10 lessons on prepping from around the world

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Prepping is a human condition practiced across the globe for thousands of years. Customs are influenced by geography, culture, politics, and threat. Here are ten applicable observations on preparedness from around the world.

1. Argentina: Get hard.

Fernando “Ferfal” Aguirre’s The Modern Survival Manual: Surviving the Economic Collapse is required reading for preppers, and it’s chock-full of real-life lessons from his experiences during Argentina's 2001 economic crisis. But the very first thing he starts with is preparing your body and your mind so you’re not a soft target. Stop being soft. Do difficult things to develop your body and your mind. Go camping. Hit the gym. Get in shape! It’ll do wonders for your health, survivability, and confidence.

Take home point: here’sa simple weightlifting plan that most able-bodied adults can perform. Learn to stand up straight and act confident. Get your dental and health problems fixed while you can—don’t put it off for after stuff hits the fan.

2. Netherlands: Involve the kids!

The motto of the Boy Scouts of America is “Be Prepared” and the organization has taught boys wilderness and practical skills for over 100 years. The Dutch have their own version of inculcating confidence in their children via a cultural tradition known as Dutch Dropping. Kids, starting around the age of 11-12, are dropped off in the forest alone or in small groups at night with minimal gear and instructed to find their way home or to the campsite with ZERO adult assistance. Some nights are tough and miserable, but overall, the practice instills independence, decision-making skills, and is widely practiced.

Take home point: instill grit and self-confidence in your children early.

3. Israel: Always be prepared.

Entire books could be dedicated to the 10/7 attack, but the key takeaway is this: no one saw it coming. The folks attending the Supernova music festival expected a fun party, and what they got instead was hell. Israel is a bit of a special case, but the reality is you never know when a mass shooter or other disaster will strike. Never get too intoxicated, never let your guard down too much, because you never know when your life will change forever.

Take home point: you don’t have to live on hyper-alert (that is grossly unhealthy) but keep your wits about you and have a plan if things go south.

4.Taiwan: Grassroots communities are the best.

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Post-COVID and especially after the start of the Russia-Ukraine War, prepping has exploded in Taiwan. Fearing an imminent blockade and invasion, the Taiwanese have recognized their precarious position. Prepper groups have sprung up across the island and vary in their focus from all-hazards to gear geeks to weaponized resistance forces training with airsoft guns. Skills taught are varied; examples include building an emergency kit, learning first aid, and basic survival proficiencies.

However, some groups go much further and provide instruction on military simulations. Participants run the political gamut and are highly varied in their professions, reflecting a massive cross-section of the island. One common theme that appears across these groups is the adage that disaster can happen at any moment and can consist of assorted hazards. The April 2024 severe earthquake is proof positive of this understanding.

Take home point: community resilience is vital!

5. Bosnia: Get your ham radio license.

During the Bosnian War of the early 1990s, ham radio operators like Himzo Devedzija helped separated families stay in touch via radio. These days, the ubiquity of the internet and smartphones has made ham radio seem obsolete, but radio has a key advantage over more modern and user-friendly tech: it requires practically no infrastructure. Hook a radio up to a battery connected to a solar panel, throw a wire over a tree, and you’re in business. Master digital modes like Winlink and you can even send email over the air. The downside is the equipment is expensive, and you need to take tests with the FCC to obtain the necessary licenses. Your best bet is to contact yournearest ham radio club, who can help prepare you for the tests and recommend the best equipment for your area. But you can do a lot of interesting things even without a license, like listen to worldwide HF transmissions and learn how to track down radio transmitters through foxhunting.

Take home point: pick up a hobby, even if it’s not ham and make it FUN!

6. Russia: Plant a garden.

While the leadership of Russia is commonly maligned, the Russian people are damn tough. They’ve survived Genghis Khan, famines, a communist revolution, and total government collapse. One secret to Russian resiliency? Dacha gardens, which the Russian people have maintained for over 1,000 years. These small backyard gardens account for 3% of Russia’s land but provide over 50% of the country’s food, including 92% of potatoes, 77% of vegetables, 87% of fruit, 59% of meat, and 49% of milk. You don’t have to grow everything overnight, but simply starting with a single raised bed of lettuce and maybe a handful of chickens will give you invaluable real-world experience you can scale when the chips are down.

Take home point: build your resilience in bite-sized (pun intended) chunks.

7. Cyprus: Diversification saves.

During the 2013 financial crisis in Cyprus, Germany agreed to bail out the island, but with some characteristic German austerity: a tax of 6.75 percent from insured deposits up to €100,000 and a 9.9 percent from uninsured amounts over €100,000. People panicked, and Cyprus had to shut down banks for two weeks to avoid a run. Ultimately, depositors lost nearlyhalf of their savings. The crisis in Cyprussparked Bitcoin’s meteoric rise from obscure nerd money to a financial titan as the savvy rich realized that they couldn’t trust the banks. Of course, there are alternative places to store wealth other than a bank, but as for your liquid capital, it pays to diversify. Keep some in cash, Bitcoin, and precious metals.

