Barbed Wire, Barricades, and Bunkers: The Free Citizen's Guide to Fortifying the Home Retreat

More like a 4.5.This author prefaces his book by stating that he shares the gut level intuition that many of us have that something very bad may well be approaching for the United States.If whatever Emergency there is looks like it will be manageable, or if for some reason you won't or can't "bug out" for the countryside, you may elect to stay in a major urban area, in which case Fernando Ferfal Aguirre's book "The Modern Survival Manual: Surviving the Economic Collapse," about he and his family's experiences and lessons learned living and surviving in Argentina's capital city of Buenos Aires during the 2001 economic collapse--a time of chaos, virtual anarchy, violence, high crime, shortages, and economic and social collapse--might be very useful information to have. Aguirre maintains that, in an Emergency of this type, the major cities will always take care of themselves at the expense of the surrounding countryside, and will always have the food and other necessities they need.However, as many prepper books recommend--if its general societal and economic collapse, "grid down," dog-eat-dog, state of nature, no government cavalry coming over the hill to rescue you time--the first thing you need to do is to "bug out," to get out of the about to become extraordinarily dangerous cities, and to head for the less populated and less dangerous countryside (see Joel M. Skousen's exhaustive work, "Survival Relocation" for suggestions as to where). And might I suggest that now is the time to think about and to search for and to identify such a retreat.Because, while--for the short term, until the power, heat/AC, and water stop and you use up your supplies--you can try to hide in your big city apartment, tract home, gated community, or individual suburban home, and hope nobody notices you (see Joe Nobody's book, "Holding Your Ground" for his suggestions on how to disguise your house so that it will be less noticeable, or to make it seem to already have been looted), if the threat from others is great and they are numerous, determined, and desperate--barring incredible luck or a heavily manned, well-armed, strong neighborhood defense group, there is no way that you and perhaps another family member or two can really successfully "defend" something like an apartment or a tract house from them, especially on a long term basis; rolls of concertina wire, bollards, or gabions in front of your house being a dead giveaway that someone is home. There will just be too many of them, and they will all be desperately hunting for the food, weapons, and other things they lack and need to survive, and that you likely have.Thus, virtually all of the various barriers, entanglements, barricades, fighting positions, and bunkers touched on and pictured in this slim, well-illustrated work--many, if not most, requiring a lot of manpower and quite often heavy equipment to construct--rest on the unspoken assumption that you are located somewhere outside of the big cities and/or have a fair amount of land to build them on and, in many cases, ready sources for supplies, and likely a lot of time for advance preparation.The several barriers that I did think practical to construct without such a reliance on a lot of heavy equipment or a large workforce--and that were much less of a giveaway-- were concrete garden walls, large "decorative" boulders and heavy concrete planters, and living fences of Pyracantha or other very tough and thorny bushes--although such bushes would obviously take quite a while to grow to an effective size.With a location in the country as a given, this slim work--based on Army practice and models--does, indeed, inform you about several of the major impediments you can build that will restrict, channel, slow down, block hostiles, or even stop a high speed ramming attack by a heavy truck, and about how to build strong shelters, bunkers, and fighting positions. Of course, you first have to be able to locate and to perhaps purchase such a property; this isn't called "preparing" for nothing.A couple of things I found particularly useful to know were the fact that burlap sandbags have only a useful life of something like 18 months, and that the author has discovered that you cannot easily purchase a complete, pre-manufactured storm shelter/underground bunker to install yourself without the manufacturer wanting to construct it themselves, and taking pictures--all, of course, for his and your own protection, and to make sure that you have put things together correctly and in a safe manner--and forwarding those pictures (a minimum of 14) and that shelter's GPS coordinates to FEMA. But, hey, no biggie. We all trust the government, right?Since this slim work just touched briefly on each particular item, it would have been much improved if it had had footnotes referring to specific sections of Army field manuals, or a selected bibliography of the Army field manuals (often available free or at little cost on the Internet) that the book's information was largely drawn from, which likely contain much more detailed information on how to construct each one of these barriers, shelters, fighting positions, and bunkers.

Would've liked more information but very pleased with what I got

I've been collecting books from Paladin, Delta, Loompanics, etc for many decades. Many books of this type gloss over a subject. They speak in generalities or simply lack pertinent detail were one to actually try to employ the methods and techniques outlined. This book gives the necessary detail for the homeowner to make decisions on how to fortify your home, create fighting positions, and thusly entry control points/observation posts/listening posts, etc. Valuable tools to deny, channelize, and disrupt a potential foe; or mitigate a potential security risk.OTHER OBSERVATIONS The book briefly (1 page) covers underground use of shipping containers and how to reinforce them structurally with easily obtainable resources (i.e. not pouring concrete). It is my understanding that engineers strongly recommend against the subterranean use of these containers as the walls are designed to support weight vertically, and not the lateral pressure created by back filling them underground. Something not specified in the limited entry. Engineers often recommend simply building a concrete (or etc) structure underground as it saves more resources than reinforcing the container with additional materials.SUGGESTIONS The book covers bollards, but I don't recall secant/CFA walls being covered in the underground bunker section. Perhaps this could be covered in a second book.Overall highly recommended.

Ordered the book and was extremely disappointed in the the content. At best it is a superficial and/or historical description of some military and some comercial (expensive to produce and install without access to professional earthmoving equipment) barricades and shelters.. Do yourself a favor, if you are interested in this topic order the various Military Combat Engineering manuals available on this site. They will be more detailed and in-depth than this particular book.

Great book that gives you a lot of information on shielding your home and property from bad people in SHTF.

The book is pretty short, yet about a quarter of the content is fluff. Feels a little like the author wrote a draft, decided it was too short, then went back and injected a bunch of text to try to reach some subjective target length. It's unfortunate, because the book does have some good hard to find content. For example, charts describing the vehicle stopping capacity of various barriers. The book is not written as an exploration of the matierals discussed. The author used a practiced laymen's tone that can be summarized as, "Use each material in the way I describe and it will work."

Excerpts from military manuals and I have some experience with while in the military. The great thing about this book is it gives the reader who may not have been in the military a book that is easy to read and understand.All in all a good read and for those who wish to learn more can find the manuals on line.

Barbed Wire, Barricades, and Bunkers answered my questions. It was easy to read and understand how to use natural vegetation to hide and protect your home. Instead of barbed wire one could use honeysuckle or pyracantha to slow intruders. Blackberry vines would be another choice. The author make a point of pointing how that it is important to make your bunker blend in with the surroundings. His suggestion of creating decoy fortifications to confuse intruders is very interesting. I liked the book because it provided a good survey of fortifications.

More of a history book than a guide to building. Interesting, but it what expected.

excellent starter book. Would like a later volume with more detail and plans as well

loads of good info !