#that was like ‘we can totally win an ICBM exchange’

[tanadrin]

Rarely do we predict the end of the world two or three generations hence; it’s always “this generation will not pass away before all these things have come to pass.” And I’m sure there are a lot of reasons for this—if you’re running a genuine doomsday cult, for instance, you don’t want to put the doomsday too far off. And I *think* part of the driving force there is that it’s really hard for us to imagine that the world will continue once we are gone, more or less intact. Like, it’s really weird to look at small children and know that, if everything goes right, they will see and do and think things you will never share in. That your life before they came along will be nothing more than the thinly imagined world beyond the borders of photographs that your parents’ or grandparents’ was before you. That however important and accomplished you are, the world will continue to spin when you have died.

That’s a hard fact to get your head around! And it’s sort of the inverse of the way we ofte treat our childhood as cosmogonic, as the default state against which all else rises and falls. We are prone to a solipsism where the bounds of the word are the bounds of our lives. That’s not a novel idea, but it does make me very skeptical of any eschatology positive or negative. The world has, so far, an extremely good track record of zero transformative catastrophes or eucatastrophes that take place with the sound of trumpets in the twinkling of an eye. Sure, it has lots of moments of *change.* Whole ages of them—dramatic sometimes, but always continuous. Differentiable, you might say, in that however rapidly the status quo is in flux you can see there is one, and how we got here from a previous state.

And not only do doomsayers have a pretty lousy track record, they frequently exhibit telltale signs that their doomsaying is based in something other than careful deduction—like Paul Ehrlich not only missing the Green Revolution (a forgivable error perhaps) but digging in even further the more reality continued to drift from his apocalyptic forecasts. One cannot help but think of Harold Camping, continually reissuing his predictions for the Second Coming. But also—peak oil was wrong; climate change has been bad but looks like it will not be “the end of industrial civilization” bad; a NATO/Warsaw Pact nuclear war never came to pass, (although arguably that’s the one that was in a lot of ways the most rational, and where we got luckiest). The non-doomsday-prophet types look at these fortunate turns and go “thank God that never happened!” But some people seem truly disappointed—after all, if the word will outlast you, how special can you or your era really be?

[introvertguide]

Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964); AFI #39

The most recent movie for the group to review was the Kubrick dark comedy, Dr. Strangelove (I am not writing out the whole title each time). This film has some of the most legitimately funny lines of bewilderment, with some occasions involving an actor playing across from himself. For most film goers, this will be Peter Seller’s most famous role since he plays three main characters, all with different accents, appearances, and quirks. The film was nominated for 4 Academy Awards (Best Picture, Best Director, Best Screenplay, and Best Actor) but did not take home any trophies. The film did win best picture at the BAFTAs. This film was definitely in the style of Kubrick, but it was in a genre that I don’t believe he delved into again. I want to review the plot before discussing further, so let me get the usual out of the way:

SPOILER ALERT!!! I AM ABOUT TO GIVE AWAY THE WHOLE PLOT OF THE FILM!!! IF YOU WANT TO WATCH THE FILM ON YOUR OWN WITHOUT HAVING ANYTHING SPOILED, STOP NOW AND WATCH THE FILM!!! YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!!!

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At the start, we are introduced to United States Air Force Brigadier General Jack D. Ripper (Sterling Hayden) who is commander of Burpelson Air Force Base. This base houses a group of B-52 bombers armed with hydrogen bombs that are constantly in the air. The planes are constantly within two hours from their targets inside the USSR in case of nuclear war. General Ripper orders his executive officer, Group Captain Lionel Mandrake of the UK Royal Air Force (Peter Sellers), to put the base on alert and to issue "Wing Attack Plan R" to the patrolling bombers, one of which is commanded by Major T. J. "King" Kong (Slim Pickens). All of the aircraft commence an attack flight on the USSR, and set their radios to allow communications only through their CRM 114 discriminators, which was designed to accept only communications preceded by a secret three-letter code known only to General Ripper. Mandrake discovers that no attack order has been issued by the Pentagon and tries to stop Ripper, who locks them both in his office. Ripper tells Mandrake that he believes the Soviets have been fluoridating American water supplies to pollute the "precious bodily fluids" of Americans. Mandrake realizes Ripper has gone insane.

In the War Room at the Pentagon, General Buck Turgidson (George C Scott) briefs President Merkin Muffley (Peter Sellers again) and other officers about how "Plan R" enables a senior officer to launch a retaliatory nuclear attack on the Soviets if all superiors have been killed in a first strike on the United States. It would take two days to try every CRM code combination to issue the recall order, but the planes are due to reach their targets within hours. Muffley orders the U.S. Army to storm the base and arrest General Ripper. Turgidson then attempts to convince Muffley to let the attack continue, but Muffley refuses. Instead, he brings Soviet ambassador Alexei de Sadeski (Peter Bull) into the War Room to telephone Soviet Premier Dimitri Kissov on the "hotline". Muffley warns the Premier of the impending attack, and offers to reveal the positions of the bombers and their targets so that the Soviets can protect themselves.

After a heated discussion in Russian with the Premier, the ambassador informs President Muffley that the Soviet Union had created a doomsday machine as a nuclear deterrent; it consists of many buried bombs jacketed with "cobalt-thorium G", which are set to detonate automatically should any nuclear attack strike the country. Within two months after detonation, the cobalt-thorium G would encircle the planet in a radioactive shroud that would render the Earth's surface uninhabitable. The device cannot be deactivated, as it is programmed to explode if any such attempt is made. The President's wheelchair-bound scientific advisor, former Nazi German Dr. Strangelove (Peter Sellers one more time), points out that such a doomsday machine would only be an effective deterrent if everyone knew about it; Alexei replies that the Soviet Premier had planned to reveal its existence to the world the following week.

Meanwhile, U.S. Army troops arrive at Burpelson, and General Ripper commits suicide. Mandrake identifies Ripper's CRM code from his desk blotter and relays it to the Pentagon. Using the code, Strategic Air Command successfully recalls all of the bombers except Major Kong's, whose radio equipment has been damaged in a missile attack. The Soviets attempt to find it, but Kong has the bomber attack a closer target due to dwindling fuel. As the plane approaches the new target, a Soviet ICBM site, the crew is unable to open the damaged bomb bay doors. Kong enters the bay and repairs the broken electrical wiring while sitting on a H-bomb, whereupon the doors open and the bomb is dropped. Kong joyfully straddles the bomb as it falls and detonates over the target.