Take home point: your mother was right, don’t put all your eggs in one basket.

8.Japan: Government CAN be helpful.

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Japan overall, and Tokyo specifically, take disaster preparedness quite seriously. The 2024 New Years Day earthquake hammered that point home, yet again. At the national level, the Japanese Ground Self-Defense Force is habitually prepared to respond to calamity; everything from earthquakes to typhoons to tsunamis.

As a country, September 1st is nationally designated as Disaster Prevention Day, commemorating the 1923 Great Kanto Earthquake which claimed 140,000 lives. School children, businesses, theme parks, and members of the national government participate annually. At the municipal level, Tokyo publishes a very thorough and thoughtful pamphlet on preparedness for its residents (English link here:https://www.metro.tokyo.lg.jp/english/guide/bosai/index.html). Tokyo also boasts the massive Rinkai Disaster Prevention Park, near downtown, that is used both as a tourist attraction and an actual disaster response site.

Take home point: remembrance, codified in national action and tribute, contributes to a culture of preparedness.

9. Finland, Switzerland, Israel: Bunkers aren't mainstream, but the concept is widespread.

You would really have to be a tinfoil hat wearing loon to invest in a bunker, right? Wrong. Switzerland mandates either a personal bunker or a tax for a space in a public bunker. In 2023, Finland ascertained it had over 50,000 bunkers, enough to shelter nearly 90% of its population. For these countries, the shelters are due to nuclear fears. Israeli law stipulates residential homes should possess a Merkhav Mugan (translation: protected space) to protect from conventional rocket and mortar attacks. Some countries and some areas are at higher risk for conventional or nuclear attack. It is folly to ignore this.

Take home point: the need for a nuclear bunker at home should not be a top prepping priority, but many areas of the US could greatly benefit from a reinforced room (e.g. panic room, tornado, or hurricane shelter) to mitigate threats.

10. United Kingdom, Canada, Australia: International preparedness is growing.

Although the tide is turning (slowly), one negative export from America on prepping, especially to the Western World, is that prepping is fringe and even anti-social, if not downright dangerous. Fortunately, things are changing for the better. The United Kingdom is, at least anecdotally, seeing an uptick in interest. The reality series Alone Australia, a spin-off of the American show where survivalists test their wits in nature, is a hit. A December 2023 survey of Canadians found 7% considered themselves preppers with British Columbia reporting the highest levels. Given wildfires, home prices, and general angst regarding a host of potential crises, it’s not hard to see why many are changing their views regarding preparedness.

Take home point: prepping has been a human staple for millennia; the world is rediscovering this and taking action.

About the authors:

Josh Centers has no masters degrees, but he does own four chickens along with some meat rabbits on his Tennessee compound. He runs unprepared.life, the best-selling Substack newsletter on preparedness, where he discusses subjects like food storage, nuclear war preparations, homeschooling, and the importance of cleaning your dryer vents. His views absolutely do not reflect the views of the Department of Defense or the Army.

Dr. Chris Ellis has four masters degrees and earned his PhD at Cornell University. He is a Colonel in the Army who specializes in a variety of disaster and homeland defense initiatives. His views are from his studies and experience and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Department of Defense, the Army, or his current command. Sadly, Chris does not own any chickens.

The THREE ways RFK Jr. will Make America Healthy Again

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One of President Trump's most popular campaign promises was to "Make America Great Again," and he has employed the help of his former opponent, RFK Jr., to make that promise come true.

In an interview with NPR, RFK Jr. revealed the three directives Trump has tasked him as the new head of the Department of Health and Human Services. These directives aim to cut out the "cancer" that Glenn exposed in his latest TV special that has spread throughout theentire federal government.

Here are the three directives Trump gave RFK Jr.:

1. Rid health agencies of corruption and conflicts.

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It is no secret that the departments that fall under the HHS, such as the FDA, NIH, and CDC, are rife with corruption. After the COVID lockdowns raised suspicion that these federal agencies did not have the American people's best interests at heart, Americans have been increasingly distrustful of these institutions. Glenn exposed several instances of corruption across the HHS, from Dr. Fauchi's Covid powertrip to the insidious relationship between private entities like Big Food, Big Pharma, and the federal agencies that regulate them.

RFK Jr. has been one of the most vocal critics of the corruption that has turned these federal agencies against the very people they were created to protect and is the best person to reform these institutions.

2. Return agencies to the gold standard of empirically based, evidence-based science and medicine.

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Under Biden, the HHS has degraded even further than it had before. Scientific methodology and empirical data are no longer the backbones of these institutions. They have been replaced with DEI and other woke agendas. The Department of Health and Human Services is the second largest federal agency, only behind the Pentagon, with a budget of 1.7 trillion dollarsand over 83 thousand employees. The opportunity for waste and negligence is monumental.

