"Outbreak" movie scenario?

[chasfm11]

I guess my point was lost in what I tried to say. What I was getting at is, though you cannot account for all situations, the bad guys generally look for opportunities where they can get away with causing trouble without having trouble themselves. Bad guys prefer unarmed victims, no matter if it is common thugs or some other nation...

I'm not sure that the global bad guys are as worried about retaliation as they used to be. My perspective is this: if two guys are standing a few feet apart with guns drawn, the deterrent effect works as long as both of them believe that the other will shoot. I'm not sure that is the case any longer at the National level. I believe that there are rogue regimes who believe that the US would not risk retaliation, whether that is factual or not. North Korea is one of those. Their reasoning seems to believe that the US is more afraid of China's response and will hedge on lashing out against North Korean aggression. We've continually made threats and they have continually done things that we threatened about but didn't follow through on. I fear that Iran might be another. When you embolden BGs, they will keep pushing,

Don't buy it? Saddam Hussein believed that he could "hunker down" against the onslaught of the American military, and for a while he did. He was more afraid (apparently) of Iran finding out that the didn't have any WMD than of the power of the US. That is a pretty strong statement by itself.

Making that a little more realistic, I truly believe that there a BGs out there with absolutely no sense of remorse. They are "here and now" thinkers who don't really care about consequences. If the spirit motivates them to shoot someone, they will do it. They do prey on what they think is weakness but I'm not sure that, confronted with force, some would not simply throw everything that they had against the other party, hoping they would survive the return fire. There is no deterrence in these cases. When you throw in those with the mentality of suicide bombing, the case for deterrence working gets even weaker.

While retaliation might make you feel better in a doomsday type scenario. it doesn't help the survivors much. I didn't see Outbreak but I assume that it deals with the resulting chaos. "A Second After" does the same.

[Heartland Patriot]

I guess my point was lost in what I tried to say. What I was getting at is, though you cannot account for all situations, the bad guys generally look for opportunities where they can get away with causing trouble without having trouble themselves. Bad guys prefer unarmed victims, no matter if it is common thugs or some other nation...

I'm not sure that the global bad guys are as worried about retaliation as they used to be. My perspective is this: if two guys are standing a few feet apart with guns drawn, the deterrent effect works as long as both of them believe that the other will shoot. I'm not sure that is the case any longer at the National level. I believe that there are rogue regimes who believe that the US would not risk retaliation, whether that is factual or not. North Korea is one of those. Their reasoning seems to believe that the US is more afraid of China's response and will hedge on lashing out against North Korean aggression. We've continually made threats and they have continually done things that we threatened about but didn't follow through on. I fear that Iran might be another. When you embolden BGs, they will keep pushing,

Don't buy it? Saddam Hussein believed that he could "hunker down" against the onslaught of the American military, and for a while he did. He was more afraid (apparently) of Iran finding out that the didn't have any WMD than of the power of the US. That is a pretty strong statement by itself.

Making that a little more realistic, I truly believe that there a BGs out there with absolutely no sense of remorse. They are "here and now" thinkers who don't really care about consequences. If the spirit motivates them to shoot someone, they will do it. They do prey on what they think is weakness but I'm not sure that, confronted with force, some would not simply throw everything that they had against the other party, hoping they would survive the return fire. There is no deterrence in these cases. When you throw in those with the mentality of suicide bombing, the case for deterrence working gets even weaker.

While retaliation might make you feel better in a doomsday type scenario. it doesn't help the survivors much. I didn't see Outbreak but I assume that it deals with the resulting chaos. "A Second After" does the same.

While I understand what you are getting at on a global scale, and certainly in light of the current administration, I think you probably mentioned the two nations that MIGHT go for it if they think the circumstances are right. AND, in line with that, there probably are bad guys out there that would "go for it"...but they are few and far between, as well. I'll tell you what, if bad guys were regularly "going for it" against armed citizens, I am 100% certain the generally anti-firearms, anti-Second Amendment mass media would be ALL OVER IT, so they could show everyone that "see self defense, even with a gun, doesn't work/turn them in Mr. and Mrs. America"...and despite terrible events where evil and/or disturbed folks have gone on shooting sprees, I haven't really noticed too many cases where BGs have KNOWINGLY taken on armed citizens, and defeated them, in the news. And I would have noticed, as I am an admitted "news junkie". In the meantime, I'll continue to do my best to avoid trouble, try to be prepared to respond to the best of my ability if it comes my way, and hope I don't run into any of the true "mad dogs"...and I will hope that continues to hold true for our nation, as well. Good day to you.

[chasfm11]

While I understand what you are getting at on a global scale, and certainly in light of the current administration, I think you probably mentioned the two nations that MIGHT go for it if they think the circumstances are right. AND, in line with that, there probably are bad guys out there that would "go for it"...but they are few and far between, as well. I'll tell you what, if bad guys were regularly "going for it" against armed citizens, I am 100% certain the generally anti-firearms, anti-Second Amendment mass media would be ALL OVER IT, so they could show everyone that "see self defense, even with a gun, doesn't work/turn them in Mr. and Mrs. America"...and despite terrible events where evil and/or disturbed folks have gone on shooting sprees, I haven't really noticed too many cases where BGs have KNOWINGLY taken on armed citizens, and defeated them, in the news. And I would have noticed, as I am an admitted "news junkie". In the meantime, I'll continue to do my best to avoid trouble, try to be prepared to respond to the best of my ability if it comes my way, and hope I don't run into any of the true "mad dogs"...and I will hope that continues to hold true for our nation, as well. Good day to you.

If you look at the news, there are two disturbing trends in light of this discussion. One deals with the level of brazen thefts that is occurring. When they steal man hole covers (15 quantity) out of down town Ft. Worth, there is a level of desperation and brazenness that we haven't seen before. The volume of such thefts appears to be on the increase and I haven't seen very much in the way of the culprits being caught. To me, it implies a rising level of lawlessness.

The rise of "flash mobs" or whatever you want to call them also does not bode well. While some of them might scatter in the face of force, they seem to know that when they use their numbers and not weapons to accomplish evil deeds, our society is not willing to allow much confrontation with them. One person with a gun against 25 or more people, regardless if the majority of the mob splits off, would be a difficult situation to handle. It takes the multiple BG drill to a whole new level. Again, the sheer brazen nature of their action make their response to a lone defender unpredictable. I suspect that we'll see the WI type situation occur more. Those in UK have correctly deduced that they are in little danger from the police and the level of confrontation that they are willing undertake is appalling. I believe both of those locations might have some of the same underlying causes. I also worry that there may be copy cat type groups in the US who feed off the news generated from the UK violence. There is a "perfect storm" combination of continuing oppressive heat, large unemployed groups and news whipping up class warfare that could play a part.

I agree with your strategy to stay alert and out of harm's way. I've lost nothing that I'm anxious to find in the presence of a large group of young people who don't appear to have a clear purpose for being together. The problem is that you never know when you might accidentally come upon a band of people in the middle of something like the massive tire and wheel heist that happened in Rockwall recently. A group that brazen is likely to armed. And the bands of kids just seem to show up out of nowhere. I'm not sure that any amount of situational awareness will help with one of those events if you are unlucky enough to be present. For the moment, I would assess the risks of these kinds of situations a very low but most of us felt that about Wal-Mart parking lots a year ago and look at the news to see how accurate those expectations were.