James Wesley Rawles

James Wesley Rawles (born 1960) is a non-fiction author, survivalist-fiction author, blogger, and survival retreat consultant. Rawles is a Christian conservative, constitutionalist libertarian. Rawles is an influential figure in the modern survivalist movement. He is the editor of SurvivalBlog.com, a popular blog on survival and preparedness topics.

Biography

Rawles was born in Livermore, California in 1960 and received a BA degree from San Jose State University. He was a United States Army Military Intelligence officer, serving from 1984 to 1993. He resigned his commission as an Army Captain, immediately after Bill Clinton was sworn in as President of the United States. Rawles worked as an Associate Editor and Regional Editor (for the Western U.S.) with Defense Electronics magazine in the late 1980s and early 1990s and concurrently was Managing Editor of The International Countermeasures Handbook. He worked as a technical writer through most of the 1990s with a variety of electronics and software companies including Oracle Corporation. In 2005 he began full-time blogging.

He is now a freelance writer, blogger and survival retreat consultant. Rawles is an influential figure in the modern survivalist movement. He has been called a preparedness "guru." He reportedly lives at "a survival-ready ranch [in an undisclosed location] 'somewhere west of the Rocky Mountains' that is surrounded by US National Forest lands. Rawles is best known as the author of the survivalist novel Patriots: A Novel of Survival in the Coming Collapse. On April 8, 2009, shortly after its release, it was ranked #6 in Amazon.com's overall book sales rankings, #1 in Contemporary Fiction, and #1 in the Thrillers category.

His wife Linda died of an unspecified illness in 2009.

Philosophical, political and economic views

Rawles is an outspoken proponent of family preparedness, especially regarding food storage and his advocacy of relocating to lightly populated rural "retreat" areas. His preparedness philosophy emphasizes the fragility of modern society, the value of silver and other tangibles for barter, recognition of moral absolutes, being well armed, maintaining a "deep larder", relocation to rural retreats, and Christian charity.

Rawles has said that he grew up "in the bomb shelter era", and that he was interested in preparedness even when he was a teenager. He subscribes to "a post-tribulation view of the apocalypse — that Jesus won't return until after a long period of social turmoil, wars and disaster." Rawles "takes inspiration from the biblical story of Joseph, who warned Pharaoh in Genesis to store up grain in preparation for a seven-year famine." One of his long-standing investment recommendations is rolling over IRAs and 401(k) accounts into American Eagle gold coin IRAs.

In a Usenet post in February 2001, Rawles fairly accurately called the bottom of the two-decade long bear market in the price of silver that had brought silver down from a high of $50 per ounce, to under $5 per ounce. In the post, Rawles mentioned a low of $4.25 per ounce. It actually bottomed just a few months later (intraday) at $4.03 per ounce.

Without setting a specific timeframe, Rawles was one of many who predicted the end of the housing bubble in the United States, urging his readers on August 14, 2005 to "Sell any rental or non-retreat vacation houses that you own. Take your profit now. It is better to be a year too early than a day too late. Keep that money on the sidelines, with at least a portion of it in precious metals. Then after the bubble bursts, you'll have the chance to step in with cash and buy at perhaps as low as 40 cents on the dollar versus the currently over-inflated prices. When you eventually do decide to buy, concentrate on productive farm land in a lightly populated rural region.". In August, 2005, Rawles correctly predicted mortgage holders "walking away" from houses and turning in the house keys to their bankers—what has now been dubbed "jingle mail": "When the bubble does burst, watch out. Things could get ugly. I predict that people that are caught "upside down" in their mortgages will just turn in the keys at the bank and walk away from their houses. This has happened before—most notably in Texas in the 1980s when the Houston Oil Boom fell apart and took the real estate market for the region with it."

Rawles was one of many economic commentators who warned about the global derivatives market as a potential trigger for an economic catastrophe. In October 2007 he predicted that hedge funds will fail and suspend investor redemptions at a greatly increasing rate, in what he described as "a disaster story that could unfold in quarterly episodes." His warnings on derivatives were confirmed by the global credit market collapse that began in the summer of 2007, since the collapse has been blamed in large measure on credit derivatives.

In February 2008, Rawles warned SurvivalBlog readers to "be ready for bank runs". But as of July 2009, while many more banks have failed than in preceding years, no significant bank runs have occurred in the United States. In July 2009, FDIC chief Sheila Bair publicly stated that she expected 10 times as many bank failures than in previous years.

