Dark Sky over Wisconsin...ARTICLE SENT TO ME...I REPORT AND YOU DECIDE

Dark Sky over Wisconsin

                             

 

In an ominous move against civil liberties, the Wisconsin Army National Guard has partnered with local emergency management agencies (fire and police) to send about 110 soldiers door to door in the city of Omro on the pretext of conducting a “voluntary survey about smoke detectors” for three days this month: May 15-17, 2018.

Dark Sky is being conducted in Brown, Calumet, Dane, Fond du Lac, Milwaukee, Outagamie and Winnebago Counties in Wisconsin.

 

Among the official reasons given for this Security State exercise is to test how “public and private sector partners work with local citizens impacted by critical infrastructure failures and to coordinate critical fuel distribution, cyber response, intelligence sharing, and other resources as well as procedures for opening and operating the state’s Business Emergency Operations Center.”

The military’s intrusion into residential neighborhoods is being described by the Wisconsin Department of Military Affairs as:

“A full-scale training exercise simulating a long-term mass power outage.”

Does the federal government know something about Wisconsin that we don’t? The state does have its fair share of actual natural disasters.

On July 13, 2017, after severe flooding, the Wisconsin National Guard Soldiers and Airmen who were on state active duty responded in similar fashion. The National Guard Reaction Force served one of its stated primary purposes:

“Assisting civil authorities during times of emergency is at the core of the National Guard’s dual mission as the state’s first military responder and primary combat reserve of the Army and Air Force.”

 

However, getting US residents used to seeing military personnel out and about, going onto private property, and generally snooping around smacks of a policial set-up to prepare us all for an impending police state. Of course, the Wisconsin Department of Military Affairs assures us that there is nothing amiss and certainly nothing to worry about:

“The public should not be concerned if they notice an increased emergency responder presence, military personnel, vehicles and equipment, or non-military unmanned aerial vehicles operating in their communities during the exercise.”

Never mind the khaki camo-clad soldiers marching through your streets and up to your door. They just want to ask you about your smoke detector awareness. Riiiiight.

Although we are being told that the Dark Sky initiative “health and welfare checks” are preventative preparation for “a major crisis,” it is hard to believe that smoke alarm education will help much after “cyber and physical threats to critical Wisconsin infrastructure.”

Certainly, we all would prefer to be prepared when the chips fall and the bathtub bottoms out, but our Inner Cynic says this Wisconsin business looks a lot like Big Brother getting all up in our stuff – so to speak.

Other observers, even more jaded, might even predict an actual event will follow the drill that requires responding to a state-level emergency. We have seen this happen time and time again with school shootings: there are drills for the exact same scenario before the atrocity happens.

Real emergency preparedness, as offered by Community Emergency Response Team (CERT) training, focuses on what to do immediately after a large-impact disaster occurs – and before the first responders (fire and police) arrive.

Learning first aid and CPR (Cardiopulmonary resuscitation) is critical to surviving crises that inflict human injury and helping others hang on long enough for professional help.

Another key aspect of real emergency preparedness, in case of a long-term power outage, is stocking up on needful supplies like food, water, medical supplies, and fuel. Unfortunately, as a Panda article tells us, the post-9/11 Patriot Act federal government lists people who do this mindful preparation as “a suspected terrorist.”

It might interest you to know that you might be put on the potential-threat-to-national-security list if you are:

• Reverent of individual liberty
• Suspicious of centralized federal authority
• Pay with cash
• Travel illogical distances

We have to wonder how the fed defines “illogical distances” – would this include vacations?

One way the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) identifies people who store extra fuel is through publications like this flyer targeting “Bulk Fuel Distributors.” Big Box store personnel are admonished that “preventing terrorism is a community effort” and to keep a sharp eye out for a laundry list of red flag signals that warrant escalation to a “law enforcement professional.”

 

Wisconsin’s National Guard believes their Dark Sky drills are paying off, and worth bothering the citizenry over. But, if Wisconsin – or any other part of the United States – experienced a weeks-long power outage, the best preparedness might be a gun and plenty of ammo.

Civil insurrection is thought to be a mere three days away after access to grocery stores is cut off. In 1906 – over a hundred years ago – a gentleman named Alfred Henry Lewis said famously:

“There are only nine meals between mankind and anarchy.”

So go ahead and check your smoke alarm batteries – it’s a great idea. But it might be an even better idea to do what the preppers advise: have food, water, fuel, the means to defend yourself, and gold (coins are good) on hand.

After all, you can’t eat a smoke detector.