Enemies Foreign and Domestic vs. Patriot Dawn

No, this isn’t the post you expected it to be. It’s not really about Matt Bracken’s Enemies Foreign and Domestic (EFAD) being better or worse than my Patriot Dawn (PD).

I am coming late to Bracken’s books. I finished EFAD on Christmas day. Quite simply, I loved it. What a great book! I couldn’t recommend it more. What I also liked was that Bracken’s background as a Navy SEAL is apparent in the book, and it also contains many great tactical tips. And sailboats

So, if you haven’t yet read it, read it.

So what is the connection between EFAD and PD then? Well, I responded to a comment a little while back, about the difference between these books. PD is designed as a novel that is also a vehicle to demonstrate the tactical concepts that I lay out in ‘Contact! A Tactical Manual for Post collapse Survival’. ‘Contact!’ is designed to give you tactics that will help you survive in an SHTF ‘post-collapse’ environment, whether that is a natural disaster, or something more sinister such as a situation involving ‘enemies foreign and domestic’.

PD is set in a post-collapse environment overlain by government tyranny. It is a full civil war situation of resistance against tyranny. EFAD takes place prior to any total collapse and addresses the threat from overreaching government tyranny. It does so in an excellent manner.

And this leads me to what I really wanted to say; to discuss the continuum from freedom through tyranny towards collapse and a full SHTF environment. I often talk about this when I refer to ‘soft tyranny’ and ‘hardening tyranny’ and the soft tapping of the bureaucratic keyboards taking away your liberty, punctuated by the flashes of violence when SWAT raids go in.

I am concerned now about the hardening of tyranny and the loss of liberty. My books are designed for full-SHTF, however that ultimately comes about and whoever you end up needing to fight. Along that ‘tyranny continuum’ there is a matching ‘use of force’ continuum of appropriate responses. I think some of this is why we don’t take the ‘tacticool’ crowd with us: They are happy with two magazines for their carbine, because that is all they need to repel a home invasion. Right? Why would they need a Battle Belt and a patrol pack? Why do they need to learn small unit tactics (SUT)? This was discussed recently on the Chickens have had enough Blog HERE. It is a meme that I am always challenging.

EFAD is set pre-collapse, in a time of government tyranny. Full camo gear and your battle belt would not be appropriate. I have discussed this before when talking about ‘profile’ considerations. There is a time to be driving about in a low profile manner, there is a time to take to the woods and go full camo. This is why you need to have appropriate gear, for example for your bug-out, where you may need to pass through checkpoints etc. Concealed carry may be more appropriate, with a grab bag ready to go. Keep the full patrol gear in the trunk for when you get to the woods.

I think it is important to be clear about what we are discussing when we talk about appropriate responses. Some are only concerned about a current day self-defense scenario, such as with meeting three bad guys in an alleyway and taking them out rapidly with a concealed weapon. Some are concerned about that, but also want to be able to conduct effective SUT, patrol, ambush, raid etc in the coming SHTF environment. And don’t forget this: if you can do SUT, you can do it anywhere, even if your raid is carried out in jeans in a pre-collapse environment, so long as such use of force was called for.

Live Hard.

Die Free.

Max