With Biden’s encouragement of millions of illegal aliens entering and taking up residence in the United States along with 2024 being an election year, we might be in for a wild ride. Like Will Rogers, all I know about this is what I read on the internet (loosely paraphrased), but from what I’ve read lately I can easily imagine some bad scenarios. I am very interested in your takes on this, what you think is likely, what you are preparing for, and where you think I’m just being paranoid.
Up to this point, I have thought in
terms of short-term disruptions, and that’s what I have been preparing for.
This level of prep is also good for natural disasters, so it would be appropriate
for everyone to prepare for a week or so of disruption. However, given that any
foreign actor who wants direct action teams (terrorist, guerrilla, etc.) in place
in the US has had plenty of opportunity to get them here, I’ve been thinking in
terms of scattered small-scale actions like, e.g., maybe squad-size terrorist
cells shooting up festivals or concerts, maybe even coordinated attacks so
several of these squads hit at the same time in different places. Also,
infrastructure sabotage, like taking down parts of an electrical grid, seems quite
possible. Any of these could produce significant disruptions, but would probably
not last too long, so preparing for a week or two of civil unrest seemed
reasonable.
However, the recent letter on uncontrolled immigration by ten retired FBI leaders got me thinking in much
larger scale terms. I encourage everyone to read the whole letter, but the
following paragraph from it sparked this post:
It would be difficult to overstate the danger represented by the presence inside our borders of what is comparatively a multi-division army of young single adult males from hostile nations and regions whose background, intent, or allegiance is completely unknown. They include individuals encountered by border officials and then possibly released into the country, along with a shockingly high estimate of ‘gotaways’ – meaning those who have entered and evaded apprehension.
Several paragraphs later, the letter
says:
… elements of this recent surge are likely no accident or coincidence. These men are potential operators in what appears to be an accelerated and strategic penetration, a soft invasion, designed to gain internal access to a country that cannot be invaded militarily in order to inflict catastrophic damage if and when enemies deem it necessary.
So, “multi-division army” caught
my thoughts. What if – just thinking through that – we are not looking at
possible action by disparate squads, but by platoons or companies? A company-sized
element, hidden as smaller elements on different patches of private land around
a target area, could carry out repeated coordinated attacks in that area, effectively
rendering the area uncontrolled territory. Now, add in that several
company-sized units could be coordinating attacks within a state. How long
would it take National Guard units to get things under control? And if this
were to happen in multiple states at the same time, federal assistance could take
a while to arrive in any given affected area.
Or, the October 7 attack in
Israel was carried out by about 3 battalions of terrorists, I think. I guess
really good intelligence work would be the only thing that might prevent battalions
of terrorists in the US from hanging out in small groups in geographically distant
areas until the order to go is given and then gathering for and conducting a
mass attack. Really good intelligence work is by no means assured.
I think we can all imagine other possible scenarios, and of course it is possible none of this will happen. I certainly hope and pray that none of it happens.
What do the rest of you think?
What is likely to happen, in your opinion, and why do you think that? What
should we as private citizens be prepared for this year, while we might still
have time to make those preparations?
Edit: I just want to clarify that I'm thinking of what preparations to make, not a "let's go down the worst-case scenarios rabbit hole" conversation. Clearly, other than being ready to escape or make a good account of myself and die well, there's nothing I can really do to prepare for a 10/7-sized assault on my city.
But if I'm not in the targeted area and just affected by loss of services, etc., how should I be prepared? I'm asking because I respect the regulars here and hearing what you think will give me a better idea of what's reasonable. It is a kind of check on my own imagination, if you will.
18 comments:
"From what I’ve read lately I can easily imagine some bad scenarios. I am very interested in your takes on this..."
Right off the bat, I'd like to note that it is a violation of the Stoic principles I've been advocating as a road to happiness and mental stability. One of the most important and basic of these principles is "Never suffer from imaginary harms."
Say you are in a position in which you have lost your job and will soon lose your house if you can't find another. You could lie awake every night worrying about how you're going to lose your house, but worrying and thinking about it won't help you. It will occasion a great deal of sleepless nights and suffering, but that's all it will do.
On the other hand, if you note that you haven't lost your house yet and that tomorrow will bring another opportunity to find a job, you can go to sleep and approach the problem rested.
In addition to the Stoics, this is also advocated in the Havamal (verse 23).
Foolish is he who frets at night,
And lies awake to worry'
A weary man when morning comes,
He finds all as bad as before.
So if you find the game fun, go ahead and talk about it; but don't invest any worry into imaginary things. The important thing is to work out what you stand for, not to fret about every possible thing that might go wrong.