Back in the War Room, Dr. Strangelove recommends that the President gather several hundred thousand people to live in deep underground mines where the radiation will not penetrate. He suggests a 10:1 female-to-male ratio for a breeding program to repopulate the Earth once the radiation has subsided. Worried that the Soviets will do the same, Turgidson warns about a "mineshaft gap" while Alexei secretly photographs the war room. Dr. Strangelove declares he has a plan, but then rises from his wheelchair and announces "Mein Führer, I can walk!" as the Doomsday Machine activates. The film ends with a montage of many nuclear explosions, accompanied by Vera Lynn's rendition of the song "We'll Meet Again".

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This is a pretty weird film, but it has some of the funniest lines in cinema. Discussions of not letting a Russian envoy into the war room because he will “see the big board,” the president announcing there is no fighting in the war room, a crazy general constantly talking about a plot to steal American bodily fluids, and a discussion about how the high ranking officials and generals would be hidden in shelters with a 10-1 ratio of hot women to men with the expectation of constant impregnation which everybody suddenly favors: it is all absurd. But I really love it and laugh every time I watch.

The three roles of Peter Sellers is especially noteworthy, as all of his characters are so different. He plays a very British foreign exchange officer (I am not sure this exists), an absolutely whacky former Nazi scientist, and the straight man of the film in the form of the US president. Since Dr. Strangelove was an advisor to the president, there were many scenes in which Peter Sellers was acting across from a stunt shoulder or the back of a head that was supposed to be him. He did a fantastic job of making light of total world destruction during the cold war.

One very notable thing about the acting of Peter Sellers was that he had a couple of ad libs during the movie. Stanley Kubrick is not a director that particularly cares if he gets along with his actors, often times demanding dozens of takes for even the simplest of background scenes. Long dialogue scenes are repeated over and over to the point that many actors did not want to work with Kubrick. And still, the director seemed to like Sellers quite a bit and kept a couple of the takes that were ad-libbed, specifically for the character of Dr. Strangelove. Perhaps the crazy former Nazi character was so unpredictable that random whacky outbursts (like the scream for “Mein Fuhrer” at the end) seemed appropriate.

A little side note is that this was the first film appearance of James Earl Jones as one of the bombardiers on the B-52. He was known for his work in the theatre at the time, so of course he had a bit part in which he was mostly covered in a flight suit and said very little. Now that is a misuse of talent. 

A point about the movie that I was unaware but was pointed out by a follower of the group was that the promotional material for the film shows that the plane was named “Leper Colony” (thank you @themightyfoo). This implies that this group was actually a bunch of screw ups, which is part of the overall joke that this group was given access to world ending bombing capabilities. Maybe it was assumed that the order to drop the bombs would never be given and this group was just given this detail to get them out of the way.

So does this movie belong on the AFI list? Yes, but maybe not ranked so high. It has a lot of name recognition, but I think that is more due to the very distinct naming and the titular role. Maybe the notoriety is also due to the subject matter and the time it was released. It is a fine film with great acting, but I find it hard to put above Jaws, Rocky, or Taxi Driver. I guess that is more my humble opinion, but I agree the list would be lacking without this film. So would I recommend it? Absolutely. It is an interesting story about how red tape allowed one high ranking individual to literally destroy the world. And it is a joke. It is such a well told story that they had to put a disclaimer at the front. A great lesson, even today. 

[thecoroutfitters]

2017 has been quite a year for the Kim dynasty in North Korea. Ever since the Soviets gave control to Kim Il-sung in 1948, the North Koreans have been bent on military dominance. While this may seem like nothing more than a dictator running amok to the rest of the world, there really is some solid reasoning behind their madness.

One of the key goals for the Kim dynasty has been the reunification of the Korean peninsula under their rule. Their bid to reunify the Korean peninsula in 1950, starting the Korean War, was a failure, thanks to the intervention of the United States.

But that war never really ended. All we did was sign an armistice.

The only real outcome of the Korean War was to make North Korea and the United States bitter enemies. As with Japan in World War II, the North Koreans have come to realize that they will not be able to accomplish their goals, unless they can first stop the superpower that is getting in their way.

That means finding some way of neutralizing the United States’ massive amount of military power.

Here’s Why We Can Never Win Against North Korea!

Hence the North Korean fascination with developing nuclear weapons and the intercontinental ballistic missiles to deliver them. The reasoning in Pyongyang, is that the only thing which can neutralize US military might is nuclear weapons.

The other thing that the North Koreans have done is to build the world’s largest submarine fleet. Traditionally, submarines are the biggest threat to aircraft carriers, the US government’s number one tool of choice, when it is necessary to project power into some part of the world. If the Korean War ever turns hot again, you can be sure that some of the first military forces we will have supporting the theater of conflict will fly off the decks of aircraft carriers.

But until recent times, we’ve been able to ignore all this. President after president has kicked the can of the North Korean threat down the road, attempting to placate the North Koreans and keeping their aggression under control at the same time.

All that has changed in the last year. Left-leaning politicians and the news media have hammered President Trump mercilessly over his ongoing word battle with Kim Jong-un. They have seen it as an unnecessary escalation of tensions between the United States government and the government of Pyongyang.

There’s just one problem with that though, it assumes that everything is the same as it was before… and it’s not.

Things are distinctly different today, than they were at the beginning of the year. 2017 opened with North Korean being the normal nuisance we’ve all come to expect. They made what were thought to be idle threats, while mistreating their own population, starving them so that they could spend their money on military research.

That research has paid off handsomely for the North Korean ruler, as North Korea has made breakthrough after breakthrough, taking us from relative safety to imminent danger. In the last few months, they have tested their first multi-stage nuclear device, what they claim is a hydrogen bomb, giving them nuclear weapons that are ten times stronger than what they had before, as well as being roughly on par with our own.

At the same time, 2017 has seen an increased number of missile launches out of North Korea, with each missile being more technologically advanced than its predecessor. At the beginning of the year, these launches were mostly laughable, with missiles exploding on launch, never reaching their target altitude, and demonstrating a large number of other problems.

Yet there has been a clear improvement in the performance of North Korea’s missiles. The last couple of them have been multi-stage devices, which are true ICBMs. With the launch of the Hwasong-15 missile in November, North Korea claims to now have the capability of launching ICBMs which have the capability of reaching the entire continental United States, carrying nuclear weapons to destroy the city of their choosing.

Video first seen on Fox News.

While some of this may be exaggeration and bravado, the technical realities are clear. A host of people track North Korea’s missile tests, including scientists working for the South Korean government and our own. Based upon their reports, not just North Korea’s, the Hwasong-15 is a formidable weapon, which directly threatens the USA.

All through this process, there has been an amazing amount of unbelief being expressed by pundits and experts alike. Each advance has been explained away with talk about the huge hurdles that North Korea still has to overcome, in order to field effective nuclear-tipped ICBMs.

