Clandestine Comms: The Bare Bones of What You Need, by GuerrillaLogistician

By GuerrillaLogistician

@glogistician on X.com

Somewhere in the coastal area, about 45 minutes from a major city, in a small, still open dive bar
6 months after the start of the fall

“We have to get organized and do something”, Jonathan whispered to the other young man across from him.

“Bro all we got is a bunch of guns and I have like 500 rounds of ammo for like six ARs”, Mikey barely said above the noise, “Plus your miles away and the restrictions on fuel make all this impossible.”

“We have to do something because it can’t be my wife and kid.”, the young man stammered out.  “If they figure out we went to church for a little while, it will end up being both of them.” Unconsciously, Jonathan covered his cross tattoo with his hand.  The small tattoo of a cross was safely hidden under his shirt, but that didn’t stop his lizard brain from trying to conceal it.  “I can’t let them get hurt, and I can’t fight by myself or endanger them.”

“Yeah but we gotta do something bro they are gonna figure it out and were all going to end up in that fucking reeducation camp”, Mikey responded to his friends pleas for help.  “Who else is going to do anything seriously? I know we don’t have much, but we could maybe ambush a few and get some more ammo.”

As the last words escaped Mikey’s mouth, a shadow drew across the table, and both young men looked up at an imposing 6-foot monster with a grey beard.  Shaking his head, “Can you eat paper?”

“What?” Jonathan stammered out.

The bearded hulk slid up his shirt, turning his back to everyone as he faced the two in the corner. Both young men’s eyes widened as they saw the frame of a 1911, and then slightly relaxed as they saw a Jerusalem cross etched into the grips. “Can either one of you idiots eat paper?” he said very slowly.

Jonathan nodded, looking up at the imposing man, who seemed more scared now than when he was thinking about a future fight with an armed Christian killer. A small piece of paper came out of the large paw of a hand and dropped in front of Jonathan. On the paper was an address, a date for Friday, and a time.

The monster of a man had given them sufficient time to memorize what was on the paper, a skill both had learned from Every Man a Warrior.  “If you’re done memorizing it, eat it”, he said.  He watched Jonathan grab it up and toss the paper in his mouth like a potato chip. Chewing away, the napkin paper melted and broke down until a swig of beer sent it down his throat.  Leaning over, he dropped his shirt and put both monster hands on the table, “Good, now there will be three empty bottles in the back of some clear alcohol.” “Don’t say another word about any of this. You were so loud that my friend heard you.”  Bring a friend or girlfriend who isn’t as dumb as you two, and if anyone asks, you’re going to a party.” “Also, fill the bottles with water so they look the part.”  With that said, he stood back up and left, leaving the two scared and confused.

Next Friday, the two met up with the big man and began learning an Irish way of doing things and dealing with occupying forces. Two months later, the real fight for their lives, culture, and beliefs began stalling the purge that the socialists had planned.

This was delayed a bit, but many of you probably forgot the Christians in Syria already; many more haven’t, thank God.  Well, with a dead computer, losing most of this and having to redo this, more BS has occurred in our fractured world. Instead of showing murder porn, lets look at the UK and it’s nonsense.  For those of you who remember “The Troubles,” I want you to think back to that little bit of late 60s-70s history as you watch this.

https://x.com/WallStreetApes/status/1909378089723035668

• I got guns and buddies and a heart of gold – dead.
• I have guns and I am a believer – probably dead but going to the right place.
• I have guns, gear, and I can shoot well, and I have no training on how to use my radios. I also have no idea how to hide from SIGINT – Dead with extra steps.

So many in our community have a bag of guns, a wall of ammo, and skills to shoot a bug off a wall at 20 yards, but almost no other skills.  You, dear reader, are probably excluded from that group of good-willed people, but you know those guys.  Great gun skills and absolutely no ability to do other things.  Then there are the people who have taken training but haven’t practiced in a while.  Some of those skills require people and friends, which means you need to make local friends. That all said, what the hell do you need beyond boomsticks and shooting skills?

A way to communicate.

With who?

• A team of guys
• Regional Comms
• Worldwide Comms

Urban Dwellers (God save you)

The bare minimum is handheld radios, a headset, or my favorite, the H-250.  If you are in a city, an ONN tablet or other similar tablets that are Wi-Fi only are a must.  In fact, the next step up is radio, cable, and the ONN tablet.  (Other tablets are fine, but they MUST NOT have the ability to connect to the cell towers.) This allows both encryption and digital signals on a cheap handheld radio.  Additionally, if needed, you can use Apps to communicate via Bluetooth with other people.  So, what apps do I need? What other things do I need?

