If you really want to prepare for something like this, here are some things you can do. The good news is that these are all very productive things in their own right, so in the extremely likely event that you never have to engage in a war against the government, it wasn’t a waste of time. I’m excluding things like storing a couple months’ worth of food and prescriptions and ammo because by now everyone knows we should be doing them anyway.
1) Educate yourself about internet protocol. How the internet works and how data moves from one computer to another. Download a TOR browser and learn how to minimize your ability to be tracked over the internet.
2) Invest in old fashioned maps for areas you may need to operate in. In an emergency, the satellites that supply data to consumer GPS units can be disabled. If you can find a wide format scanner to use, scan the maps in the highest resolution the scanner is capable of and convert them to PDF. These can then be digitally shared with other likeminded people.
3) Next time you are in an area that you rarely frequent, stop at a drug store and buy a pay-as-you-go cellphone with cash and never use it. These are extremely useful for a lot of things and cost very little. You can even add more minutes to the phone using kiosks and cash and they are completely untraceable. Drug dealers call them burners because you use them for awhile then throw them away and get new ones leaving anyone tracking you at square one.
4) Take lots of classes on first aid. Preventing infections and being able to set a bone could mean life over death if you were in a situation where you couldn’t go to a hospital.
5) Join social organizations like the Freemasons, Elks, or local business organizations. Build strong networks within your community that can be called on later. Try not to be “that guy who won’t shut up about the upcoming revolution.”
6) Read. Read. Read. Read books about war, sociology, medicine, history. Most of the military’s more common training manuals are available online for free. Whatever you want to do in this world, someone has already succeeded at and someone has failed at. There are likely books on both.
7) If you do join “patriot” groups, there will be undercover government agents there. They were in the 60’s, OWS, Ruby Ridge, and there is no reason to believe the government’s changed tactics. If there is a new guy who nobody knows who says “Lets blow up this building, I know where to get a bomb.” This is a government agent.
Most importantly, do not isolate people who don’t agree with you. They will keep you grounded. What happens is these groups reinforce their own delusions, and prevent you from getting a realistic view of the situation.