But that seems more and more like wishful thinking, than any true analysis. The North Koreans have either sidestepped these hurdles or have shown their ability to overcome them.

One of the big hurdles that didn’t appear was the necessity to “miniaturize” their nuclear weapons. We heard about that ad-nauseam, as the news hammered the story that things weren’t as bad as they seemed. But then a report from the Obama years surfaced, showing that North Korea had been designing their nukes to be miniaturized from the beginning. So much for that “huge technical hurdle.” It simply vanished like the morning fog.

It’s quite possible that the same can be said for some of the other technical hurdles that have been mentioned. North Korean scientists have the advantage of being able to learn from the mistakes of the US missile program, as well as that of other countries.

While there is a huge amount of material that is highly classified, there is plenty that is openly available. Science is science, and it knows no security classification.

As with the “problem” of miniaturizing nukes, I’m sure that the North Koreans have been working on issues with reentry heat and aiming of their missiles. It’s even possible that they solved those problems long ago, as they were working on other issues. We really have no way of knowing.

Where Does This Leave Us?

The truth is that there is nothing stopping the North Koreans from launching a nuclear strike against the United States, Japan or South Korea, except the North Koreans themselves. Even though we have some missile defenses in place, we may not have enough to stop a concerted attack.

Besides, chances are that the North Koreans know what we have, where we have it and what those defenses’ capabilities are. While that information may very well be classified, those defenses have been around for enough time and tested sufficiently, so that there isn’t much about them that is truly secret anymore.

Any military plan has to take into account the capabilities of the enemy. So you can be sure that there are people in North Korea’s military who have looked at our anti-missile capabilities and are working on plans to overcome them.

This could mean shooting the missiles at us from a direction where we are not protected, overwhelming our defenses by sending too many missiles, or developing some technology that spoofs our missile defense.

The point is, there is little likelihood that the North Koreans are going to attack, before they are at least reasonably sure that their attack will be successful. So however they do it, you can be sure that it will be well planned, well coordinated and intended to succeed.

Chances are fairly good that at least part of their attack will be a high-altitude EMP. That would give them the most bang for their buck, limiting our ability to retaliate. Sending an EMP, along with some missiles fused for more conventional nuclear attack would be the best of both worlds for the North Koreans, essentially copying American nuclear war plans from the Cold War.

The problem for you and I is that our country is totally unprepared for such an attack. In many ways, we were better prepared in the 1960s, when people at least knew to “duck and cover.” While we have technology today, which we didn’t have back then, the general population is totally untrained in surviving either an EMP or a conventional nuclear exchange.

Worse than that, the government just de-established the EMP Commission, the country’s only group of true experts on EMP. So we don’t even have anyone in government service who is working on creating an EMP survival plan.

Of course, the government hasn’t paid much attention to the work that the EMP Commission did anyway. Congress never saw EMP survival as a priority, partially because there were no immediate, visible benefits, which would help them get reelected. So that can kept getting kicked on down the road as well.

What this means is that if we are going to survive an EMP or a conventional nuclear attack from North Korea, it’s going to be up to you and I to prepare for it on our own.

We can’t count on FEMA showing up with their mountains of red tape, or any other government agency raising a finger to ensure our survival. If we don’t ensure it ourselves, we’ll simply become part of the 90% of the population that the EMP Commission projects will die off in the first year after an EMP.

The Worst Possible Scenario

Of all the potential survival situations we face, surviving an EMP is probably the worst. Unfortunately, it is also one of the most likely. So it’s not the type of thing we can just ignore, hoping that it will never happen. That’s what all the sheeple out there are doing, making it so that they are the ones who will suffer, if North Korea ever does attack us.

An EMP attack would actually be more devastating than a conventional nuclear attack.

While a conventional attack would gut a number of our major cities, killing millions of people, the area affected by each nuclear explosion would actually be rather limited. An EMP, on the other hand, has the potential of shutting down the entire country, leaving us without any sort of electrical power or infrastructure we could count on.

It is the loss of the infrastructure which will ultimately cause something like 300 million deaths, not the EMP itself. Without electrical power and the infrastructure that depends on it so much, movement of critical supplies, like food, from production to market would come to a stop. Without food and supplies, people will be dependent on only what is available where they live. When that gets used up, they’ll be in trouble.

There will be a race between starvation and those who are working to reestablish the electrical grid. But I fear that starvation will win. The necessary materials to rebuild the grid just don’t exist, so they will have to be made.

That takes too long, as the normal lead time for the transformers used in electrical sub-stations is a year. There just isn’t the production capability to make tens of thousands of them on a rush basis. Nor will there be the raw material available or the ability to create that raw material. Other than a few select areas, people will have to learn how to survive without electricity.

The problems caused by the loss of the grid will clearly be more severe in the cities, than it will be in rural areas. The sheer mass of people competing for limited resources will cause a huge increase in crime, as people seek food, creating gang-style warfare. Surviving the months following an EMP will require a combination of self-sufficiency and the ability to defend yourself and your resources.

Some smaller communities might band together, sharing resources and helping each other out. But this is much more likely in communities where there will be an abundance of resources, such as rural farming communities. People living in such communities are used to working together and helping each other out anyway, making it much easier for them to work together in a post-EMP world.

For the rest of us, survival of the fittest will become the rule.

No food stockpile will be big enough to sustain a family until things return to normal. Rather, the people who will do the best will be those who can quickly adapt to sustaining themselves, converting their home and property into a homestead.

Are you ready?

This article has been written by Bill White for Survivopedia.

References:

https://www.globalfirepower.com/navy-submarines.asp

from Survivopedia Don't forget to visit the store and pick up some gear at The COR Outfitters. How prepared are you for emergencies? #SurvivalFirestarter #SurvivalBugOutBackpack #PrepperSurvivalPack #SHTFGear #SHTFBag

[southsidehunny-blog]

Usa vs russia

The U.H. Armed service Vs. Russia And China

Usa can still fight and win two major wars at the same time, or at least come near enough to winning that neither Russia nor China would see much hope in the gamble. However, in a standard World War 3 scenario, the allies on their own in European countries would not give NATO a huge advantage over the Russians. It is definitely possible that Russia could take parts of the Baltics, but they would suffer due to the airpower of NATO and more than likely they would not become able to hold onto the areas they experienced taken for too lengthy. The USAF along with USN would provide support, and each performs their assignments, and this would give the NATO allies an advantage that they would need to beat the usa vs russia. The nuclear pressure of the US would become insurance against the decision by the Russians to employ tactical or tactical nuclear weapons.

