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Whatchagonna DO ?
Highball
Member Posts: 15,755
Well ..the subject continues to grow. Perhaps it is time to advance another step.
Scenario;
The country has sunk into a deep depression. There are roving bands of criminals and assorted thugs ..plundering and killing and burning nearly at will. The government has retreated to the bigger cities ..lack of manpower compelling them to limit their areas of control.
The police are outgunned and out manned ..and many on the take. There are none within 30 miles of your retreat...and they won't come anyway.
You have established your 160 acres with a group of like-minded individuals ..men chosen carefully for their abilities and belief in the Constitution.
You have had several brushes with the local bike gang...murdering thugs that exist by praying on others...some have been shot, as your men protected themselves.
They are systematically working their way towards your retreat...leaving broken and dead people in their wake.
The next neighbor over is completely opposed to you and your armed group...guns are an evil thing, you see. His hundred acres is a nice place ..he keeps chickens, a few steers, and a hog or two. Nice guy ..as long as guns are not the topic.
Five days ago, your OP watches as the biker gang roars into his yard ..and shortly afterwards, they watch as a steer is slaughtered and devoured by the gang. The gang appears to be settling in for perhaps the winter ..its getting cold, nights, and there appears to be plenty of food there.
There are groups of bikers leaving ..they come back loaded with booty.
Your neighbor had previously refused your offer of lending a hand in just such a case .."nobody needs guns".
Now ..in his last, desperate attempt to stay alive, he is aiding and abetting the enemy. Your outpost sees him busily butchering the steers, the chickens...as his wife unwillingly becomes the center of the show .
His refusal to allow any aid in his own defense has dictated that he WILL be subject to the lowest dregs of society.
The question is;
WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO DO ?
Scenario;
The country has sunk into a deep depression. There are roving bands of criminals and assorted thugs ..plundering and killing and burning nearly at will. The government has retreated to the bigger cities ..lack of manpower compelling them to limit their areas of control.
The police are outgunned and out manned ..and many on the take. There are none within 30 miles of your retreat...and they won't come anyway.
You have established your 160 acres with a group of like-minded individuals ..men chosen carefully for their abilities and belief in the Constitution.
You have had several brushes with the local bike gang...murdering thugs that exist by praying on others...some have been shot, as your men protected themselves.
They are systematically working their way towards your retreat...leaving broken and dead people in their wake.
The next neighbor over is completely opposed to you and your armed group...guns are an evil thing, you see. His hundred acres is a nice place ..he keeps chickens, a few steers, and a hog or two. Nice guy ..as long as guns are not the topic.
Five days ago, your OP watches as the biker gang roars into his yard ..and shortly afterwards, they watch as a steer is slaughtered and devoured by the gang. The gang appears to be settling in for perhaps the winter ..its getting cold, nights, and there appears to be plenty of food there.
There are groups of bikers leaving ..they come back loaded with booty.
Your neighbor had previously refused your offer of lending a hand in just such a case .."nobody needs guns".
Now ..in his last, desperate attempt to stay alive, he is aiding and abetting the enemy. Your outpost sees him busily butchering the steers, the chickens...as his wife unwillingly becomes the center of the show .
His refusal to allow any aid in his own defense has dictated that he WILL be subject to the lowest dregs of society.
The question is;
WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO DO ?
Comments
My course of action would be largely dependent on what my own band was capable of. If we were strong enough, I'd want to try to push them off my neighbors land.....If not, it might be a long winter.
Taking offensive action, even if the party being rescued "had it coming" serves a couple of purposes:
1) You've eliminated a clear and present danger your own survival
2) You may have won someone to your cause....if nothing else, I can just about guarantee the wife comes over, she'll keep a gun from then on whether hubby likes it or not.
3) Its the right thing to do.
If, by some twisted logic, the newly liberated neighbors go right back to the way they were before, that's fine...#1 was a good enough reason to take action, and it would be a good enough reason to take action again if the situation reoccurred...but I wouldn't shed any tears at their loss.
