Is It Wise To Live Near Army Base If SHTF?

[Turtle]

And yeah, I've gotta agree with Survival Nut . . . I've known WAY more solid individuals in the various branches of the military than any suspect scumbag criminals.

Except, perhaps, for the vast majority of the Marine Corps. Those guys are all nuts. lol

I would much rather ally myself with former and current military folks than your average civilian.

[Vertigo]

Originally Posted by neil-v1

Hello all

I have been looking to move my family. I have been set on the Blairsville, Young Harris and Hiawassee, Georgia area but my question would really be for anywhere. How wise is it to live near an Army (or any other) service base if the sh*t was really to hit the fan?? It is something I never really thought of until today. Any opinions would be greatly appreciated.

In my opinion, living near a military base is not per se good or bad for you, it depends. If a crisis happens, at first this will not be good for you, since a lot of people will flock to that base in search of help. At this stage, it is not the military base itself that should worry you, it is the people who will try to get help there and will be passing along your front yard.

If the crisis worsens, and there are some bouts of anarchy, protest, gangs roving around, but there is still a government, I believe you will be very thankful for living close to a military base. Because of its calming effect on possible perpetrators.

If the big time, there is widespread anarchy, complete loss of authority, then a military base would probably be the worst place to live close to. They have the training, equipment and spirit that combined will prove unstoppable for most civilians.

Overall, a military base close by is actually an asset (especially a smaller one) it will provide stability and security, so the average civilian can concentrate on survival and growing food, instead of planning how to kill their neighbour.

V.

[kyfarmer]

I lived in Richmond Ky. for a few year's not far from thousand's of ton's of nasty gas. Even worked on the place for a while. I got the crap outa there as soon as i could. Back to the hill's where i belong.

[TreeMUPKennel]

I'm right outside the Fort Bragg base here in the Carolinas. The only good thing about living here is the deals on military surplus, and opportunity to buy all kinds of goodies.

[oldsoldier]

Originally Posted by SurvivalNut

Some of the negative comments here, I think, are born of innocence and arm chair QBing not ignorance.

I have a different opinion. I am an Army Retiree and live 40 minutes from a major AF base.

Short of a total nuclear strike, I feel the following applies:

In a SHTF scenario, the troops are going to be deployed to support national/regional/local issues. A skeleton force will remain.

Dependents (wives and kids) will either be moved on base, shipped home or will have filtered home already. The military trains and practices that contingency. The individual soldier deploys on the assumption their families are cared for.

Military communities have a high proportion of Military Retirees who will have access to base commissaries and medical facilities up to the last minute.

Local and regional governments will relocate to those bases.

Military Retirees have one of the most solid pensions and benefits packages that will be one of the last to fall apart. They also know guns and probably are well armed and are LAW ABIDING. They tend to own homes and are permanent residents.

When the kids are off defending our country, no one is going to screw with skipper or his community, he’s got teeth AND experience. (well, I still have my teeth).

In a lot of the eFiction downloaded on this site, Gunny, the Colonel, Lieutenant or old Sarge are the story’s local “Rock”.

Military communities also have a higher percentage of military folk serving in local government, hence an experienced head in a crisis.

I tend to like just where I am.

Saddle up to a Veteran. Make friends. We tend to take care of our troops.


(no, I don't do drugs, ain't an alcoholic and the judge didn't make me volunteer. I am not a nutcase. Just ask my Psych. Meet a 21 year old kid deploying overseas for a 3rd time and volunteering for it. That's patriotism friend! Life free in the open is better than hiding in fear).

I agree 100%, and as a Vet ( army specops) I am somewhat offended by AI's comments. The type of people he describes WILL be found ANYWHERE. Not just in the military. SOME choose the military because they don't have the education level for good civilian employment, but it is most likely due to not being able to afford college. Rather than being to dumb. I joined the military because I wanted to do my part to serve my country. I joined because I was 17 and my father had a heart attack and couldn't work anymore, so I wanted to help out. I joined because I wanted to see some of the world and make a difference. I Joined because I was/am a proud american. I think THAT IS the reason many people join not because we/they are druggy,rapist,scumbag trash to stupid to do anything else. IMO opinions like that hurts our military and the wonderful people serving in it. Bigoted remarks like A.I.'s are to me as I said extremely offensive.