Russia is usually developing just one stealth fighter but it offers capabilities that some put on par with the N-22. The Capital t-50 will probably enter services in late 2016 or early 2017. Also known as the PAK FA, it's less stealthy than the Raptor but more maneuverable The N-22 would probably get a jump on the Russians in a war, but would become in severe problems if it was seen first.

That's shown in the reality that Russia keeps a single aircraft pet carrier while the U.Beds. Navy's 10-company navy works on a carrying on with global deployment cycle. Instead of service providers created for offensive power projection at sea, the Russians are investing in an expanding navy of submarines that can merchandise their nuclear push and, conventionally, jeopardize an enemy surface navy in nearby seas such as the Black Sea, the Baltic Sea or the Mediterranean Sea.

If you consider every weapon in lifetime today, around 6500 megatons between 15,000 warheads with an typical yield of 433 KT, 11 and put a single bomb in its own 100 square mile grid… one bomb per grid (10 miles x 10 miles), you will contain >95% of the destructive force of each bomb on ordinary within the grid it is certainly in. 12 This means the total landmass to obtain a damaging power from all the world's nuclear bombs is certainly an region of 1.5 million rectangle mls. Not really quite half of the United Expresses and 1/38 of the world's total property mass…. that's it!

Power is definitely a comparative concept. To say that one state is definitely powerful means nothing. Power only derives meaning if it is definitely evaluated in assessment. Two of the claims whose forces we constantly re-evaluate are Russia and the United Claims. Much of our analysis is definitely driven by just how vulnerable we believe the Russian Federation is normally. When we appear at its techniques in Syria or Eastern Europe, we keep in mind Russia's comparable talents and weaknesses compared to its neighbors and the United Claims. There are many different ways to evaluate this difference, but comparing the regional economies of the U.T. and Russia is definitely especially stunning.

In terms of submarines, the U.S. has a visible advantage over Russia and China, boasting as many as 14 ballistic missile submarines equipped with 280 nuclear missiles; 4 guided-missile submarines equipped with more than 150 Tomahawk cruise missiles each; and 54 nuclear attack submarines. Not only is America's submarine fleet impressive in its numbers, but it also presents a great threat to the enemy's fleet because it's heavily armed and stealthy.

US Water Drive European countries (MARFOREUR) was prepared as a support device which could strengthen the forces in case of a struggle. This device was produced in the eighties with much less than 200 marines, today the command word is normally established in Cöblingen, Germany with approximately 1,500 marines assigned to support EUCOM and NATO missions. MARFOREUR was active in the Balkans, and has regular drills especially with the Norwegian forces. It is presumed that this unit will make a particular geostrategic difference in the Arctic region.

produced through production licenses. Data cover main regular weapons such as aircraft, armored vehicles, artillery, radar systems, missiles, and boats made for military make use of. Ruled out are transfers of various other military devices such as little hands and light weapons, trucks, little artillery, ammunition, support devices, technology transfers, and various other providers.

Michael L. Levin is an Executive-in-Residence at the Thunderbird School of Global Management, where he has provided international consulting, research, and advising for both the school and its clients―multinational companies. Levin provides resided and proved helpful in Hong Kong, Jerusalem, Moscow, Shanghai in china, and Washington, N.C. He presently lives in Chi town, where he is certainly at function on his following reserve, the initial English-language biography of Yevgeny Primakov, one of Russia's primary diplomats and politicians.

Although the Russians retain the potential to destroy most of the U.S. ICBM force with their strategic forces, it now costs them most of their force to do therefore. Also, the silo-based windowpane of vulnerability” has not really been shut, but its destabilizing results possess been mitigated by the danger drawdown. The New Begin roof will decrease amounts actually further. Under New Begin, the United Areas and Russia will consent to a roof of 1,550 warheads. If we right now believe a 2:1 assault against U.S i9000. ICBMs on both silos and LCCs, even more than 900 RVs are needed of an attacker. This can be nearly 60 percent of the post-New Begin total. Computing ICBMs solely against ICBMs, if Russia allocated half of its warhead total to its ICBM power, it would not really possess plenty of to devote a 2:1 assault. Russia offers historically allotted between one-half and two-thirds of its warhead total to ICBMs.

As we stated, no surroundings drive comes near to this, but Russia, India and China have got highly ranked gear and are often part of lists made up of what is usually said to be the world's best air flow causes. It's worth noting that the second option two countries are investing greatly in aerial armed service developments. Russia's most advanced aircraft is usually it's highly ranked Sukhoi Su-35, implemented by its Sukhoi Su-27s and MiG-31 interceptors, all of which are component of a fleet of 3,000 aircraft. That's why Russia generally comes after the U.Beds. on the most effective list.

The U.Beds. army would become under strong pressure to deliver decisive triumph in at least one theater mainly because quickly as possible. This might drive the United Claims to slim greatly in one direction with air flow, space and cyber property, wishing to accomplish a tactical and politics success that would enable the remainder of its fat to change to the various other theater. Provided the power of U.Beds. allies in European countries, the United State governments might at first concentrate on the struggle in the Pacific.

By comparison Russia's condition debts is normally nearly miniscule at 13% of GDP in 2016, the US money equal at present exchange prices of $190 billion. Inflation can be presently measured between 4-5%. The Ruble is stable since the sanctions crisis and oil shock of 2014. And foreign investment is coming back into Russia's economy Moreover, despite the collapse of globe oil prices after Sept 2014, Russian oil exports possess kept company or expanded and gas exports via fresh pipelines to China and somewhere else in east Eurasia are about to provide added income to state-owned Gazprom and additional Russian oil businesses. Russian local creation costs for oil and gas are costed in Rubles and offered for dollars so the impact of a significant Ruble fall versus the dollar after 2014 was hardly severe as US Treasury financial warfare jockeys might have hoped.

The total amount of blasts would end up being crazy, simply no much less than 2,526. We never have actually measured any Air flow Push method, presuming that the Russians could/would ruin them in airline flight. However, even if strikes were doubled and/or tripled up on cities, it would mean that no less than 1,000 locations would be wiped out by more than one (some with three or four) nuclear blasts. The destruction would be absolute.

Nevertheless, these similarities do not suggest that the two leaders will simply stand together. As the old Chinese saying goes, one mountain cannot contain two tigers. Although both Xi and Putin are pursuing national rejuvenation, the two nations have historically not received along. Although neither Xi nor Putin like the Traditional western globe purchase led by U . s, they do not share a common vision of a so-called new world order.