In March 2008, Rawles warned that the US government would take the approach of employing what he dubbed the "Mother of All Bailouts" (MOAB), to counteract the collapse of the global credit market, in the wake of the sub-prime mortgage and credit default swap (CDS) fiasco. Rawles predicted that more and more institutions—both public and private—would be bailed out, and indeed they were. He further predicts that this uncontrolled public spending will inevitably result in mass inflation of the US currency.

Proving that no one bats 1.000, Rawles was one of the many individuals that warned about possible disasters related to the Year 2000 problem (Y2K). Because the risks were mitigated by intensive work by computer programmers in 1998 and 1999, their warnings turned out to unfounded. Rawles, at least was not alone in this misjudgment. Others that made similar predictions about Y2K included economists Dr. Gary North, Don McAlvany, Edward Yourdon and Ed Yardeni.

Rawles has shown in both his fiction and on line articles to be strongly anti-racist. He has a regular Jewish Israeli correspondent on his blog and he has fielded questions from minorities specifically relating to racism problems during national emergencies. His anti-racist stance has made him the target of sharp criticism by neo-Nazis and "White nationalists".

He is quoted so often by journalists covering preparedness topics that Rawles has become the de facto spokesman for the survivalist movement.

Blog presence and consulting

Rawles is the editor of SurvivalBlog.com, a popular blog on survival and preparedness topics. SurvivalBlog has about 137,000 unique visitors per week. The main focus of his blog is preparing for the multitude of possible threats toward society. In his various writings, Rawles has warned about the Year 2000 problem (Y2K), socio-economic collapse, terrorist attacks, and food shortages. As a consultant, Rawles advises his clients primarily via telephone on retreat locales, retreat security, and retreat logistics.

Survivalist writings

Rawles authored the nonfiction book How to Survive the End of the World as We Know It, which was released in September 2009 and quickly jumped into Amazon's Top Ten.

His first book was a work of speculative fiction set in a near future period of hyperinflation and socio-economic collapse first titled: Patriots: Surviving the Coming Collapse, and later re-titled: Patriots: A Novel of Survival in the Coming Collapse. The book was originally released in draft form as shareware in the early 1990s but was later printed by the Christian partner publisher Huntington House. After Huntington House went out of business, the book was re-released by Xlibris, a "print on demand" publisher. Starting in April, 2009, the novel went back into wide circulation, in a 400-page trade paperback edition, published by Ulysses Press, Berkeley, California. This new edition was updated and expanded to include a glossary and index.

Starting in the early 1990s, he also authored or co-authored 17 Internet FAQ reference pages, primarily on firearms topics, such as one on antique guns that is often cited. More recently, Rawles has self-published two non-fiction books.

Rawles is represented by Madison Avenue literary agent Robert Gottlieb of Trident Media Group. Gottlieb is best known as the agent that discovered Tom Clancy, and who now represents Deepak Chopra, Dale Brown, Ralph Peters, Neale Donald Walsch and the estate of Isaac Asimov.

In April 2009, Rawles announced that he had signed a contract with the Atria and Pocket Books Divisions of Simon & Schuster to write two sequels to Patriots. Rawles described the project: "Unlike traditional sequels, the storylines of these novels will be contemporaneous with the economic collapse and invasion described in the first novel. There will be some overlap of characters, but most of the action will take place in different locales. My goal is to use these two books to write about a lot of different tactics, techniques, and technologies for survival." Release of the two sequels is scheduled for 2010 and 2011.

Quotes

• Owning a gun doesn’t make someone a “shooter” any more than owning a surfboard makes someone a surfer.

• [At my retreat] I'm surrounded by National Forest. A river runs through the back end of the property, so there's no shortage of water and no shortage of fish, or game to shoot. If Western civilization were to collapse tomorrow, I'd have to read about it on the Internet. [Otherwise,] I just wouldn't notice.

• It's taken me 15 years to become an overnight sensation.

• There is no substitute for mass. Mass stops bullets. Mass stops gamma radiation. Mass stops (or at least slows down) bad guys from entering a home and depriving its residents of life and property. Sandbags are cheap, so buy plenty of them. When planning your retreat house, think: medieval castle.

• I'm often asked why I make such a 'big deal' about choosing conservative Christians, Messianic Jews, or Orthodox Jews for neighbors. The plain truth is that in a societal collapse there will be a veritable vacuum of law enforcement. In such times, with a few exceptions, it will only be the God fearing that will continue to be law abiding. Choose your neighborhood wisely.

• The three most important things to look for when searching for a church home are doctrine, doctrine, and doctrine. If your main criteria are 'programs' and 'outreach' to this or that niche group, then in my opinion you are starting your search the wrong way.

