James Rawles - Founders

She set down the dustpan and came into the living room with Ben. As he continued packing, he said, “I need to be on my way, tonight. It is easier to fight from outside barbed wire than from inside it. We’re lucky that I didn’t get arrested today. I don’t want to give them another chance. Now listen carefully: I want you to tell people that I was arrested and taken away tonight. Otherwise, they’ll ask questions when they see that I’ve gone. In addition to the Army, there are at least three agencies of the ProvGov and four security contracting companies that are independently arresting people and hauling them off to camps, or I suppose for immediate liquidation. The right hand doesn’t know what the left hand is doing. So by blaming them for my disappearance, you’ll put yourself in the clear.”

“And also make the Hutchings government look even worse,” Rebecca added.

Ben nodded and said, “That’s right. It’s a win-win. They use psychological warfare on us, so it’s only fair that we return the favor.”

He let out a breath and went on. “Now I’ll be going to Nashville to see some old friends. It’s safer for both of us if I don’t tell you exactly who.”

“Okay.”

Ben finished strapping his sleeping bag onto his pack. “I’m leaving you most of our silver. I can’t be sure, but I’ll do my best to send you money from time to time. Whenever I enclose a letter, you have to promise me that you’ll burn it, right after you read it.”

“I promise.”

Then he shouldered his pack and gave his wife a two-minute hug and a kiss. Ben touched the mezuzah on his way out the door. On the porch he snapped closed his backpack’s bellyband clasp, and picked up his guitar case. He turned to face his wife again in the doorway. “Trust in Adonai and May His Ruach HaKodesh (Holy Spirit) comfort you during the days you sit Shivah for Joseph. I will remember Joseph with you and will pray the Kaddish for him every day. I will pray every day for peace, safety, and that you would be comforted by the Lord, despite my absence from your side. Remember that Joseph is ‘asleep.’ He loved the Lord Yeshua and is with Him, at this very moment. Ani meohev otach yoter Midai! ”

“I love you without measure as well,” she said as he turned and walked out into the darkness.

Muddy Pond, Tennessee

August, the Second Year

After his son Joseph was killed, Ben immediately traveled to Nashville. There, he arrived on the doorstep of Adrian Evans. Adrian had been a junior partner at his old law firm. He was the firm’s gun nut and had been the one who first taught Ben to shoot. He also brought Ben to his first gun show, where he bought his HK USP .45 pistol. Adrian had always struck Ben as an odd duck who was “always thinking outside the box.” It was Adrian who had advised Ben to buy all his guns secondhand from private party sellers, rather than from licensed dealers. “When it comes to guns and ammunition, never leave a paper trail,” he had always insisted.

Adrian, now working as a handyman and housepainter, offered to have Ben stay at his house. He promised to link Ben up with a friend who was in the nascent resistance movement.

Neither Ben nor Rebecca had any military or law enforcement experience. Ben had attended just a few Krav Maga martial arts classes, and he was only an occasional recreational shooter with no formal training. He regretted not taking more classes before the Crunch. He realized that he needed to get some training in a hurry, or he’d have a short life expectancy as a resistance fighter. So, at Adrian’s suggestion, Ben sought the help of Peter Moeller, a retired neighbor who was a Vietnam veteran and longtime competitive shooter. With mostly dry practice and some .22 rimfire training in his basement, Ben became a much more competent shooter. Under Moeller’s tutelage, Ben also learned the basics of combat fieldcraft, first-aid for gunshot wounds, and land navigation. Ben began running, stretching, and calisthenics every morning. He also read and reread every book that he could find on guerrilla warfare.

Diving into Adrian’s book collection, as well as Moeller’s, Ben read a variety of books that ranged from texts like Guerrilla by Charles W. Thayer, Guerrilla Strategies by Gérard Chaliand, and Total Resistance by H. Von Dach. Adrian also insisted that Ben read the lengthy novel Unintended Consequences by fellow attorney John Ross. As Adrian said, “This ain’t your everyday novel. You’ll end up taking notes. Trust me.”

Through Adrian, Ben was put in touch with a resistance group that was being formed locally to conduct arson and sabotage. They called themselves the Matchmakers.

By prearrangement, Ben first met the sabotage group’s recruiter at a local bar. Initially, Ben was enthusiastic about the Matchmakers’ plans, but this turned to disappointment as the group endlessly built incendiaries, trained, and practiced. But their few operations were against relatively soft targets of no significance.

The Matchmakers met sporadically after-hours at a Nashville dye plant. From the outset, Ben was not impressed with their organizational structure or their operational security (OPSEC). He thought they talked too openly of their plans and that the group was too large. With eighteen members, the resistance group’s size would have been more appropriate for more overt guerrilla warfare, rather than just the sabotage that they planned. In Ben’s estimation, sabotage teams should have no more than five members, and just a three-member team was ideal. He eventually convinced the unit to break into three smaller cells. Eventually, Ben left the Matchmakers after concluding that they were long on talk, and short on action.

Now physically fit and better trained, Ben moved out of Adrian’s house and joined a seven-man raiding team, with members mainly from Crossville. They called themselves the Cantrell Company, in honor of Charles Cantrell, a Tennessee-born Medal of Honor recipient in the Spanish-American War. Here, Ben got his first taste of combat, in a series of raids and ambushes, most within thirty miles of Crossville. Ben developed a reputation as a daring fighter willing to take risks. Eventually, he became the team’s most frequent point man. He developed a specialty in sentry removal. Eventually Ben was recruited out of the Cantrell Company to join the Old Man’s reconnaissance team.

While he was first with the Matchmakers, Ben learned how to make thermite, which later proved to be a valuable skill. In addition to using some of it himself to weld shut artillery breech blocks, Ben passed along his thermite mixing knowledge to four other independent resistance groups.

The Resistance was impossible for the ProvGov to isolate and defeat because it was essentially leaderless. Anyone who tried to establish himself as a “spokesman” or “commander” was quickly and quietly told to shut up or shut down. Instead of a formal hierarchy, decentralized cells, led by subject matter experts, characterized the Resistance. This gave each resistance group a distinct personality and modus operandi. They numbered anywhere from lone wolves to teams of about thirty. Typically, however, most teams or cells were made up of three to ten people. Each team had a specialty, such as demolition, arson, vehicular sabotage, thermiting, reconnaissance, logistics, couriering, sniping, or assassination.