[coindex]

Meet the Startup Eve

Meet the Startup Everybody in Europe is Talking About: Neufund Interview Neufund a Blockchain equity platform from Berlin has managed to raise more than $11 mln so far and is announcing one more funding round today. Zoe Adamovicz Neufunds co-founder and CEO has shared the platform success story her views on the current market and tips for ICO enthusiasts. 1. First of all congratulations on raising $11.6 mln from private investors! How did you manage to do that? Actually we raised this capital from both private and institutional investors from the venture capital firms business angels and the cryptocommunity. I believe a big part of our success is owed to the fact that since the inception of Neufund we were catering to both the cryptocommunity and the broader tech community startups VC investors tech enthusiasts and so on. Neufund is a platform to make actual equity investments using Blockchain something many of the current token issuers and investors want but which is not happening due to relative technical and regulatory complexity. In the Neufund platform on the one hand we enable the cryptocommunity to get real equity in companies they invest in represented by equity tokens. On the other hand we open a channel for EUR investors to invest in equity tokens without the need of purchasing cryptocurrencies on the exchanges. Through this we connect the off- and on-chain world. Thanks to building this bridge between the crypto and the venture capital world we were able to attract investors from both sides and of course this was very helpful. In fact we have built around Neufund a community of all kinds of investors who share the same goal to remove unnecessary barriers that prevent the alliance of inventors and investors who seek transparency trustless-trust and a direct alliance of founders with those who believe in their success. We just announced some of our most prominent investors who participated in the pre-sale in the past few days. It is a fantastic and a very diverse crowd from core Ethereum developers to professional VCs business angels cryptoinvestors and even Oscar winning movie producers like Dario Suter Max Kordek (Lisk Foundation) Julian Zawistowski (Golem Project) Michael Jackson (Mangrove Capital) Philipp Freise (Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co) Piotr Wilam (Innovation Nest) Fabian Vogelsteller (Ethereum Mist ERC20) Max Niederhofer (Sunstone Capital) Eric Wahlforss (SoundCloud) Brian Fabian Crain Christophe Maire (Atlantic Labs). It shows that Neufund is a platform for everybody and that Blockchain is a technology for everybody. You can find the full list on our Medium. 2. Could you describe how your platform is set up to run? In order to understand Neufund as a decentralized fundraising platform one needs to grasp two aspects of the project: Firstly Neufund provides a possibility to issue and invest in Equity Tokens which represent shares in companies. Secondly and more importantly for the cryptocommunity Neufund is a decentralized ecosystem. It is owned by the community of investors including those that I mentioned before. This ownership is represented by Neufund token Neumark. The two main types of actors on the platform are investors and companies. Investors bring capital to the platform and look for interesting investment opportunities in companies. Companies are businesses of various kinds that look for funding by offering part or all of their shares to investors. The fundamental transaction of the platform is investment where investors become shareholders in companies via Equity Token Offerings (ETO). Investors that have yet to join the crypto economy find in Neufund an easy way to get started. With our stable coin EURT (Euro Token pegged 1:1 to Euro) we bring off-chain capital on-chain. This is just an internal coin but it provides a stable reference for value of investments and may stabilize the price of Ether by preventing sell-offs. With the advent of the EURT Neufunds solution to the volatility of cryptocurrency all investments will be denominated in Euro which serves as the base currency of the platform. This does not prevent fundraising in existing crypto-currencies of which Ether will be supported initially. Companies and investors are free to choose what currencies they accept during the ETO. Companies can raise funds from investors in their existing network as well as any cryptocurrency holder or via the capital pool on the Neufund Platform dedicated to funding innovation. Once a company has successfully completed a campaign and issued its equity tokens Neufund provides an easy-to-use user interface for interacting with shareholders. It is possible to hold votes for legally binding resolutions issue updates and reports open further fundraising rounds enable secondary trading of equity tokens and perform other functions necessary for responsible corporate governance. Aside from the sheer utility of the Equity Token it is important to note that Neufund is a network. Its a universal fundraising protocol and Neufund is a decentralized fundraising ecosystem. Neufund Platforms value grows when the number and volume of investments grow. The economy must be designed to stimulate investment and reward transacting participants. Here the guiding principle is that anyone who invests should get a share in the whole platform. To be a self-sustaining system Neufund is designed to be a true token economy. Its value is reflected by a protocol token called Neumark (NEU) which participants get as a reward for committing capital to the platform. This essentially allows people to economically own the ecosystem a powerful incentive for investors to bootstrap the platform and grow it with further investment. NEU Token Value The value of NEU results from fee payouts and participation in a platform portfolio of equity tokens and thus gives economic ownership of the network to said holders. 1. With each successful ETO a fee is deducted from the invested amount. This platform fee is then distributed to NEU holders in proportion to amount of NEU they own (pro rata). 2. Within the same ETO a small fee in the form of company equity tokens is deducted from the total number of tokens that were acquired. This token participation fee is added to a platform portfolio of all companies ever to conduct a token sale on the platform. The platform fee mechanism is a simple one. It is taken from the investment upon each successful ETO on the platform and immediately distributed to NEU holders. 3. How do you see further development of your project? Any specific plans? There are two parallel paths to the Neufund story. The first one is about the product: building the product with all necessary features bringing capital to the platform procuring relevant deals producing a sound token economy and so on. The second one is about governance: performing a gradual legal and organizational transformation to make the Platform Operator redundant in the sense of transforming all legal entities into decentralized organizations (tokenized public companies as we call them). We are working towards a future where Neufund is fully owned and managed by community members. The first step however is launch of platform fundamentals. The registration and login flows with hardware Neukey support KYC processes for individuals and organizations have already launched and you can see how this works by participating in our currently ongoing pre-sale or pre-ICBM (Initial Capital Building Mechanism) as we call it. The next steps are stable EURT token and associated Neumint entity to provide a way to commit funds in the ICBM and/or ETOs via fiat currency. Existing Neumark token holders may proceed with migration to the platform and perform KYC for their accounts. At the same time the capital buildup of the platform continues. All investors may participate in the EURT phase of ICBM where they may commit Euro in the form of EURT and be rewarded with Neumark that is immediately tradable. The next step is the launch of primary market platform first Offerings of Equity Tokens when Companies start listing their offers talk and negotiate terms with investors proceed with ETOs and get funded. Neufund also reveals a first batch of pre-selected high-quality deals prepared in advance. Once first equity offerings are completed fees are distributed for the first time Neumarks are mined for the first time outside of ICBM and ETO investors become shareholders of the companies they invested in which will give them access to on-chain company governance. 4. When you spoke with Cointelegraph reporter almost a year ago you said that ICOs are the future of funding. Do you still have the same vision? With the enormous number of ICOs going on and the amount of money raised from them drastically going down? The discussion about the inefficiency of app tokens as investment vehicle has been unfolding over the past few months resulting in a general conclusion that such tokens are not a good way to fund new or existing projects both for regulatory and economic modeling reasons. Many app token projects today have little economic sense and do not represent any network value. Sometimes they are just flawed business models designed with a good intention and sometimes they are outward scams. This does not however undermine the value of Blockchain and ICOs as an extremely efficient secure and cheap process to fund any project. Since the inception of Neufund for us the main value of ICOs and the underlying Blockchain technology in fact has been in the efficiency of that process. If you set it up right it is as if anyone could afford doing an IPO from a coffee shop to a huge corporation. It lowers the barriers to entry and the transaction costs massively it makes them almost negligible. For comparison to do an IPO today you need to have hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars available to even start considering it as an option! So while the market still needs to stabilize the hype needs to cool down and the regulation needs to kick in we strongly believe that cryptocurrencies and ICOs are here to stay. Even Christine Lagarde the head of International Monetary Fund in an official statement said recently that it may not be wise to dismiss virtual currencies. The problem with equity is that it in cryptocommunity it is often associated with the classical financial industry with the mistakes of regulators and governments and a lot of people would rather see a complete revolution of this system rather than an evolution. However when stripped of its negative connotations liaisons with banks greed the crises of 2001 and 2008 and in general the pre-Blockchain finance industry the concept of equity appears as one of humanitys greatest economic inventions. It could be thought of as an abstract general token standard that could represent any business model. The concept of a share is actually not so oldit starts in 1602 with East India Company issuing first shares tradeable on Amsterdam Stock Exchange. This innovation made a great deal of Europes economic growth following the Middle Ages. In todays Blockchain economies shares could be thought of as equity tokens put on-chain as an abstraction above app tokens. Equity tokens could represent a stake in governance economic output and information of the network etc. Some of the benefits of combining ICO with startup funding are have been expressed by the founder of Lisk Max Kordek. Lisk was one of the first and remains one of the worlds biggest ICOs ever. 5. Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin said recently that like any other the crypto market is going to mature and and almost all of the issued coins will lose their value. Do you agree with his point of view? Yes Vitalik is actually pointing out to the fact that a utility token or an app token is not the best investment vehicle. There are strong arguments that by buying app tokens the project supporter may actually be killing the project they want to supporteven a project with a perfectly balanced token economy behind. In his On Medium-of-Exchange Token Valuations he is discussing the economics of network tokens in terms of equilibrium seeking between developers (supply side) and users (demand side). In the process of equilibrium seeking the token looks to establish the optimal price of service or good produced by the network. This is a standard economic situation where the value of goods produced is maximised by the competing forcesusers wanting to drive the price down and developers (service providers in this case) wanting the price up. However Vitalik argues the above economic equilibrium is destroyed when the third party appears in the equationthe investor or as Vitalik says the manipulatorwhose economic gain is best achieved by destabilizing the equilibrium of the economy of the network. We were part of this debate with our CTOs concept of entangled tokens which are both the reward miners get for contributing work and a price the consumer needs to pay in order to access the network and make use of its services. Its the same argument as Vitaliks just differently phrased. Originally the price of the token should be set based on the supply and demand on the free market between the user and the producer. The involvement of a third partyan investor entirely changes token economy dynamics eventually destabilizing the price of the token and putting the entire token economy at risk. The investors are not aligned with other network participantsthey will either pump and dump tokens for a short-term gain or look for a large increase of token value long term which also poses significant problems. This is however an argument against using the utility tokens as investment vehicles indeed those tokens may lose all the value in time. This is however not an argument against ICOs per se. 6. In conclusion do you have any advice or recommendation for people planning to launch an ICO in the future? Say the key dos and donts? Dont get lured by regulatory or economic workarounds. The people who invented economic models or regulations that control them were often great mathematicians or economists. Economy and current financial markets regulation are a goldmine of knowledge and inspiration. Dont get lured by exotic jurisdictions. Most of the western world and in particular Europe have very similar if not identical regulation on securities and ICOs even Swiss law is actually not different. There is so much movement in the regulatory space at the moment that it is better to use a stable jurisdiction and be sure that you wont be affected by sudden changes in the space. Thank you so much Zoe! Follow us on Facebook