The neighbor should be approached and the offer should be re-stated. The offer should specifically state the protective nature of the action and clearly define the self-interest you have in extending your perimeter, coupled with the specific statement that his property is his and that you only expect full access for defense and the launching of any offensive action you deem necessary for the security of that perimeter. People tend to have a different view of armed self-defense once violated.
If he is an unwilling participant with the Bikers, the conversation would last 5 minutes. If he is a willing participant, he thus knows full well their activities and proclivities and he should be shot where he stands, his land secured, treated with respect, and returned to his wife and heirs when the situation stabilizes.
The obvious conundrum is that he could be an unwilling participant with the bikers, yet still unwilling to take the step and accept your offer. In that case, one could not shoot him, and one could not force him off his land. As he has proven his pacifism in not resisting the bikers, he will simply have to accept that his land will be occupied by you until the threat no longer exists. If that pacifism is not repeated for your group, his true sympathies will have been exposed.
Brad Steele
An occupation is a task. Men that would otherwise be doing something productive will instead have to play babysitter and keep an eye on the neighbors and their property.....this has been the case with occupations throughout history.
An occupation only works when the benefits outweigh the costs.....and occupations provide three major benefits
Plunder: As when Iraq occupied Kuwait.
Living space: As when Germany invaded Poland and the USSR
Defensive Advantage: Israel's occupation of the Golan Heights.
Your principles take the first two off the table....so it is only the 3rd condition which has any relevance, as I see it....and in this scenario, I couldn't see many conditions where occupying another parcel of land would make good sense from a defensive standpoint.
A small, compact perimeter is most easiest to defend....a longer perimeter means your rifles are spread thinner, and without the benefit of extra hands to man the lines you're only making your position weaker.
If that gang is settling in for the winter, it'll be a long hard one with proven enemies that close so it only makes sense to take them out before they decide to come calling on US again. If we can't assalt them directly, we employ massive recon on their movements and stealth tactics to remove stragglers , once again IF skills and manpower allows this without hurting MY groups chances for long-term survival. You can't let a known, dangerous enemy gain a foothold, or in this case a stronghold, otherwise more than just you is going to be in harms way if their group gets larger now that they have a home base of sorts.
Just my uneducated two bits worth......
I find damn little to argue about in the above solutions..ANY OF THEM !!! The situation being fluid, one must evaluate all aspects;
But allowing a deadly enemy to co-exist just across the fence is playing the part of `victim' ..something I despise.
Where ..perhaps I differ is;
When it came time for the assault to take out the bikers.I would do my level best to protect the wife ..her part in all this not being known, and what is being observed is her very unwilling participation .
I would not be quite so careful concerning the husband ..and damn SURE wouldn't risk one of my men lives to save him.
And there WOULD be an effort made to take out the gang; Otherwise, YOU may as well start packing and try to flee in the middle of the night...for they will eventually fall upon your little group and take you down.
Don's remark about restitution to the wife and Heirs is also a damn important point...provided clear evidence exists that the wife took no part willingly.
But simply from a security stand point, we could let him go it on his own. We would have to assume a protective stance to enhance our own security.
IF advantage dictates, we rescue the wife and any kids and take out the gang. Every last ONE of that gang. We won't worry much about saving the husband. Orders would be given NOT to harm him, but if his stupidity got him killed, I wouldn't lose sleep.
After the cleanup, we let the wife and kids free, to do what they wish, either join us or live it alone. IF it happened again, no effort would be made to save them IF they decided not to join us. We would eliminate the enemy and let THEM clean up the mess.
If our numbers were QUESTIONABLE, then we would have to pick them off as oppertunity allowed, within a short time frame. Making every ATTEMPT to save the wife and kids.
That would not be automatic ..in my opinion. If the husband was killed in the action, there would be a necessity to provide a certain level of care to the survivors...but unless there was an honest embracing of the groups philosophy ..after all, we are talking about the Constitution, here..One could not afford to extend `benefits' until there was some proof.
The safety of the fighting core being rather important...to say nothing at all of the major risk to the women and children by taking in a viper.
Finding the wife standing over the body of some scumbag would be a good start, here...
like it was said befor though. there are a lot of variables that could get thrown into this to have a totally different outcome.
Unfortunately...unless one has spent some time thinking through the possibilities...that person will never be prepared for ACTION when it is time for action.
