[quote=wildman800]The problems with bugging out:

Under Martial Law conditions-
1) Slow movement due to the need to remain concealed from law enforcement and military units (avoid being forced into a "Refugee Camp").

I happen to be professionally involved in disaster mitigation/response at the federal level, as a member of a Disaster Medical Assistance Team, under US Dep't of Health and Human Services. I've never encountered any plans to "force" anyone into refugee "camps."

The basic theory of shelter management is to get people OUT as soon as possible, back to their jobs and coping with their own problems, to re-start the local economy and get things up and running as normally and quickly as possible

2) Slow movement due to need to avoid "Brigands".

Try not to look like a brigand yourself, i.e., by not going around in groups with heavy arms on display, in neighborhoods where you are not known. My personal gear and bugout clothing is "low observable" but not "tactical" in appearance. I can defend myself or hide out and get by without trouble, but I can also walk into a store or get on a bus without looking out of place.

3) Forced to leave food and other resources behind. (if local authorities hadn't already been informed of your "hoarding" and seized it already).
3a) "Hoard" the majority of food and resources at the bug out location.

There is really no need to seize personal property, nor any method formally to do so. It would really complicate logistics, too. If we need supplies not in our logistics train, we have corporate agreements to draw on commercial distribution channels, wharehouses and retail outlets in or near the effected area, with means for reimbursement. This is how it's done. Our commander even carries a federal credit card for impromptu expenses, to PAY for what we need.

On other occasions, local stores and hospitals who's inventories were a total insurance write-off have granted permission for us to salvage some things that would othewise just be dumped. These methods are far more efficient and legally proper than going door to door, hunting for and stealing from the vitims we are trying to help. I'm aware of the NOPD and scattered instances of individuals "freelancing" under color of authority, but criminals can be found anywhere.

4) The need to maintain a 24/7 security/defensive watch/tactics while on the move and in encampment.

ALways. Just don't be too paranoid or agressive about it. I could tell you a story about a certain "militia" group's unpleasant encounter, but, um, I'm not allowed to.


Jeff

I am with Troglodyte. I don't think we need to experience firsthand, what Jeff McCann says, "the NOPD...scattered instances of individuals "freelancing" under color of authority."

Police officers and members of military are trained to obey orders, even if the person (criminal) directing them is a little off the rocker.

Good luck.

“What Jeff says all sounds pretty good, but I think what most people are afraid of here is something like Katrina, not something like riots where you'll quell the violence and go home."

I was deployed to Katrina, as well as to a variety of other events and potential events, some you never heard of. The events surrounding H. Katrina were hideously misreported, both by wild exaggeration and hysteria or lying, and by non-or-underreporting. What happened to those stacks of dead bodies reportedly at the Superdome? They didn’t exist.

Remember, the actual hurricane was pretty much a miss, and the real trouble only started later, when the levees broke. This, plus a severe instance of the usual political fumbling, led to a poor coordinated and delayed federal response. Nonetheless, within hours ( >72 hrs) assistance was flowing in full throttle. Thereafter, no one died of thirst or hunger, and the shelter fiasco was pretty quickly sorted out. My team treated over 2K patients over a period of a few days. Furthermore, we can sustain operations indefinitely by drawing on our own and other federal resources, military logistics (we cross-train directly with the military), and commercial sources. Nonetheless, we were all loaded, ready and just sitting around waiting for the go order to deploy for days before being ordered in. This was in sharp contrast to the FL series of hurricanes, where our and several other teams were staged in place or on the road before the hurricanes even made landfall.

The Feds, at the boots on the ground level, did a great job, in the face of tough interference and massive political stonewalling, grandstanding and gross incompetence at the political level. For instance, three of our logistics trucks, still loaded with much needed equipment, were pulled away for hours for an “emergency elsewhere” that turned out to be a Presidential photo-op to show him posing in front of “federal trucks full of supplies headed to those in need.” I need not further point out the infuriating irony of creating the appearance of delivering help by removing help that was already in place.

The point isn’t to defend the Feds, but to point out that disaster relief on a very large scale was delivered and disbursed fairly promptly, because the professionals are used to overcoming obstacles of both the natural and man-made (political) types.

For example, if Wal-Mart can keep the shelves stocked all over the country every day, they can certainly deliver some of the same goods to a distribution center set up on the margin of a disaster zone, even if we have to set up an armed convoy and fuel depot system for them. The same is true for the military. Even with the war in Iraq, there were enough MREs, trucks and helicopters on hand for domestic emergency use.

As for local cops going rogue, I seriously doubt that anything similar could happen within the National Disaster Medical System or related services. We have no problem saying NO to wrong or stupid ideas, and anyone who puts a toe over the line gets dealt with pretty quickly. Although a “uniformed service of the United States,” we are just civilians, like you, and are free to quit and walk away at any time, and we will. We, most of us, simply will not tolerate the quasi-totalitarian “martial law” scenario imagined and feared by some. Heck, when I was once sent into a wrecked and flooded hospital to scavenge one particular instrument that we didn’t carry but was requested by one of my doc’s, I personally rechecked consent with both my command staff and the hospital’s representative personally before I’d proceed. In another instance, we had corporate permission to retrieve some convenience items from a wrecked chain pharmacy, and ran across some “looters” inside. We just warned them not to mess with us, take only needed items, which was all they seemed to be doing, and we left each other otherwise unmolested.