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[wionews]

South Korea warns North may launch ICBMs after nuclear test

South Korea said on Monday it was talking to the United States about deploying aircraft carriers and strategic bombers to the Korean peninsula after signs North Korea might launch more missiles in the wake of its sixth and largest nuclear test.

The U.N. Security Council was set to meet later on Monday to discuss new sanctions against the isolated regime. U.S. President Donald Trump had also asked to be briefed on all available military options, according to his defence chief.

Officials said activity around missile launch sites suggested North Korea planned more missile tests.

We have continued to see signs of possibly more ballistic missile launches. We also forecast North Korea could fire an intercontinental ballistic missile,' Jang Kyoung-soo, acting deputy minister of national defense policy, told a parliament hearing on Monday

  ×

"We have continued to see signs of possibly more ballistic missile launches. We also forecast North Korea could fire an intercontinental ballistic missile," Jang Kyoung-soo, acting deputy minister of national defense policy, told a parliament hearing on Monday.

North Korea tested two ICBMs in July that could fly about 10,000 km (6,200 miles), putting many parts of the U.S. mainland within range and prompting a new round of tough international sanctions.

South Korea's air force and army conducted exercises involving long-range air-to-surface and ballistic missiles on Monday following the North's nuclear test on Sunday, its joint chiefs of staff said in a statement.

In addition to the drill, South Korea will cooperate with the United States and seek to deploy "strategic assets like aircraft carriers and strategic bombers", Jang said.

South Korea's defence ministry also said it would deploy the four remaining launchers of a new U.S. missile defence system after the completion of an environmental assessment by the government.

The rollout of the controversial Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system at a site south of the South Korean capital, Seoul, is vehemently opposed by neighbouring China and Russia, had been delayed since June.

North Korea said it tested an advanced hydrogen bomb for a long-range missile on Sunday, prompting a warning of a "massive" military response from the United States if it or its allies were threatened.

"We are not looking to the total annihilation of a country, namely North Korea," U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said after meeting Trump and his national security team.

"But as I said, we have many options to do so."

Trump has previously vowed to stop North Korea developing nuclear weapons and said he would unleash "fire and fury" if it threatened U.S. territory

Despite the tough talk, the immediate focus of the international response was expected to be on tougher economic sanctions.

Diplomats have said the U.N. Security Council could now consider banning North Korean textile exports and its national airline, stop supplies of oil to the government and military, prevent North Koreans from working abroad and add top officials to a blacklist to subject them to an asset freeze and travel ban.