OKAY EVERYONE END OF RANT

[allen_idaho]

I'm a vet (Navy) as well. And the truth of the matter is that there are some in the military who are actually decent folks. But the other half really are worthless dirtbags. Just like in civilian life. I don't see why you would be so offended by that. You know it's true. That's why the captain's mast sheet is never blank.

[NaeKid]

Just heard a "horror-story" on the news today. Seems a commander of a base in Ontario has just been charged with the murder of a local female. The police (OPP) seem to think that there are many unsolved deaths following this commander's career-path and all of the unsolved deaths involve females ...

Yes, there may be some bad-apples in the military and I know some of them personally and there are some really good-apples as well and I have met more of them than the bad ones.

Is it safe to live near a base? If you are looking at the people on the base, you will find a similar mix of good and bad people. If you are looking at the base as being a point-of-attack, I would imagine it would be one and being further away would keep your skin coverin' your meat.

[Dean]

Serial Killer in the Canadian Military?

[NaeKid]

Originally Posted by Dean

Serial Killer in the Canadian Military?

Here is the story with a picture of the guy. He looks pretty respectable, eh?

'In the company of the devil': Victim | Canada | News | Calgary Sun

Originally Posted by CalgarySun

“I was in the company of the devil himself.

“And I was sure he was going to kill me.”

She has titanic courage, this Tweed single mom.

For 21/2 hours in the deepest dark of last Sept. 30, she fought, begged, cajoled and prayed for her life.

And now the horror of that sexual assault returns in a stunning flash.

Her accused attacker is CFB Trenton’s commander, Col. Russ Williams — also charged Monday in another Tweed sexual attack, and for the murders of Jessica Lloyd and Marie-France Comeau.

A top soldier. A neighbour. A leading citizen of Tweed.

“I’m still in shock,” the mom tells me. “Just sick to my stomach. He was so close.”

The detectives gave her the news first thing Monday morning. “It’s over,” they assured her.

Well, not by a long shot. Not for her. Hours of counselling lie behind and ahead.

And she will live that night again and again.

She fell asleep alone in her house, in a back room, and awoke around 2 a.m. She was choking. Her comforter was pressed to her face. “I thought maybe there was a fire,” she says.

But it was a man. A strong man. She struggled. He beat her about the head. She broke free enough to breathe.

“You DON’T want to look at me,” he said. His voice was deep and muffled.

“I won’t,” she whispered. But he blindfolded her and she never laid eyes on him, not once.

Even when he bound her hands behind her back.

Even when he trussed her up in a sort of makeshift harness, fashioned from a pillowcase, twist ties and wire he found in her room.

Even when he cut off her clothes with a knife and said, “I’ll be careful not to cut you.”

Even when he assaulted her.

Even when he took photographs, letting her touch the camera so she’d know.

Even when he told her: “You seem like a nice lady.”

“It was so bizarre,” she says. “He was playing a game with me. I had conversations with him the whole time, almost like I was negotiating with him.”

“You’re going to kill me, aren’t you?” she asked him, early on.

“No need for that,” he replied.

He convinced her he had accomplices burglarizing her home, though she heard nothing.

At 4:30 a.m, in that bleakest time before dawn, he ordered her onto her knees, head down, on a couch. “He has a gun,” she thought. “Now, I die.”

But he left, warning her he’d come back in 10 minutes. She waited, but he did not return. And she called for help.

The next four months are a blur. DNA tests, therapy, bewilderment, fear. She bought a German shepherd. She could not sleep. Always the question: Who could do this? In Tweed!?

She saw no connection to the Lloyd and Comeau cases, until cops announced last week there might be a link.

