Scott Wagner: Gun Digest Book of Survival Guns

How able-bodied does your family need to be? How about this: can they hold a gun (of a size that fits them) and pull the trigger? Can they discern friend from foe? Can they pull the trigger when it is aimed at another dangerous human being—even if that dangerous human being was once a friend? Can they hit what they are pointing their gun at? If you can answer those questions with a resounding “Yes” for each person, you are good to go, and the “Yes” members receive equipment and training suitable for each. Remember Mel Gibson’s movie The Patriot ? Remember the scene where Benjamin Martin’s (Gibson’s) son Thomas is gunned down by the British Colonel Tavington and Martin enlists his other two young sons to lay in ambush for the British detachment? The boys assisted their father in wiping out the detachment, personally killing several of the soldiers themselves. They fired and reloaded their own rifles, but it was Benjamin Martin who did the up-close tomahawk fighting; that weapon wouldn’t have been appropriate for the physical size of the boys.

The uproar by the usual suspects over that scene was furious. How dare the movie depict young boys killing, even in wartime! Well, I’ve got a newsflash for you. That happened a lot in those days and continued through the twentieth century. It still happens in justified legal circumstances today, when kids are home alone and someone breaks in. And, until very recently, we had 15-year-old boys lying about their ages to get into WWII and Korea to get a chance to fight!

There is nothing wrong with teaching our children how to defend themselves, what a serious and permanent thing taking a life is and when it is justified. Teaching them all the aspects of armed defense, including the fact that, under most circumstances, life is sacred and not to be destroyed, is essential. If you don’t enlist the help of your children when they are old enough to assist, your plan may not work for long. You cannot sleep with one eye open; rest will be at a premium, fatigue will be in abundance.

Pick a weapon that is appropriate for the small-statured, maybe a .22 lever gun, such as the ones available through the Henry Repeating Arms Company (Henry doesn’t have a blasted crossbolt safety that could mean the difference between life and death in a dire situation), then practice, practice, practice with it. Small but capable children don’t need to get a larger gun for a long time, because inside 100 yards, 15 rounds of .22 LR fired accurately is nothing to ignore by anyone. In fact, if you looked at stats, the .22 LR has probably accounted for more deaths in the ranks of civilians than any other caliber since cartridge firearms were introduced. It will do the job, maybe not spectacularly, but the job will be done nonetheless. From there, the new shooter can be taught to at least be familiar with the operation of the other weapons you have on hand. Family members of slight stature may not like shooting your 12-gauge Ithaca M37 defense shotgun in practice, and don’t make them do it much, but at least they will know how to work it if called upon to do so in an emergency (and you may assure them that, in the heat of battle, they will not notice the recoil).

No one knows. Localized events depend on the resolution and honor of the people in that particular area. How moral were the people in the area before the event? Are they solid, law-abiding folks? How self-reliant are they? Folks in rural, particularly agricultural, areas are very self-sufficient and usually willing to get to work helping their neighbors. Last year, there were numerous tornados in the Midwest, and some of the towns hit were literally wiped out, totally flattened. The folks there didn’t go hollering for help from FEMA. They helped themselves and their communities, counties, and states as needed. They didn’t even want FEMA there, and I applaud them for it. Right now, FEMA has info on its websites, along with the Center for Disease Control (CDC), about what to do in case of a zombie attack. This is not a joke! That’s the way to get folks to take a mistrusted federal agency—the same folks who mangled the Katrina response—seriously.

As I tell my police cadets, I don’t need to embellish or make up police stories to tell them, the truth is always stranger. The same goes for this book. Indeed, I have to ask, why bother making up stories? Here in the central Ohio area this past spring, state and local EMA held a role-playing practice disaster drill, where the disaster was, you guessed it, a zombie outbreak. What a waste of time, what a joke. Shame on the local first responders who participated in that ridiculous waste of taxpayer dollars.

The absolute crisis phase of localized, natural disaster-related events (tornado, fire, flood) are usually under control, without looting, in literally a matter of hours. “Under control” means that no one is in imminent danger of serious injury or death. Sure, long-term solutions, such as rebuilding structures and homes, may take days or up to a year, and standards of living will be reduced for a while, but supplies and donations from fellow citizens will arrive soon, mostly because, under normal circumstances, Americans are the most generous people in the history of this planet. But if the disaster condition affects a major portion, if not all, of the United States, then we may be talking years for full recovery, with certain regions faring better than others.

Therein lies the difference between localized and national disaster. There won’t be convoys of food, fuel, medicine, and supplies arriving on a daily basis in national disasters. You will be on your own, like it or not, with only your pre-planning to save you. If FEMA or some other federal agency arrives to help, are you going to want to go to their shelters or food lines? I suggest that would be a bad idea, unless you and your family are starving. Your weapons won’t be permitted inside and, in fact, may be permanently confiscated. This is not a palatable choice, since FEMA aid might/will eventually end if the disaster also involves financial collapse or, in the extreme, all the supplies are usurped by some other authority or local tyrant and you end up on your own. How about planning to always be on your own from the get-go instead? Then it won’t be as big an issue when you are.