 Burn

Recommended: Has Big Pharma Hijacked Evidence-Based Medicine? By Dr. Joseph Mercola

https://www.lewrockwell.com/2022/12/joseph-mercola/has-big-pharma-hijacked-evidence-based-medicine/ This is a very interesting article and video. I recommend you watch and read, then do your own research! Semper Paratus Chek 6 Burn

Becoming A Danite (Updated DEC 2022)

This is just a reference to the article of SEP 29, 2022. Read it! Burn