Asked about Trump's threat to punish countries that trade with North Korea, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Geng Shuang said China has dedicated itself to resolving the North Korean issue via talks, and China's efforts had been recognised.

"What we absolutely cannot accept is that on the one hand (we are) making arduous efforts to peacefully resolve the North Korean nuclear issue, and on the other hand (our) interests are being sanctioned or harmed. This is both not objective and not fair," he told a regular briefing.

On possible new U.N. sanctions, and whether China would support cutting off oil, Geng said it would depend on the outcome of Security Council discussions.

Chinese state-run Xinhua news agency said in an editorial North Korea was "playing a dangerous game of brinkmanship" and it should wake up to the fact that such a tactic "can never bring security it pursues".

While South Korean President Moon Jae-in and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe agreed on Monday to work with the United States to pursue stronger sanctions, Russia voiced scepticism.

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said sanctions on North Korea had reached the limit of their impact. Any more would be aimed at breaking its economy, so a decision to impose further constraints would become dramatically harder, he told a BRICS summit in China.

South Korea says the aim of stronger sanctions is to draw North Korea into dialogue. But, in a series of tweets on Sunday, Trump also appeared to rebuke South Korea for that approach.

"South Korea is finding, as I have told them, that their talk of appeasement with North Korea will not work, they only understand one thing!" Trump said on Twitter.

Still, Trump's response was more orderly and less haphazard than he had offered to other hostile actions by North Korea.

His handling of its latest nuclear test reflected a more traditional approach to crisis management, which U.S. officials said illustrated the influence of Mattis and new White House chief of staff, retired Marine Corps General John Kelly.

Japanese and South Korean stock markets both closed down about 1 percent on Monday, while safe haven assets including gold and sovereign bonds ticked higher, but trade was cautious.

"Assuming the worst on the Korean peninsula has not proven to be a winning trading strategy this year," said Sean Callow, a senior foreign exchange strategist at Westpac Bank.

"Investors seem reluctant to price in anything more severe than trade sanctions, and the absence of another 'fire and fury' Trump tweet has helped encourage markets to respond warily."

South Korea's finance minister vowed to support financial markets if instability showed signs of spreading to the real economy.

Sunday's test had registered with international seismic agencies as a man-made earthquake near a test site. Japanese and South Korean officials said the tremor was about 10 times more powerful than the one picked up after North Korea's previous nuclear test a year ago.

China's National Nuclear Safety Administration said data from radiation monitoring stations near the North Korean border showed no impact on "China's environment or populace".

Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said that, while North Korea was not a puppet state of China, Beijing needed to do more to pressure its neighbour.

"The Chinese are frustrated and dismayed by North Korea's conduct, but China has the greatest leverage, and with the greatest leverage comes the greatest responsibility," he told the Australian Broadcasting Corp on Monday.

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[thecoroutfitters]

As the rhetoric between Washington and Pyongyang has heated up, so has the risk to the United States. Recent missile and nuclear tests by the North Korean regime have made it clear that they are closer to their long-stated goal of attacking the United States than ever.

After their sixth nuclear test, in which they exploded what was supposed to be a two-stage hydrogen bomb, the North Korean news agency started talking about an EMP (electromagnetic pulse) attack against the United States for the first time.

What’s next for us? A totally off-grid world, where the survival of the fittest would become effective?

In a way, it’s surprising it’s taken them this long, considering how long I and others have been warning about that possibility.

Any county that is smart enough to develop nuclear bombs and intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBM) has to have people in their war plans department who are aware of how effective an EMP is and who would be punching the numbers to figure out how to use their nuclear arsenal in that regard.

An EMP attack doesn’t preclude the possibility of conventional nuclear war and we shouldn’t assume that it will. Regardless of the flaming rhetoric coming out of Kim Jong-un and his Secretary of State, they have to realize that they can’t win a nuclear exchange with the United States.

No matter how effective they are, we have way more nukes than they do.

Here’s Why We Can Never Win This War!

Even if they are able to take out Washington, a few other major cities and our entire electrical grid in one coordinated attack, we have more than enough nuclear missiles in submarines and nuclear bombs on aircraft carriers to turn their entire country into a parking lot.

But don’t think that will deter them from this course of action. This is a grudge match for them, wanting to get even with us for the first Korean War.

Based on that grudge, the North Korean government is bent on destruction and the people of that small country are willing to die in support of their leadership. If anything, that increases the likelihood for a combined EMP and conventional nuclear attack. They want to punish us and they want to punish us good.

Should that happen, our chances of surviving the attack unscathed are minimal. While we do have some anti-ICBM defense, there aren’t enough, especially not for a southern approach. So, the best we can hope for is that North Korea destroys a few cities; the worst is an effective EMP.

That’s the scenario we have to prepare for; an EMP taking out our electrical grid and turning the clock back 150 years or so, technologically speaking. The possibility of us surviving any sort of nuclear exchange, unscathed, is minimal.

The Worst Scenario

This is the worst possible scenario we face today; and it is not one that we can ignore. While I will be absolutely thrilled if our missile defenses are able to neutralize such an attack, I don’t believe that it is something we can count on.

With that being the case, you and I need to be ready to survive in a post-EMP world; one in which we don’t have electrical power; one which most people are unprepared to live in. According to the reports of the EMP Commission, as much as 90% of the US population will die of starvation. That sort of world. Somehow, we’re not only going to have to survive in it, but rebuild as much of our lives as we can.

This is why we are preppers; in order to ensure our family’s survival in the case of such an event. Everything we do is ultimately for this reason. But that isn’t enough. If all we do is ensure our own survival, what about our kids? Our grandkids? The human race in general.

That’s why it’s going to be important to be able to rebuild as much of society as possible. Then, and only then, will we be able to guarantee the survival of our children and grandchildren. That’s going to require the right sorts of skills, many of which aren’t common today.

Fortunately, there is still time. So if you don’t already have the right sorts of skills, you could at least try to learn some of them. There’s no way that anyone could possibly learn all of them, but the more that you can learn, the more valuable you will be in that post-EMP world. Perhaps you could be valuable enough that others would help to guarantee your survival and that of your family.

Of course, you’ll want to get something for your skills. That means turning those skills into some sort of business; a business where you can produce a product or provide a service to people who will be struggling to survive and rebuild their lives.

Valuable Businesses in a Post-EMP World

Any business you attempt to build for that post-EMP world will have to operate under the assumption that you won’t have any electrical power available to you, other than that which you produce yourself.

