There is a lot to be said for both arguements. It's the 5 year mission profile that limits what can be done. So the question to be asked is, just what would be available 5 years after a nuclear exchange? If you want to use the Katrina example, the very things needed to sustain a survivor community ran out the quickest. Things like batteries, flashlights, bottled water, and all the way through to diapers and hand wipes. Now this was within a week of the storm hitting the coast, what would it have been like 5 years later, and in a TEOTWAWKI event?
Would FEMA have been able to haul supplies from one side of the country to the other? And remember, in a nuclear exchange one of the key targets would be communications nodes. So there is nothing beyond short haul railway, the interstate highway system is jammed with wreckage and blast damage at key locations. The various relief agencies would have been completely overwhelmed. Just how much aid could be moved around?
IMO, there is need for every team to have at least one "camp in a box". If only to help set-up or resupply an existing survivor community. I can even see "nests" of the CIAB located in areas that were planned to shelter large numbers of survivors, I can even see the arguement, that some of these CIAB would not be as well concealed as a regular supply cache. The goal is to help the survivors that the team encounters, to at least some degree. And going with the small numbers of personnel, the only other force multiplier would be supplies.
|