Not just a catchy computer game name, “total war” is a common name for an extreme version of war between nation-states, or even between nations and “unconventional combatants” – rebels, revolutionists, even corporations and religious groups.
Most people equate “nuclear war” with total war, though that is far from accurate. Nuclear weapons can be, and probably usually will be, part of a total war, but war can be total even with conventional – and even primitive – weapons. Witness the Mongol invasions, the actions of the Assyrians, and even the Roman wars with Carthage.
How do we deal with, prepare for, and survive total war is a subject worth discussing. And so we shall do in a future commentary. Specifically, what can an anarchist, a lover of liberty do to prepare for and live and work through a total (or near-total) war?
But speaking of nuclear war, a recent fluff article tries to tell us where in the States we can be safe (safer?) in case of a nuclear exchange with, say, China, Russia, or perhaps France.
This map (from a website “Organically Human” – huh?) is similar to those which have been published for decades. And just a bogus, frankly. Let us take the “safer areas: California? Are you kidding? Yeah, more and more military bases are closed, but the massive population and the targets: what is left is the Sierras, the desert, and far Northern California. All crippled by the idiots in Sacramento. Nebraska? Even the map shows you are nowhere near “far enough from nuclear blast sites” – you have F.E. Warren’s missile fields in the Panhandle, Startcom (Offut AFB) and the juicy targets in Omaha, Sioux City, and Lincoln – the wind will get you both ways with fallout. Even if the missiles don’t slag the railyards at North Platte. The Mississippi “Banks” – The Mississippi, Ohio, Missouri, and Arkansas Rivers with plenty of targets upstream all flow into it with everything including radioactive matter. The Midwest? Great place to build a shelter!?! Florida and North Carolina? Do you know how many people and targets and how small those places are? The best place (distance, population, food supplies, self-sufficiency, and above all liberty) is the Rocky Mountain States.
If you want to survive and thrive during and after a nuclear war, go West (but not too far): the Northern Rockies and Great Plains: well outside the missile fields of course, but still a place to live.
Continuing on, total war is war against not just military personnel and targets, but civilians. Not just production facilities but urban areas in general, and rural areas: food production and raw materials production. WW2 was the closest to total war in the last two centuries we’ve see that involved more than a single country. And everything was a target: everything and everybody. But only in Europe and East Asia and the Pacific: the New World did not really get touched. But look at Germany in 1945-1950 to see the results of what total war can produce. Without nukes.
One amusing note: Wyoming, with its high availability of weapons and security resources, also ranked in the top five of good places to live (as long as you stay out the Cheyenne area missile fields (which is too close to Denver, anyway). Odd that weapons – privately owned weapons – is one reason that Wyoming was good. Talk about hypocrisy!
But let us move to a related point regarding total war. Like Germany, much of Germany, Poland, and other parts of Europe, China too has endured near total war: the Japanese invasion and occupation and then after WW2 the Chinese Civil War in which the present Chinese Communist Party gained power – and continued to kill millions.
Though I am sure that virtually all modern Chinese have forgotten this, the CCP and the present cult-of-personality tyrants associate total war with their gaining and keeping power. So to some degree, we might think there is something to what the mainstream media and its shills and worshippers tell us: that China is preparing a direct attack to “destroy America” – a “People’s war” has been declared (several years ago) and tens of thousands of Chinese agents and soldiers are preparing a Fifth Column to wreak havoc in the States and Canada and possibly Mexico.
Such a war would have impacts second in severity only to a massive civil war or new war between the States. Which it might resemble, as there would be some people who would be willing to join forces with the Chicom forces: out of misguided “self-interest” and due to the massive propaganda of modern government and academia and media. Not just “military” conflict and actions, but constant attacks on anything and everything: fuel and electrical production and distribution systems, cropland and ranchland, food processing centers, and all kinds of communications.
Again, compared to even a thousand or more nuclear explosions, total war is far more devastating. And worse, it is not wholesale, it is retail. And it requires preparation, even more. Your preparation includes a healthy dose of prevention and of building relationships and organizing in advance.
Follower of Christ Jesus (a christian), Pahasapan (resident of the Black Hills), Westerner, Lover of Liberty, Free-Market Anarchist, Engineer, Army Officer, Husband, Father, Historian, Writer, Evangelist. Successor to Lady Susan (Mama Liberty) at TPOL.
The Price of Liberty 
Are you ready for total war?