For those in a city, Briar should be your go-to; it allows you to communicate via Wifi, Bluetooth, and helps you hide a bit using TOR.  That said, just like a digital radio, those tablets have identification information, and if someone works hard, they might be able to sniff out you if you are very active.  That is more of a hacker space thing than anything I know about.  @4nt1p4tt3rn on X.com, I believe, has discussed some safety precautions and done a few dives into different tablets.  If PMAN has turned them into articles, they will obviously be on AP. Overall, though, Briar and I believe WIRE is the current go-to app.  Stay off SIGNAL, Telegram, etc, unless it is purely safe conversations.

Briar – https://briarproject.org/ – Bluetooth and WIFI comms. It also features a mailbox for those who are not online simultaneously.  SIDE LOAD THIS ON A TABLET that doesn’t have an Android account connected to you.

Wireless Comms in more Rural areas.

ITEMS

Radio – AR-152 or UV-5RM
ALTERNATIVE MORE COSTLY – Encrypted Digital radio DM-F8 has 128 encryption, the BTECH 6×2 has 256
Guerrillas Guide to the Baofeng
Adapter cable – APRS-K1 PRO for USB-C only tablets or K1 Data cable for a 3.5 mm audio jack
Android tablet

Radios
https://brushbeater.store/products/ar-152-vhf-uhf-radio
https://brushbeater.store/products/baofeng-uv-5rm

Digital Radios
https://brushbeater.store/products/abbree-dm-f8-digital-mobile-radio
https://brushbeater.store/products/baofeng-tech-dmr-6×2

Info on the 6×2 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FhoH5roj0VQ

Guerrilla’s Guide to the Baofeng Radio

Cables
3.5 mm cable https://brushbeater.store/products/k1-data-interface-cable
USB-C https://brushbeater.store/products/btech-aprs-k1-pro-multi-function-audio-interface-cable

APPS

AndFlmsg is a combination of Fldigi and Flmsg for Android devices.  This allows you to use specific digital modes on your radios in a tablet-sized format.  This is a must for Radio to tablet comms.

REGIONAL Comms

Regional comms are a bit more difficult to go into detail about, especially in a small article. The reality is that any HF radio will do; you also need to learn how to make a Near Vertical Incidence Skywave (NVIS) antenna. NVIS has many features that are not seen in most ham radio operator setups. Without boring you all to death, there is a zone with most ham radio operators that you skip to make a long-range bounce. Basically, very little signal comes back down to earth within 50 to several 100 miles of the transmitting station unless you do some specific things. This isn’t difficult to understand, and several people around the United States teach this.  You can also probably find a ham radio operator who knows how to do this, although most ham radio operators aren’t into NVIS.

That said, NVIS shoots your signal as if you were spraying a fog nozzle out of a water hose straight into the air. This allows local people to hear you very clearly, and it is also extremely hard to track down the source of this signal compared to a long bounce, which can reach around the world. Please understand me, you need to know how to do this properly, or you will get into trouble.  So unlike the other items for local communications that you can possibly learn yourself using the manual with practice, this one takes a little more finesse.

Lastly, you will need either a good tablet or a small computer. I recommend using a used Windows computer that you can put in a good case. Many refurbished Windows computers will work just fine and have a low power drain.  Why do you need a computer? Because you’re going to need to do digital most of the time to prevent yourself from being tracked down quickly. I will go into details with this a little bit later.

ITEMS

HF Radio – Recommend at least a Xeigu G90, 6100, or 6200 for price and available information. The 6100 is my preferred these days for field work. Any HF radio will do, though
Knowledge of building an NVIS antenna, whether 40 meters or 80 meters, is recommended, as well as the ability to set it up properly.
Laptop with Windows or LINUX variation

Antenna
https://vigilante-engineering.com/products/wire-antenna-frame
https://vigilante-engineering.com/products/assembled-wire-antenna-w-frame
https://brushbeater.store/products/vigilante-engineering-antenna-dipole-center
https://brushbeater.store/products/split-post-bnc-adapter-cobra-head-bnc-female-2-pack

World Wide Communications

So now we’ll have a quick discussion about worldwide communication. The reality is you probably won’t need the worldwide communication in a two-way format, especially if you’re in the US. This may change when it comes to people who are from Europe, but I doubt many of you are reading this article. Primarily, this form of communication will be received only and will be specifically for news information, which you can’t get because of local broadcasting, preventing you from hearing alternative information. Right now, we rely on the Internet to access things from other nations, but that may not always be possible, especially if the grid goes down. If you have a regional communications set up, like an HF radio, you will have the opportunity to get this information and possibly ask people.