Biden appointed former California Attorney General, Xavier Becerra, to the head of HHS, along with Rachel Levine, a transgender woman, as the Assistant Secretary for Health. Before long the second-largest federal agency started looking like a university DEI office, with hundreds of DEI hires adding to government bloat. Instead of battling the diseases and sicknesses that plague our country, the HHS spent the past four years going after pro-life investigators who were exposing how Planned Parenthood sells body parts of aborted babies, opposing the merger of religious-based hospitals to protect transgender and abortion "rights," and wrestling over Obama-era contraceptive mandates with a group of Catholic nuns. This is quackery and waste on an unprecedented scale.

RFK Jr. is tasked with rooting out the corruption that sprang forth with the Biden administration's DEI agenda and put science back in our health policy.

3. End the chronic disease epidemic with measurable impacts within two years.

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Today, despite our modern technology, Americans are sicker than ever before. 129 million Americans have at least one chronic disease, 42 percent have two or more, and 12 percent have more than five. Life expectancy is at a twenty-year low despite the fact that we are spending more than ever on health care. Even our children are sick, with a staggering 40 percent of school-aged kids having at least one chronic disease. One in nine kids has ADHD, and one in 54 has autism, both representing a steep increase over past decades.

America is sick, and Big Pharma is just rolling in the profits. This is where RFK Jr. comes in. He aims to find the cures and preventions to these diseases and make Americans healthy instead of lifelong patients.

POLL: Is Matt Gaetz in trouble?!

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Trump is assembling a dream team to take on the deep state that has burdened the American people for far too long.

It's no surprise Democrats have been pushing back against Trump's nominations, but one person in particular has been experiencing the most resistance: Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz, Trump's pick to serve as his Attorney General. The controversy centers around a years-long House ethics probe regarding sexual misconduct allegations made against Gaetz several years ago. Despite the FBI conducting its own investigation and refusing to prosecute Gaetz, his nomination re-ignited interest in these allegations.

Democrats and some Republicans demand the House Ethics Committee release their probe into Gaetz before his Senate confirmation hearing. Conveniently, earlier this week, an anonymous hacker obtained this coveted report and gave it to the New York Times, which has yet to make the information public.

Glenn is very skeptical about the entire affair, from the allegations against Gaetz to the hacker's "anonymity." Is it another case of lawfare by the Democrats?

Glenn wants to know what do you think. Did Gaetz commit the crimes he's accused of? Will he still be appointed attorney general? Let us know in the poll below:

Is Matt Gaetz guilty of the crimes he is accused of committing? 

Will Matt Gaetz still be appointed to Trump's cabinet?

Was the "hacker" really some Democratic staffer or lawmaker? 

3 BIGGEST lies about Trump's plans for deportations

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To the right, Trump's deportation plans seem like a reasonable step to secure the border. For the left, mass deportation represents an existential threat to democracy.

However, the left's main arguments against Trump's deportation plans are not only based on racially problematic lies and fabrications they are outright hypocritical.

Here are the three BIGGEST lies about Trump's deportation plans:

1. Past Deportations

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The left acts like Donald Trump is the first president in history to oversee mass deportations, but nothing could be further from the truth. Deportations have been a crucial tool for enforcing immigration laws and securing the country from the beginning, and until recently, it was a fairly bipartisan issue.

Democrat superstar President Obama holds the record for most deportations during his tenure in office, clocking in at a whopping 3,066,457 people over his eight years in office. This compares to the 551,449 people removed during Trump's first term. Obama isn't an anomaly either, President Clinton deported 865,646 people during his eight years, still toping Trump's numbers by a considerable margin.

The left's sudden aversion to deportations is clearly reactionary propaganda aimed at villainizing Trump.

2. Exploitative Labor

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Commentators on the left have insinuated that President Trump's deportation plan would endanger the agricultural industry due to the large portion of agricultural workers in the U.S. who are illegal aliens. If they are deported, food prices will skyrocket.

What the left is conveniently forgetting is the reason why many businesses choose to hire illegal immigrants (here's a hint: it's not because legal Americans aren't willing to do the work). It's because it is way easier to exploit people who are here illegally. Farmowners don't have to pay taxes on illegal aliens, pay minimum wage, offer benefits, sign contracts, or do any of the other typical requirements that protect the rights of the worker.

The left has shown their hand. This was never about some high-minded ideals of "diversity" and "inclusion." It's about cheap, expendable labor and a captive voter base to bolster their party in elections.

3."Undesirable" Jobs

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Another common talking point amid the left-wing anti-Trump hysteria is that illegal aliens take "undesirable" jobs that Americans will not do. The argument is that these people fill the "bottom tier" in the U.S. economy, jobs they consider "unfit" for American citizens.