• As an Army officer, I learned that in order to be effective, an army must have three key abilities: To move, shoot, and communicate. Take away any one, and you are ineffective. But if you get all three right, you can absolutely devastate an opponent—even one that has vastly superior numbers.

• Modern military planners often talk in terms of “threat spirals” when a given threat escalates and inspires a defensive countermeasure. Ideally you should anticipate your opponent’s next escalation and take countermeasures, insulating yourself from the future threat.

• If you are serious about preparedness, then it is time to get out of your armchair and start training and preparing. It will take time. It will take some sweat. It will take money. But once you’ve prepared, you can sleep well, knowing that you’ve done your best to protect and provide for your family, regardless of what the future brings. Don’t get stuck in the rut of simply *studying* preparedness. Unless the shelves in your pantry and garage are filling with supplies, and unless you are growing muscles and calluses, you are not preparing.

• Governments tend to expand their power to the point that they do harm. In SurvivalBlog, I often warn of the insidious tyranny of the Nanny State... ...If the state where you live becomes oppressive, then don’t hesitate to relocate. Vote with your feet!

• As a Christian, I feel morally obligated to assist others who are less fortunate. Following the Old Testament laws of tzedakah (charity and tithing), I believe that my responsibility begins with my immediate family and expands in successive rings to supporting my immediate neighborhood and church, to my community, and beyond, as resources allow. My philosophy is to give until it hurts in times of disaster.

• The foundational morality of the civilized world is best summarized in the Ten Commandments. Moral relativism and secular humanism are slippery slopes. The terminal moraine at the base of these slopes is a rubble pile consisting of either despotism and pillage, or anarchy and the depths of depravity. I believe that it takes both faith and friends to survive perilous times.

• My father often told me, “It is better to have a gun and not need it than to need a gun and not have it.” I urge readers to use less than lethal means when safe and practicable, but at times there is not a satisfactory substitute for well-aimed lead going down range at high velocity.

• It is one of the great ironies of our modern 'civilized' era that in most of the places where you don't feel the need to carry a firearm for self defense you can legally do so if you choose. But in most of places where you do indeed justifiably feel the immediate need to carry a gun, they are banned.

• With a few exceptions, lower population [density] means fewer problems [for survivalist retreats]. When the Schumer Hits the Fan, there will be a mass exodus from the cities. Think of it as an army that is spreading out across a battlefield: The wider they are spread, the less effective they are. The inverse-square law hasn’t been repealed.

• The modern world [of survivalism] is full of pundits, poseurs, and Mall Ninjas. Preparedness is not just about accumulating a pile of stuff. You need practical skills, and those come only with study, training, and practice. Any armchair survivalist with a credit card can buy a set of stylish camouflage fatigues and an “M4gery” carbine encrusted with umpteen accessories. Style points should not be mistaken for genuine skills and practicality.

• Much like a muscle that atrophies with disuse, any right that goes unexercised for many years devolves into a privilege, and eventually can even be redefined as a crime.

• Tangibles trump conceptuals. Modern fiat currencies are generally accepted, but have essentially no backing. Because they are largely a by-product of interest-bearing debt, modern currencies are destined for inflation. In the long run, inflation dooms fiat currencies to collapse. The majority of your assets should be invested in productive farmland and other tangibles such as useful hand tools. After you have your key logistics squared away, anything extra should be invested in silver and gold.

• Some things are worth fighting for. I encourage my readers to avoid trouble, most importantly via relocation to safe areas where trouble is unlikely to visit. But there may come an unavoidable day when you have to make a stand to defend your own family or your neighbors. Furthermore, if you value your liberty, then be prepared to fight for it, both for yourself and for the sake of your progeny.

Bibliography

Books

• Patriots: Surviving the Coming Collapse from Huntington House Publishers, ISBN 978-1563841552 (November 1998)
• Patriots: Surviving the Coming Collapse (33 chapter expanded edition) from Xlibris, ISBN 978-1425734077 (December 2006)
• Rawles on Retreats and Relocation, CafePress, No ISBN (January 2007)
• SurvivalBlog: The Best of the Blog, Volume 1, CafePress, No ISBN (February 2007)
• Patriots: A Novel of Survival in the Coming Collapse, a re-titled 33 chapter edition with glossary and index, from Ulysses Press, Berkeley, California, ISBN 978-1569755990 (April 2009)
• How to Survive the End of the World as We Know It, Plume (Division of Penguin Books), New York, ISBN 978-0452295834, (September 2009)

External links

• "Surviving The Apocalypse," October 31, 2008, Forbes.com
• SurvivalBlog.com
• http://www.Rawles.to
• James Wesley, Rawles on Survival Fire Arms: The End of the World as We Know It at Y2KChaos