So, one of the things you may want to consider, as part of starting your off-grid business, is making sure that you can produce enough electricity to meet your basic needs, both in your home and in your business.

Other than that, plan on using hand tools, rather than electric ones. In fact, I’d go so far as to say that you should make or buy the necessary tools now, because you probably won’t be able to find them when the time comes. Besides, getting them now gives you the chance to learn how to use them effectively.

Growing Food

The biggest need that most people will have is for food. According to the EMP commission’s report, the vast majority of the people who will die after an EMP, will do so from starvation. The vast majority of the farms in our country are owned by giant corporations and grow food (mostly grain) in bulk.

Without fuel for the farm machinery, those farms won’t be able to operate. Without fuel for trucks, that food can’t be hauled to processing plants. Without electricity to run the plants, the raw food can’t be turned into packaged foods.

All food production will have to be local. Local farmers will do well, assuming they can get fuel for their tractors and combines. That will be the problem.

Likewise, local ranchers and shepherds will find themselves sitting on a goldmine, with people needing the food that they can produce. The ability to grow food may very well be necessary for your family’s survival. Growing more than you need will give you the opportunity to trade food for other essentials.

Charging Batteries

As a society, we are addicted to our electronics. While most of those will be destroyed, there is a good chance that small portable electronics will survive if protected in a Faraday cage. These will become like gold, as people try to cling to the pre-EMP past.

If you are putting in alternate energy for your home anyway, you could offer battery charging services to friends and neighbors. Solar panels will actually survive an EMP, with a loss of only 5 to 10 percent of their efficiency. However, the solar charge controller and voltage inverter for your system will probably be fried by the EMP; so make sure you have a spare.

Herbal Medicine

The current pharmaceutical industry will collapse, as will many other industries. This means that the only medicines any community will have will be those in people’s homes and in local pharmacies. When those run out, there won’t be any replacements.

However, modern medicine is an outgrowth of herbal medicine. Quite literally, all medicines started out as plant products. Big Pharma has synthesized the chemicals found in those plants, in order to make medicines which they could patent and sell.

Knowing which plants offer which medicinal properties and growing those plants could allow you to open up a post-EMP natural pharmacy, providing medicines to your local community.

Of course, you’ll need to educate the doctors, some of who will resent you. But the truly smart ones, who care about their patients, will take knowledge wherever they can get it.

Blacksmithing

Before the industrial revelation took over from them, most metal products were the handicrafts of some blacksmith. They made everything from tools to nails, with andirons in between. But they were one of the earliest casualties of the industrial revolution. Factories took over much of what they made and then cars took over from horses, eliminating the need for shoeing.

While there will be many tools and other metal objects laying around in the post-EMP world, there won’t be the old kinds of tools that people need for working with their hands. Blacksmiths may very well find themselves in a crucial place once again, helping to rebuild society.

Building Trades

While the EMP itself won’t damage homes, factories, stores and other businesses, it will make some drastic changes to society. People will find themselves needing to build outbuildings behind their homes, for their home-based business.

Others will need to change their plumbing, so that it will work off a well. There will always be a need for the building trades.

Taking this a step further, linemen for the phone or electric company will probably find gainful employment trying to put together local phone systems, build small hydroelectric dams and otherwise help rebuild society.

The skills these people have will become an important part of rebuilding.

Practical Engineering

When I say “practical engineering” I’m not talking about someone who can design a computer chip, but rather someone who can design simple devices, of the type that we will need to have, in order to rebuild our lives. Designing a loom for weaving fabric will be important, designing a computer won’t.

These people may not even be working as engineers right now, or might be considered technicians in business and industry. But they know how to put things together that will work. If we are going to have to rebuild turbines to create power, we’ll need people who can do the job from the ground up, starting by melting down the copper and drawing wire.

Another important characteristic of the type of engineer I’m talking about is the ability to repurpose items and turn them into something useful. Without gasoline, we won’t have much use for cars and trucks, but the axle from that truck might be very useful in building a wagon. That’s the sort of engineering we’re going to need.

Mechanics

While most vehicles will be off the road, due to a shortage of gasoline, there will be some that are running. We will need mechanics not only to fix those vehicles, but to find ways of making others run, ways of modifying engines so that alternate fuels can be burned, and taking engines out of cars to be used as power sources for other things.

Good mechanics, especially good shade-tree mechanics, understand the engines they work on, better than the engineers that designed them. This knowledge gives them the ability to modify those engines in a number of ways, such as increasing the power they produce.

I’m betting that if we get mobile after the attack, it will be because of mechanics that come up with some breakthrough new ways to use the internal combustion engine.

Making Bio-Diesel & Methane

Two of the most promising fuels sources in a post-EMP world would be bio-diesel and methane gas. While there are few cars on the roads today which burn these fuels, it is possible to modify some engines to burn them.

As these two fuels are some of the easiest to produce, requiring the least amount of equipment, this could very well turn into an effective business.

General Repairs

Like mechanics, people who can repair other things will have a ready business in a post-EMP world. There will be a need for repairing just about anything, as the factories will be closed and production will come to a standstill. All we will have is what we have at the moment the attack happens.

These people will also be likely to be the ones who work together with the practical engineers to create new things or reinvent old ones. In many cases, the materials to make those tools and equipment will come from cannibalizing existing machinery, appliances and other things that no longer work. Gears and pulleys don’t care what they’re working in, they’ll still do the job.

Gunsmithing

It is widely believed that a post-EMP world will be violent, due to a breakdown of society. As such, people will need their guns, and those guns will probably get a lot more use than they do today. Guns that get used stand a chance of getting broke. Hence, the need for good gunsmiths.

For that matter, the ability to make ammunition will probably become a high priority, especially with people trying to hunt for food. Anyone with a reloading press and the appropriate dies could have a ready-made business, without any further investment.

Make Sure You’re Prepared!

Most of the businesses I’ve mentioned will require some sort of materials and supplies. Gunsmiths won’t be able to go online and order gun parts, nor will blacksmiths be able to pick up steel at their local steel supply. In both cases, the craftsmen will either need to make their own materials or find a way of reusing materials that currently exist.

Don’t count on local warehouses having what you need either. They’ll probably have enough at the beginning, but those supplies will eventually run out. When that happens, you’ll need to have a Plan B that you can put into effect. That plan may require you making things yourself.

What I’m trying to say here is that you need to think through thoroughly any off-grid business that you try to create. Don’t think of it in terms of today’s world, but in a world where you won’t be able to just buy the parts and materials you need. How will you get them? Can you scavange? Can you find the raw materials in nature? Can you repurpose old stuff, melting it down to make new stuff again?

This article has been written by Bill White for Survivopedia.

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