By their logic, we should allow hordes of undocumented, unvetted immigrants into the country so they can work the jobs that the out-of-touch liberal talking heads consider beneath them. It's no wonder why they lost the election.

Did the Left lay the foundations for election denial?

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Did Glenn predict the future?

Just a few days after the election and President Trump's historic victory, the New York Times published a noteworthy article titled "How Russia Openly Escalated Its Election Interference Efforts," in which they made some interesting suggestions. They brought up several examples of Russian election interference (stop me if you think you've heard this one before) that favored Trump. From there, they delicately approached the "election denial zone" with the following statement:

"What impact Russia’s information campaign had on the outcome of this year’s race, if any, remains uncertain"

Is anyone else getting 2016 flashbacks?

It doesn't end there. About two weeks before the election (October 23rd), Glenn and Justin Haskins, the co-author of Glenn's new book, Propaganda Wars, discuss a frightening pattern they were observing in the news cycle at the time, and it bears a striking similarity to this New York Times piece. To gain a full appreciation of this situation, let's go back to two weeks before the election when Glenn and Justin laid out this scene:

Bad Eggs in the Intelligence Community

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This story begins with a top-secret military intelligence leak. Over the October 19th weekend, someone within the U.S. Government's intelligence agencies leaked classified information regarding the Israeli military and their upcoming plans to Iran. The man responsible for this leak, Asif William Rahman, a CIA official with top security clearance, was arrested on Tuesday, November 12th.

Rahman is one of the known "bad eggs" within our intelligence community. Glenn and Justin highlighted another, a man named Robert Malley. Malley is an Iranian envoy who works at the State Department under the Biden/Harris administration and is under investigation by the FBI for mishandling classified information. While Malley was quietly placed on leave in June, he has yet to be fired and still holds security clearance.

Another suspicious figure is Ariane Tabatabai, a former aide of Mr. Malley and a confirmed Iranian agent. According to a leak by Semafor, Tabatabai was revealed to be a willing participant in an Iranian covert influence campaign run by Tehran's Foreign Ministry. Despite this shocking revelation that an Iranian agent was in the Pentagon with access to top-secret information, Tabatabai has not faced any charges or inquires, nor has she been stripped of her job or clearance.

If these are the bad actors we know about, imagine how many are unknown to the public or are flying under the radar. In short, our intelligence agencies are full of people whose goals do not align with American security.

Conspicuous Russian Misinformation

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The story continues with a video of a man accusing former VP candidate and Minnesota Governor, Tim Walz of sexual assault. The man alleged to be Matthew Metro, a former student of Walz claimed that he was assaulted by the Governor while in High School. The man in the video gave corroborating details that made the claim seem credible on the surface, and it quickly spread across the internet. But after some deeper investigation, it was revealed this man wasnot Matthew Metro and that the entire video was fake. This caught the attention of the Security Director of National Intelligence who claimed the video was a Russian hoax designed to wound the Harris/Walz campaign, and the rest of the intelligence community quickly agreed.

In the same vein, the State Department put out a $10 million bountyto find the identity of the head of the Russian-owned media company Rybar. According to the State Department, Rybar manages several social media channels that promote Russian governmental political interests targeted at Trump supporters. The content Rybar posts is directed into pro-Trump, and pro-Republican channels, and the content apparently has a pro-Trump spin, alongside its pro-Russia objectives.

Why Does the Intelligence Community Care?

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So what's the deal? Yes, Russia was trying to interfere with the election, but this is a well-known issue that has unfortunately become commonplace in our recent elections.

The real concern is the intelligence community's uncharacteristically enthusiastic and fast response. Where was this response in 2016, when Hillary Clinton and the Democrats spent months lying about Donald Trump's "collusion" with Russia? It has since been proven that the FIB knew the entire story was a Clinton campaign fabrication, and they not only kept quiet about it, but they even played along. Or what about in 2020 when the Left tried to shut down the Hunter Biden laptop story for months by calling it a Russian hoax, only for it to turn out to be true?

Between all the bad actors in the intelligence community and their demonstrated repeated trustworthiness, this sudden concern with "Russian disinformation" that happened to support Trump was just too convenient.

Laying the Foundations for Election Denial

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This is when Glenn and Justin make a startling prediction: the Left was preparing for a potential Trump victory (remember, this was two weeks before the election) so they would have something to delegitimize him with. They were painting Trump as Putin's lapdog who was receiving election assistance in the form of misinformation from the Kremlin by sounding the alarm on these cherry-picked (and in the grand scheme of things, tame) examples of Russian propaganda. They were laying the foundation of the Left's effort to resist and delegitimize a President-elect Trump.

Glenn and Justin had no idea how right they were.