Second, I would note that an army of the sort they are imagining in that letter would be an army cut off from an army’s logistical support. Separated for movement they could sustain themselves, but coming together to strike would allow only for a short term action. They would perhaps kill a lot of people, but from an enemy perspective it would be throwing away a “multi-division army” with no hope of victory.
The power grid is the exception; taking it down would be relatively easy, and putting it back up would take a very long time. Individual preparations won’t help much there, except for people who are willing to turn their lives upside down: move out of the cities, find a place where you can do the kind of hydropower I was talking about, grow a garden.
Taking your first point to heart, I will make an edit or two to clarify what I'd like to talk about here.
One of the most important and basic of these principles is "Never suffer from imaginary harms."
I do consider worst case scenarios, not from a worry-myself-to-death about them perspective, but from a what would one look like, and what can I do to prepare--including "giving a good account of myself and dying well."
To that end, I'm heavily informed by Pillsbury's The One Hundred-Year Marathon and Qiao and Wang's Unrestricted Warfare, both of which I've recommended before. These also occur against the PRC's expanding (slowly) economic distress and its (rapidly) expanding demographic strait. Included in this is what I believe was a test run with the Russian shutdown of the Colonial Pipeline and Biden's subsequent surrender regarding Nord Stream II, along with Biden's timidity regarding arming Ukraine. These last two more instructed the PRC and its PLA leadership (which Xi is revamping, perhaps in a legitimate effort to rid the PLA of corruption, perhaps in an effort to clear the decks preparatory to engagement--he doesn't seem to be carrying out a Stalin-esque Party purge of his military) than it did Russia, in the context of OP.
I've also seen the reports concerning the numbers of military age single males flooding across our erstwhile southern border; some of those reports aggregate the numbers of such PRC-origin males as amounting to as much as three divisions worth.
I don't see that as a three-division army requiring logistic support, though; I see that--to the extent the reports are accurate--as three divisions of PLA special forces, which will operate off the land. That gives me pause. Colonial pipeline demonstrated how vulnerable our oil (and by extension, our natural gas) distribution network is to disruption. Our electricity grid is even more vulnerable, as are our financial centers. Thus, while terrorist-instigated disruptions will likely be short-term, I don't see PLA-instigated disruptions being anything short of long-term with a view to forcing our surrender and acceptance of occupation. Possibly PLA special forces action would be a follow-on to the PLA's first strike capability; possibly they would be the opening blow, with the threat of follow-on nuclear being then made plain.
It's just too easy to disrupt our hydrocarbon distribution networks, and it's just too easy to generate, in situ, small scale EMP devices with which to take down key electric grid nodes, financial centers, even water distribution control computers. (What really angrifies me about the EMP bit is that it's so easy and cheap to harden our grid and our financial and data centers against EMPs, but we're not doing it. It's cheap and easy enough that the only real need for government involvement is to help the utilities with their electric grids, but everyone keeps pointing at somebody else to do it, if they deign consider it at all.)
Thus, I'm preparing for long-term disruption, potential national political collapse, and overt resistance.
In any event, preparations for long-term disruption/occupation will stand us in good stead if I'm being hysterical and disruptions do turn out to be short-term.
Eric Hines
I don't think the PLA has three divisions of special operators to send. They do have some, but they're divided into brigades spread across their geographic command. They're also completely untested, except for the navy ones who have performed counter-piracy stuff.
What you're talking about would require stripping the whole PLA of its special operations capacity, in order to throw them away -- it's a suicide mission, without any support or possibility of relief -- on a gamble that they could pull off what you are talking about them doing.
It's far more likely that these 'military age males' are showing up so much because that's the population that's always most likely to immigrate in search of fortune. During America's Western expansion, almost everyone who went to the frontier was a young man: stories from the California Gold Rush highlight how women and babies were so rare that one miner paid a woman a whole bag of gold dust just to get to hold her baby for a little while. It's not that weird that young men would mostly be the ones who would undertake a difficult adventure in search of fortune.
All most likely true. However, even a single special forces brigade, dispersed into 5-man teams, is more than enough for the dispersed, coordinated disruptions.
Eric Hines
Similarly, Matthew 6:34 "Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof." It is fine to make preparations against bad possibilities. It is not good to give your heart to them.
Looking at what others think and how they will vote, however, it is interesting that even Massachusetts Democrats who seldom pay attention to anything but local races are livid about Biden and the border. I don't know how much effect that will have. These are still people who assume Republicans hate all decent people.
I know Grim likes to go on about these new-fangled philosophies, but let's go back a bit further:
Unless the Lord builds the house,
those who build it labor in vain.
Unless the Lord watches over the city,
the watchman stays awake in vain.