Not just a catchy computer game name, “total war” is a common name for an extreme version of war between nation-states, or even between nations and “unconventional combatants” – rebels, revolutionists, even corporations and religious groups.
Most people equate “nuclear war” with total war, though that is far from accurate. Nuclear weapons can be, and probably usually will be, part of a total war, but war can be total even with conventional – and even primitive – weapons. Witness the Mongol invasions, the actions of the Assyrians, and even the Roman wars with Carthage.
How do we deal with, prepare for, and survive total war is a subject worth discussing. And so we shall do in a future commentary. Specifically, what can an anarchist, a lover of liberty do to prepare for and live and work through a total (or near-total) war?
But speaking of nuclear war, a recent fluff article tries to tell us where in the States we can be safe (safer?) in case of a nuclear exchange with, say, China, Russia, or perhaps France.
This map (from a website “Organically Human” – huh?) is similar to those which have been published for decades. And just a bogus, frankly. Let us take the “safer areas: California? Are you kidding? Yeah, more and more military bases are closed, but the massive population and the targets: what is left is the Sierras, the desert, and far Northern California. All crippled by the idiots in Sacramento. Nebraska? Even the map shows you are nowhere near “far enough from nuclear blast sites” – you have F.E. Warren’s missile fields in the Panhandle, Startcom (Offut AFB) and the juicy targets in Omaha, Sioux City, and Lincoln – the wind will get you both ways with fallout. Even if the missiles don’t slag the railyards at North Platte. The Mississippi “Banks” – The Mississippi, Ohio, Missouri, and Arkansas Rivers with plenty of targets upstream all flow into it with everything including radioactive matter. The Midwest? Great place to build a shelter!?! Florida and North Carolina? Do you know how many people and targets and how small those places are? The best place (distance, population, food supplies, self-sufficiency, and above all liberty) is the Rocky Mountain States.
If you want to survive and thrive during and after a nuclear war, go West (but not too far): the Northern Rockies and Great Plains: well outside the missile fields of course, but still a place to live.
Continuing on, total war is war against not just military personnel and targets, but civilians. Not just production facilities but urban areas in general, and rural areas: food production and raw materials production. WW2 was the closest to total war in the last two centuries we’ve see that involved more than a single country. And everything was a target: everything and everybody. But only in Europe and East Asia and the Pacific: the New World did not really get touched. But look at Germany in 1945-1950 to see the results of what total war can produce. Without nukes.
One amusing note: Wyoming, with its high availability of weapons and security resources, also ranked in the top five of good places to live (as long as you stay out the Cheyenne area missile fields (which is too close to Denver, anyway). Odd that weapons – privately owned weapons – is one reason that Wyoming was good. Talk about hypocrisy!
But let us move to a related point regarding total war. Like Germany, much of Germany, Poland, and other parts of Europe, China too has endured near total war: the Japanese invasion and occupation and then after WW2 the Chinese Civil War in which the present Chinese Communist Party gained power – and continued to kill millions.
Though I am sure that virtually all modern Chinese have forgotten this, the CCP and the present cult-of-personality tyrants associate total war with their gaining and keeping power. So to some degree, we might think there is something to what the mainstream media and its shills and worshippers tell us: that China is preparing a direct attack to “destroy America” – a “People’s war” has been declared (several years ago) and tens of thousands of Chinese agents and soldiers are preparing a Fifth Column to wreak havoc in the States and Canada and possibly Mexico.
Such a war would have impacts second in severity only to a massive civil war or new war between the States. Which it might resemble, as there would be some people who would be willing to join forces with the Chicom forces: out of misguided “self-interest” and due to the massive propaganda of modern government and academia and media. Not just “military” conflict and actions, but constant attacks on anything and everything: fuel and electrical production and distribution systems, cropland and ranchland, food processing centers, and all kinds of communications.
Again, compared to even a thousand or more nuclear explosions, total war is far more devastating. And worse, it is not wholesale, it is retail. And it requires preparation, even more. Your preparation includes a healthy dose of prevention and of building relationships and organizing in advance.
Think on these things.
Share this:
About TPOL Nathan
Follower of Christ Jesus (a christian), Pahasapan (resident of the Black Hills), Westerner, Lover of Liberty, Free-Market Anarchist, Engineer, Army Officer, Husband, Father, Historian, Writer, Evangelist. Successor to Lady Susan (Mama Liberty) at TPOL.