This doesn’t mean that the places you can communicate with will have good or reliable information, but many of these radios can also listen to shortwave broadcasts. If you don’t want to invest several hundred dollars into an HF radio, then I would suggest buying one of the shortwave radios on the market. Either way you go with this, most likely you’ll be doing a lot more reception than transmission, which is good for both security and your signal footprint.

Receive only option
https://brushbeater.store/products/malahit-dsp2-sdr-radio
https://brushbeater.store/products/tecsun-pl-368-portable-radio-fm-stereo-ssb-dsp-etm-ats-fm-mw-shortwave-world-band-receiver

Don’t Get DFed

Direction finding, or DF ING for short, is the practice of hunting down a signal. Ham radio operators called this fox hunting, and there is a massive amount of technology to do this. Scout goes over some of this information in his book, but the reality is that this has been going on since World War 2, and there are some key features to keep yourself alive. First, turn down your power, which you should be thinking about all the time. While signal strength isn’t the end-all be-all of getting a message across, many people think they need to have tons of watts of energy to have good communication. A message delivered is a message delivered as long as the receiver understands your message, regardless of whether it is static or not.  So, regardless of what radio you are using, turn down the power and make that contact if you can’t turn your power up incrementally.

The next section, on not getting DFed, really has to be done in a class setting with somebody skilled in this knowledge. If you aren’t taking the RTO class, check out Historian or Wyoming survival for the HF side of things.   This is why I am such a stickler for you going out and operating your equipment to understand how things work. For line of sight communication, specific antennas will allow you to mitigate issues such as using stubby antennas to forcibly compromise your signal. Obviously, I talked about NVIS antennas for a reason, so get the hint.

Last but not least is the tablet or computer. In World War 2, the Germans could get a basic bearing and triangulate you within two minutes. They would then transmit this information to another location for further triangulation, which required seven more minutes. Lastly, they would coordinate the closest mobile units and dispatch vehicles within 5 minutes. This was a total of 14 minutes for the standard HF operator to stay alive. Mind you, the operator was generally doing Morse code to shorten the communications time. Nowadays, the best operation to shorten communication and get a clear signal with very little power is through digital communications. This is also a giant well of information to dig into that I don’t have time to do here. If you want to go in-depth, take a class.

German DF gear in operation  – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6mSy-iA8r2w

What I am leaving out

There are so many things that I could discuss in greater detail, but this causes a twofold issue. Things like antenna construction really need a nuanced conversation, even though you can just follow a pattern and get a pretty good result. There are issues with how you set up an antenna, for instance.  You can set up an antenna and do it in a manner that makes it easier to track you down.  If you do this in Ukraine, they could send something nasty on your head.  I think Scout does a great job in his book initially dealing with your local comms, and gives you some ideas on how to deal with things like jamming and even hiding using low power, etc.  Conversely, HF is another animal, and those who went to Histoiran’s HF class have the notes for that class along with tons of knowledge.  This is a topic I am sure his book will deal with when it comes out.

The other section I am leaving out is going to be about being compromised, for specific reasons.  First of all, just like a PACE plan, your plan should be different from everyone else.   Those of you who used to enjoy the old Star Wars books might remember a story about Han Solo and Chewbacca. In that story, Solo was meeting some nefarious people who decided to do something like steal the ship. Solo had a hand signal that he used when walking back to the ship that would allow Chewbacca to know that everything was OK. If he walked up calmly, not doing anything, then Chewbacca would shoot, and that’s exactly what happened in the book. Your concepts and setups for this should be different and kept very secretive.

I also don’t suggest using any little trick that you carry around with you, written down. Theoretically, if you guys are smart, you’re using one-time pads to communicate if things have gone really sideways. In that case, if you are snatched up, any of your OTP’s can be used against you and your community. So, have some kind of plan for the radio operators that allows them to notify their home station that they have been captured. This also means the home station should not be idiots and just assume everyone’s OK when things are not correctly done. If you want more of that information and a deeper dive, this information is open source in books like London Calling the North Pole. Yes, you will have to do your own footwork. I’m not going to publicly present ideas for you to turn into a YouTube video. I think Scout has had that done to him way too much at this point.