BS: Protect and Survive

Subject: BS: Protect and Survive
From: Peg
Date: 20 Feb 03 - 11:47 AM

Just to start off on a musical note, here's a relevant lyric quotation...

"They said protect and you'll survive/but our postman didn't call..."

Ian Anderson, "Protect and Survive"
from A

Anyway, I have just been sent a wonderful and engaging article written about weapons of mass destrction and how to protect oneself against them, and what their real dangers are to a civilian populace. It was written by an ex-military weapons expert who was upset that the media is making it seem like no one should leave the house without a gas mask and everyone should immediately seal themselves into their homes with plastic sheeting and duct tape.

The writer urges widespread reproduction and sharing of the article. He covers the basic information about biological, chemical and nuclear attack concerns: how these agents function and how to protect oneself against injury, illness or possible death.

I shall post a wee bit of it here (in keeping with Joe's recent request to follow the cut and paste rules of the Mudcat) and if anyone is interested in more of it, PM me and I will send you the entire text...

Peg



-----------------------

THE TRUTH ABOUT WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION
Words of Wisdom From An Armor Master

by SFC Red Thomas (Ret) Armor Master Gunner Mesa, AZ

Since the media has decided to scare everyone with predictions of chemical, biological, or nuclear warfare on our turf I decided to write a paper and keep things in their proper perspective. I am a retired military weapons, munitions, and training expert.

Lesson number one:

In the mid 1990s there were a series of nerve gas attacks on crowded
Japanese subway stations. Given perfect conditions for an attack less than 10% of the people there were injured (the injured were better in a few hours) and only one percent of the injured died. 60 Minutes once had a fellow telling us that one drop of nerve gas could kill a thousand people. He didn't tell you the thousand dead people per drop was theoretical. Drill Sergeants exaggerate how terrible this stuff was to keep the recruits awake in class (I know this because I was a Drill Sergeant too). Forget everything you've ever seen on TV, in the movies, or read in a novel about this stuff, it was all a lie (read this sentence again out loud!). These weapons are about terror, if you remain calm, you will probably not die. This is far less scary than the media and their "Experts," make it sound.

Chemical weapons are categorized as Nerve, Blood, Blister, and
Incapacitating agents. Contrary to the hype of reporters and politicians they are not weapons of mass destruction they are "Area denial," and terror weapons that don't 'destroy' anything. When you leave the area you almost always leave the risk. That's the difference; you can leave the area and the risk; soldiers may have to stay put and sit through it and that's why they need all that spiffy gear. These are not gasses, they are vapors and/or air borne particles. The agent must be delivered in sufficient quantity to injure, and that defines when/how it's used.




Reproduction and distribution is authorized and encouraged. Just give me credit for my work.
SFC Red Thomas (Ret) Armor Master Gunner Mesa, AZ

Subject: RE: BS: Protect and Survive
From: mg
Date: 20 Feb 03 - 11:50 AM

yeah..it's the leaving the area that will get you...mg

Subject: RE: BS: Protect and Survive
From: BuckMulligan
Date: 20 Feb 03 - 01:26 PM

Well, ok, but applying the same kind of rubrics of skeptical evaluation to this that some have to mis/dis-information posted here by (ahem) others, (and not calling anyone's motives into disrepute, certainly), but how are we ("we" being the reading public who've been exposed to this piece, not necesarily Mudcatters) to know this is the real deal? We'd have to find out if this sgt (RET) really exists, if he's who he says he is, if he really WAS what he said he was, etc. etc. I mean, if one were a terrorist looking to derail "preparedness" efforts, isn't this the kinda thing one would disseminate? And here's another bit of poetry, not, I think a song lyric, but it should be -

You're paid to stop a bullet
it's a soldier's job, they say.
And so you stop that bullet,
and then they stop your pay.

(Yip Harburg)

Subject: RE: BS: Protect and Survive
From: artbrooks
Date: 20 Feb 03 - 02:08 PM

I don't know SFC Thomas, but his information is entirely correct, based upon US military training and doctrine. However, he assumes a level of training (and familiarity) that most civilians won't have.

Chemical and biological agents aren't "weapons of mass destruction", in the sense that they don't destroy anything physical, but they certainly fit into the category of "mass casualty weapons." A widely dispursed aerosol application of a nerve agent such as VX, such as you'd get from a crop duster plane, over a heavily-populated area would be devastating.

You are not in danger if you don't breath it or touch it, but that's hard to do if you are in the open and don't have protective gear. The key to limiting your danger is to get it off you as quickly as possible...blot off (don't rub!) the stuff from bare skin and remove clothing that has been contaminated as soon as possible.

Subject: RE: BS: Protect and Survive
From: Rapparee
Date: 20 Feb 03 - 04:11 PM

Dead on what I was taught, Art. The only thing is that with a blister agent (such as mustard gas), you're supposed to "pinch-blot" instead of just blotting. In any case, DON'T rub!

Also, about tear gases: if you're exposed to one (such as CS or CN), these are actually micropulverized powders, not true gases. They can and will get into your hair, which means that if you sweat they can run into your eyes EVEN AFTER you have left the scene. I know this from personal experience. If you are exposed to them, first turn into the wind to blow them away from your eyes and noses as quickly as possible, leave the area and then, as soon as possible, hose off or shower (don't bathe) using shampoo or soap. Wash your clothes, too, preferably twice, and keep them seperate before they are washed.

Subject: RE: BS: Protect and Survive
From: Boab
Date: 21 Feb 03 - 03:33 AM

It pays to keep the populace on-side and alert! More advice re. similar danger levels---if there is a traffic density which sees four cars a minute passing along a two lane carriageway, it is safer to walk two miles down the road to the nearest pedestrian overpass----

Subject: RE: BS: Protect and Survive
From: Rapparee
Date: 21 Feb 03 - 05:32 AM

Personally, I think that there is far, far more danger to me and mine from an industrial accident (such as happened yesterday in Corbin, Kentucky when a cloud of hydrogen cyanide gas closed 13 miles of Interstate highway) than from a biological, chemical or nuclear attack.

There's even more danger from an ignorant media and its talking heads.

Subject: RE: BS: Protect and Survive
From: leprechaun
Date: 21 Feb 03 - 05:30 PM

Peg said:

The writer urges widespread reproduction and sharing of the article.

Not fair, not fair! What about us folks who've had vasectomies?