Then came Monday’s shocking news. The other sexual assault. Two women murdered. One suspect. The police vowing to probe the colonel’s past.

“Why am I alive?” the Tweed mom asks me.

I wish I had an answer. She will seek it for years to come.

“I guess I’m blessed,” she says. “He let me live. I can’t explain it.

“Now I just want to sleep. I’m so exhausted.”

She knew Col. Williams only to say hello. She did not even know he was CFB Trenton’s commander.

Shortly after Christmas, she drove past his front yard on Cosy Cove Lane.

She waved. He waved back.

[NaeKid]

And another story:

Military commander charged with brutal murders | Canada | News | Calgary Sun

Originally Posted by CalgarySun

It was a dragnet along a stretch of highway north of Belleville that police say cracked the brutal murder of two eastern Ontario women, the violent sexual assault of two others and snared the base commander of one of Canada’s largest and busiest airbases.

Col. Russell Williams, 46, the wing commander of CFB Trenton, is charged with two counts of first-degree murder in the deaths of Cpl. Marie-France Comeau and Jessica Lloyd. Williams has also been charged with two counts of forcible confinement and two counts of breaking and entering and sexual assault after two Tweed women were attacked in September.

On Feb. 4, police stopped cars travelling in both directions along Hwy. 37 north of Belleville, near Lloyd’s home where she vanished without any identification, her wallet or her car in January.

Three days after that roadside canvas, Williams was arrested in Ottawa — the same city where one of his alleged victims was laid to rest in the National Cemetery back in December.

Police told reporters in Belleville Monday that unspecified information received at that roadside check put Williams in their crosshairs.

They had him in handcuffs by Sunday and were searching his Cosy Cove Lane home in Tweed.

OPP Det.-Insp. Chris Nicholas told reporters Monday it was “due to the similarities” of the crimes committed against Comeau, Lloyd’s disappearance and the assaults on women in Tweed that led police to believe the crimes were committed by the same individual. Those similarities include the “geography” of the crimes, Nicholas said.

When asked if they are examining other unsolved crimes, OPP inspectors said they will look at where Williams was stationed during his accomplished career and speak to police services in those jurisdictions.

“We are certainly tracking the movements of where this man has been over the past several years,” Nicholas said.

The colonel was out of uniform Monday, wearing a blue prisoner jumpsuit as he was led into the Belleville courthouse in shackles.

Except for reciting his name and acknowledging the charges against him, Williams said nothing and stared at the floor.

As Williams was led away, Lloyd’s burly brother, Andy, stared grimly at the man accused of killing his sister.

Lloyd, 27, went missing Jan. 29 after she failed to show up for her job in Napanee. Her body was found early Monday morning off Carry Rd., near Tweed, police said.

Comeau, 38, was found murdered in Brighton, Ont., on Nov. 25, 2009. She was a member of 437 Squadron at CFB Trenton.

A slew of media clippings, photographs and Department of National Defence literature paint a heroic portrait of Williams, a married man with more than 20 years in the Canadian Forces.

In charge of CFB Trenton since July, Williams had been tasked with overseeing the 24-hour “air bridge” that moves equipment and personnel between Trenton, Jamaica and Haiti, to support Canada’s relief mission on the earthquake ravaged island.

Williams’ wife Mary Elizabeth Harriman works in Ottawa as the associate executive director of the Heart and Stroke Foundation of Canada.

Officials from the foundation said Harriman was taking an extended leave and described her as one of their most beloved staff members.

Lieutenant-General André Deschamps, chief of the air staff, issued a statement Monday announcing Williams had been relieved of his duties.

“Although one is considered innocent until proven guilty, in light of the seriousness of the charges, and in consideration of the high level of responsibilities attached to the position of Wing Commander, an interim Wing Commander for 8 Wing Trenton will soon be appointed,” Deschamps said.

At a press conference at CFB Trenton Monday night, Gen. Yvan Blondin, Commander of 1 Air Division, said base personnel are in a state of shock.