It is in vain that you rise up early and go late to rest,
eating the bread of anxious toil;
for he gives to his beloved sleep.
And in the NT, AVI assumes we know the first part of that verse ("Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself."), but there is also Philippians 4:6:
"Have no anxiety about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God."
Some of the Greeks are a bit older than the NT, but it's a good sentiment. Figure out what you stand for, that's the most important thing. Put your trust where it belongs.
If the enemy looks to conquer the USA, they won't do it with a few divisions.
But if they wish to create chaos, ushering in Rule by Dictator (for the safety and protection of all, of course) it wouldn't take much more than 2-3 dozen well-placed destructive devices on the electrical grid.
Doesn't require Spec Ops to do this; all it requires is a few dozen well-trained drones. And the training doesn't have to be too complex, either.
In all likelihood, they'll be able to melt back into the crowd that they came from with no difficulty whatsoever.
So, AVI & Dad29 (or anyone else), what are your thoughts on preparation?
Yet, is this not a parable for being willing to consider what may lie outside the norm?
Havamal 38: "Never step a foot from your door/ without your weapons of war: for never sure is the knowing/ when you might be needing/ your weapons along the road."
To worry too much is a drag, but also to expect all to be solved as it arises may be on the Pollyanna side. So before going to bed, take the time to sharpen and oil your weapons. In the morning, you may not have time.
Some balance is called for.
An invasion and conquering army is not something I worry about. I am much more concerned with an internal cascade failure where debt/inflation, crime, lack of infrastructure and dis-interested or complicit government corrodes away our society- and this may be exactly what those who seek to remove American influence in the world desire.
A concrete example-our local hardware store has most items either locked in a cage, or retained on the wire hangers with a plastic lock. Everything has a rfid tag on the packaging. Cameras are everywhere. No store employee can raise a hand to stop the blatent theft. A common PA announcement- "loss prevention isle 8." Our grand D majority has deemed shoplifting to not be an offense. So the stores are prime foraging grounds for hunter gatherers of the lowlife scene. On line marketing means anything can be sold easily.
Trust is breaking down. Do I worry? Some. Do I go armed? Always.
BTW- If the power grid goes down, it will be mad max time in two weeks.
^ sp "blatant".
Well, Havamal verse one:
All door-ways, before going forward, should be looked to; for difficult it is to know where foes may sit within a dwelling.
So yes, you should look at what’s in front of you; and you should always be prepared. Some balance though: you shouldn’t let imagination run wild and draw you into troubles that were never actual.
The danger that I think warrants the most prep effort is disruption to the electrical grid. It's far too dispersed to be easily guarded, and destruction that takes moments can take weeks or months to repair, especially if the supply line is disrupted, as it easily can be when the electrical grid is damaged. There can be a surprisingly quick cascade effect, as we learned after the Big Freeze a few years ago.
We can work on temporary electrical power supplies, and stockpile staples. None of this will work well to combat a long-term or widespread power outage, but it can make adjusting to a temporary outage far less fraught.
There's a fine line between dysfunctional fretting and prudent planning for an event that appears to be somewhat unlikely but also quite serious if it occurs. In this case, though, disruption to the electrical grid can occur for so many reasons that it's not wasted worrying to have some reasonable backup plans.
Yeah, Tex, that seems to keep coming up as the bigger danger. I think you're right. I'm just getting into my research on generators, so hopefully I'll get that covered in the very near future.
Grim: "Some of the Greeks are a bit older than the NT ..."
Just so there's no misunderstanding, when I said, "Grim likes to go on about these new-fangled philosophies," you do know that has to be a joke, right?
But, my first quote was from the Psalms, so HA!
I've been working on a Gutenberg Psalms project and was surprised to read that, although some of the Psalms are quite old, various ones may date anywhere from the 9th to the 5th centuries B.C. They probably were put into their present familiar form after the Babylonian exile and return, 5th C. or even later, like most of the Old Testament. The Book of Job surprised me the same way. I thought it would turn out to be old, old, old, because the Hebrew is apparently extremely difficult, but it's probably post-exilic and just very poetic and idosyncratic in its language.
I gather the Israelites are thought to have arrived or begun to thrive in Canaan shortly after the collapse of the Bronze Age civilizations in the 12th C., but the Biblical monarchies generally are dated to the 9th C.
I recently heard that you can find on tik tok instructions for coming to America via the Southern Border, and that many Chinese are doing just that. This, to me, indicates a clear intent from the party that this is desirable. They may not be trained troops, but their loyalties aren't to America. Never forget, the Chinese play the long game- decades, centuries even. Just one piece in a large puzzle.
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