Really, really, really, we are just there to help people in need, and not to screw with them, take over, or interfere with private efforts to cope and recover.

I promise we won’t be raiding your cache, putting you into camps against you will, or taking anyone’s lawfully owned firearms. Our security element probably won’t let you into our base of operations with a gun if you’re a civilian, or might arrest you if you do something criminally stupid, but they’re only there to protect us and the people we are helping. They aren’t jack-booted thugs.

There does, indeed, seem to be a lot of mythinformation and misguided fear out there about the scope and nature of disaster relief operations.

“Or lets say something like a national gas shortage or truck drivers union strike, where supplies aren't being delivered and the stores are empty. A credit card doesn't do you any good if there is no food to be purchased. What's the protocol for that?”

The country will cope. If the entire nation suffers extremely severe disruption everywhere at once, I suppose things may be quite different, as they would be in the case of civil insurrection. However, there are sufficient legal means to deal with lesser threats like trucker strikes that threaten national security, and the trucks can be made to roll enough to deliver essentials. As for the credit card, it is used to purchase immediate special needs from just outside the disaster area. Now, if it’s an “End of the Earth as we know it” scenario you posit, then that’s beyond the scope of disaster relief and into the realm of rebuilding civilization, or at least civil society.

Jeff

"I am with Troglodyte. I don't think we need to experience firsthand, what Jeff McCann says, "the NOPD...scattered instances of individuals "freelancing" under color of authority."

It doesn't take a disaster to experience this sort of thing; it happens every day, all over America. By the same token, a disaster won't stop it from continuing to occur anyway. But that doesn't mean there's a secret plan to "enslave" you, or at least not one involving disaster relief operations in the normal course of events.

"Police officers and members of military are trained to obey orders, even if the person (criminal) directing them is a little off the rocker."

Cops and soldiers don't run disaster relief, they are, however, key participants, just as in most emergencies. Civilian authorities run the show, including local and state authorities who retain their powers and responsibilities, with the cooperation of federal authorities. Disasters normally don't get "federalized," with the USGOV taking over and overriding the locals; they just get federal assistance to states and localities, AFTER being requested.

As for the NOPD specifically, I'd suggest that they may have been, ahem, somewhat sub-par compared to other police departments and law-enforcement agencies. Yet, note that they still were not interfered with by the Feds during that time.

Now, if you are talking "Martial Law," that's an entirely different matter. But has Martial Law ever been declared in the US since WWII, when it was imposed in the Hawaiian islands, during any sort of disaster?

Jeff

For the record, NOLA wasn't under Martial Law, at least not since Reconstruction.

Jeff

No disrespect intended, But LA was never under Martial Law. The CA Governer requested the CA NG to assist local law enforcement under his own state emergency authority, then requested (very temporary) federal assistance (again, under state authority) when the CA NG proved too slow to mobilize in this instance.

Jeff

Jeff,

Thank you for your work. It's very reassuring to me that there are people like you out there trying to help.

-Blast, who hopes only to meet you under pleasent circumstances.

Indeed. If you see us setting up the khaki tents with the big red "NDMS" on it in your town, it's a safe bet you and your neighbors are having a pretty bad day.

Jeff
for more info on DMATs, NDMS, etc., see, e.g.:
http://www.floridaonedmat.com/
http://www.hhs.gov/aspr/opeo/ndms/teams/

With their ability to respond quickly and cost effectively, understanding the future role(s) private security companies (blackwater, armourgroup, etc.) will play in emergency situations is something thats worth looking into. On one hand you could get a lightning quick response to restore order in a stricken area should the local/state law enforcement be overwhelmed. On the other hand, determining their authority and who they'd be accountable to would give rise to some difficult questions.

A very worrisome possibility. It appears some such private security forces were afoot in the NOLA area after H. Katrina, but it seems to have been kept pretty quiet. None, AFAIK, were employed by government entities. Rather, they were employed by private businesses concerned over the breakdon in law and order and the need to protect their own personnel and assets.

It would be difficult to invision exactly how such firms could be employed to "restore order" in some legally meaningful way, though. Certain government functions are rather difficult to contract out, especially during emergencies. It's much quicker and eisier to just borrow cops from neighboring jurisdictions, states and NG MP units, and let the feds reimburse you for it.

They could be used, though, to relieve local LEOs and Guardsman for more important actual policing tasks, i.e., "restoring order," by taking over "security guard" type duties typically performed by law enforcement officers, such as maintaining (vs. "restoring") order and physical security at shelters, depots, government offices, etc.

In other roles, such as supply, shelter operations, transportation, logistics, etc., such private firms lack the resources, equipment and expertise required, or there are far better sources to get the job done already available.

Jeff