Exploring the limits of what a decent citizen ought to do is a viable exercise.
if you never plan for the future and how to act accordingly (should something happen) you will be horribly unprepared in all situations.
it is alot of times no fault of the wife her husbands views/actions(how many times have you met a total a-hole with an angel for a wife), unless she herself has cast off our ideals she would deserve to be helped, provided the group was strong enough to handle the situation. as far as a mini-scale war with a biker gang, they are generally close quarter/ hit you when you arent looking types, not the type that can wage full scale fire-fight with 20 guys with ars/aks/skss and experience.
you definetly do not want THEM as your neighbors so it would be counterintuitive to take them out, where are they gonna go when the resources of the neighbor are used up? and a little chivalry in all men think it would be prudent to help the wife. as far as the male neighbor, well he would make a good wood chopper/cook/etc.
i absolutly dont think it would be OK to ignore the situation, it would not go away.
keep this in mind, there is 1 reason we remain at the top of the food chain.. All of our other attributes hone just that one main skill. That skill is being the meanest most ruthless killers of all species on the planet.. the level of conformity in our civilization may have retarded that skill, but it is there still.
I would have pointed out the peaceful nature of our group (unless attacked) for the entire time that we had been neighbors, that our group could have easily marched in and seized his property if we had so desired, but did not out of respect for a fellow citizen embroiled in the same difficulty that all peaceful citizens were. In view of that fact, perhaps he would enter into an agreement whereby we would extend protection to his family (if needed) in exchange for provender. Whether our armed help were ever needed or not, he certainly could benefit from having a friend next door. What if a storm blew his roof off? What if he needed help digging a new well? The ex-military medical techs that would no doubt be a part of our force could be helpful if needed.
Perhaps the demonstration of the superiority of our methods in dealing with the attackers would win him over to our side - at least to the point of a grudging acceptance until national order could be reestablished.
Be that as it may.....on to the question.
Using ONLY the information posted.
In the interest of self preservation, clearing out the vermin, isn't even in question. Since you have had previous encounters with them, where some of them have been shot, they have established a pattern that you CAN NOT allow to advance. They will NOT forget you, and you are in their path of destruction. Here is where an old proverb comes into play. The best defense is a good offense.
Since there was no information on the size of either group, yours or the biker group. To reduce their numbers, since they send out groups to pillage and plunder, you ambush those groups, when they are on their way back.
You make your best plan (snipers? frontal? middle of the night? etc) to take out the rest of them, and proceed.
In the scenario posted, he is butchering steers. Obviously he does have "the means" to dispatch large animals. His wife (keyword
He is allowed free roam, to dispatch the critters, and has the means to do this. Yet he does NOTHING about what is happening to his wife??? [:(!][:(!][:(!]
Scenario aside, if I was witness to a woman getting raped, I would risk whatever to come to her aid, even if I didn't know her. To allow this to happen to my wife, while I had a breath of life in me.......is UNTHINKABLE.
Should this neighbor be caught in the crossfire, while exterminating the biker vermin, I would NOT loose any sleep over it.
I wonder what the raging debate, the names being called. and the animosity is all about ?
Not trying to pick a fight, but the debate centered on what to do with the anti-gun neighbors BEFORE the "bikers" arrived.
The neighbor lives on the hundred over...he STILL lived there ..giving the bikers a foothold.
I think it is self-explanatory. He has been left alone. You leaped to conclusions ..using remarks made by me in a state of revulsion at anti-gunners.
In a life/death struggle ..there will be far more important things to do then quiz the neighbors on their gun control stances. Their actions will be readily apparent ..and those that refuse to advance the cause of regaining control of a situation spiraling out of control will be left ALONE.
That place will merely be watched ..to ensure that the scenario I put forth does NOT happen right on ones doorstep.
Pickenup;
Sorry about the `bikers'. Stands to reason... gas will be precious. Freebooters will use bikes to get around. I use the term because it is instantly classified in most folks minds...injustice to `bikers' like you.
I think it is self-explanatory. He has been left alone. You leaped to conclusions ..using remarks made by me in a state of revulsion at anti-gunners.
In a life/death struggle ..there will be far more important things to do then quiz the neighbors on their gun control stances. Their actions will be readily apparent ..and those that refuse to advance the cause of regaining control of a situation spiraling out of control will be left ALONE.
Fair enough
On subject: something about laying off some sorta pipe...
So would you call me a hero, if, when they show up to take my guns, I kill a bunch of them???? I doubt it, I sure as hell doubt it!
Hopefully when it comes to that nobody will be at your house, and you will have friends standing with you to make sure that doesn't happen. Most yes men are cowards, and unlss they have a clear numerical advantage they will turn and run at the first sign of serious resistance
Well ..the subject continues to grow. Perhaps it is time to advance another step.
Scenario;
The country has sunk into a deep depression. There are roving bands of criminals and assorted thugs ..plundering and killing and burning nearly at will. The government has retreated to the bigger cities ..lack of manpower compelling them to limit their areas of control.
The police are outgunned and out manned ..and many on the take. There are none within 30 miles of your retreat...and they won't come anyway.
You have established your 160 acres with a group of like-minded individuals ..men chosen carefully for their abilities and belief in the Constitution.
You have had several brushes with the local bike gang...murdering thugs that exist by praying on others...some have been shot, as your men protected themselves.
They are systematically working their way towards your retreat...leaving broken and dead people in their wake.
The next neighbor over is completely opposed to you and your armed group...guns are an evil thing, you see. His hundred acres is a nice place ..he keeps chickens, a few steers, and a hog or two. Nice guy ..as long as guns are not the topic.
Five days ago, your OP watches as the biker gang roars into his yard ..and shortly afterwards, they watch as a steer is slaughtered and devoured by the gang. The gang appears to be settling in for perhaps the winter ..its getting cold, nights, and there appears to be plenty of food there.
There are groups of bikers leaving ..they come back loaded with booty.
Your neighbor had previously refused your offer of lending a hand in just such a case .."nobody needs guns".
Now ..in his last, desperate attempt to stay alive, he is aiding and abetting the enemy. Your outpost sees him busily butchering the steers, the chickens...as his wife unwillingly becomes the center of the show .
His refusal to allow any aid in his own defense has dictated that he WILL be subject to the lowest dregs of society.
The question is;
WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO DO ?
I will improvise, adapt, and over come. Unlike some here I don't have a closed mind and do not believe in the 'everything or nothing/always or never' policy![}:)]
Tells us precisely nothing at all.
The only thing I can make out of that is ;
"I have no values I will stand up squarely for or against...I will bend whichever way the wind is blowing".
That capsulate it ?
This was probing the mindset of various responders concerning their duties to `protect and defend the Constitution' ..where it begins...and where it ends.
I didn't expect some `Three men take the right flank..three the left"..
Rack,, I thought the question was what to do after the "bikers" showed up.
That was the question this time, but our previous.....disagreement....came from a perception of what would transpire before we found ourselves in such a situation.
Highball has clearly stated his position, and I find it matches well with mine.
Personally, I would issue them a warning that if they do not leave there would be met with violent opposition. If they persist, my militia will take them ALL out. One must remember that if a survivor happens to make it out alive, he WILL come back with more men with more weapons. It would be wiser to take them out early and rid the town of any evidence that they were there.
As for my neighbors beliefs.He will get over it. I am not going to put my family in danger because he wants to be a pacifist.
I probably won't use firearms either to take out the gang members.
I would simply poison the food they were stealing.
It would conserve ammo, be safer for my men, it wouldn't draw attention, and easier for cleanup.
Guns are meant for handling unexpected conflicts at unexpected times in unexpected places. My strike would be pre-meditated and well calculated.
I mean it would be a shame if a roving band got shumer, feinstein, pelosi etc type of people. when things settle these people will certainly use the situation to their advantage, of course.
We would wait til they went out pillaging and attack those who stayed. Then the returning parties would be ambushed and sniped. Attacking them while they are in smaller groups give us an advantage.
To let a known enemy close and not take offensive action only means that they will attack you at a time best for them.
As to the neighbor and his wife. I would try my best to keep them unharmed but the main goal here is to protect my group and insure their survival.