Survival and Basic Badass Podcast

FORTRESS America: 90 Days Without the Grid

Why is the Pentagon preparing military bases to operate for 90 days without civilian power, water, fuel, or communications? What exactly are they preparing for — and should the rest of us be paying attention?

In this episode of The Survival and Basic Badass Podcast, Chuck and Kevin dig into FORTRESS America, military preparedness, nuclear microreactors, cyberattacks, and a growing list of international security concerns.

From China's Volt Typhoon cyber operations and threats involving Iran to the Army's Operation Dragon Covenant training exercise, there's plenty to unpack. Are these routine precautions, signs of growing national security threats, or has the internet simply connected a few too many dots?

This week we're talking about:

Chuck brings the research. Kevin brings the conspiracy theories, political opinions, and an impressive ability to take a conversation somewhere nobody expected.

Together, they ask the question: If the Pentagon thinks 90 days of self-sufficiency is worth planning for, shouldn't the rest of us have a backup plan?

We're not saying the grid is going down tomorrow. We're just saying that discovering your entire survival strategy depends on an electrical outlet might be a problem.

Prepare for disruption. Build resilience. Become Hard to Disrupt.

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Disclaimer: This podcast is intended for news commentary, education, discussion, and entertainment. The hosts express personal opinions and explore hypothetical scenarios, publicly reported information, and unverified theories. Discussion of possible threats does not mean those threats are confirmed or imminent. Opinions expressed by individual hosts do not necessarily represent the views of the other host or the podcast. We encourage listeners to verify important claims through reliable sources. Nothing in this episode advocates violence, unlawful conduct, or attacks on critical infrastructure.

Sponsor & Affiliate Disclosure: This episode mentions companies with which the podcast may have sponsorship or affiliate relationships. We may receive compensation or commissions from qualifying purchases.

#FortressAmerica #GridDown #Preparedness #SurvivalPodcast #Cybersecurity #HardToDisrupt LINKS

Army Janus: https://www.army.mil/article-amp/294891/army_reaches_agreement_with_private_industry_for_nuclear_micro_reactors

Dragon Covenant: https://www.army.mil/article/296311

UK: https://beready.campaign.gov.uk/be-ready-for-emergencies/

DHS: https://www.dhs.gov/national-terrorism-advisory-system

FBI PLC alert: https://www.fbi.gov/investigate/cyber/alerts/2026/malicious-cyber-actors-targeting-water-and-wastewater-sector-internet--facing-programmable-logic-controllers-causing-operational-disruptions

DOE IG: https://www.energy.gov/ig/articles/management-letter-doe-oig-26-22

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The Hard to Disrupt Community | Building Resilience Before Disaster Strikes

What happens when the power goes out, the water stops flowing, or a major disaster overwhelms emergency services? Is your community prepared to survive together, or is everyone on their own?

In this episode of The Survival and Basic Badass Podcast, Chuck and Kevin explore how building stronger communities can make everyone more resilient when disaster strikes.

Preparedness isn't just about stockpiling food, buying survival gear, or building an off-grid homestead. It's about creating relationships, sharing resources, developing practical skills, and building systems that keep working when the infrastructure we depend on fails.

From community gardens and emergency water supplies to working with local government and first responders, we discuss practical ways ordinary people can strengthen their neighborhoods before the next emergency.

In this episode, we discuss:

The goal isn't to predict the next disaster. It's to build a life—and a community—that's hard to disrupt.

Whether you're an experienced prepper, a homesteader, or someone just getting started with emergency preparedness, this conversation offers practical ideas for making your neighborhood safer, stronger, and more independent.

Because when disaster strikes, your greatest survival resource might not be what you've stockpiled. It might be the people around you.

Build a Life That's Hard to Disrupt.

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#Preparedness #CommunityResilience #Survival #Prepping #SelfReliance

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How secure is your homestead when help isn’t coming?

In this episode of The Survival and Basic Badass Podcast, we break down homestead security, preparedness, and protecting your property during a grid-down emergency or major disruption.

Security isn’t just about weapons or defending the front door. A resilient homestead uses layers: controlling access, detecting problems early, protecting critical resources, maintaining communications, and having a plan when things don’t go the way you expected.

We discuss practical ways to make your property harder to disrupt, including fences and natural barriers, driveway alarms, cameras, motion lighting, doors and windows, livestock and animals, fire protection, communications, operational security, and working with neighbors.

We also get into something that is often overlooked in preparedness: having a fallback plan. If all of your food, equipment, supplies, and resources are concentrated in one place, that location becomes a single point of failure. Sometimes the smartest security strategy isn't standing your ground—it's making sure you still have options.

In this episode:
• Layered homestead security
• Property access and perimeter awareness
• Driveway alarms and early-warning systems
• Security cameras and local recording
• Solar and motion-activated lighting
• Doors, windows, and physical security
• Protecting gardens, livestock, and supplies
• Fire and carbon-monoxide safety
• Radios and backup communications
• Family emergency procedures and rally points
• Operational security (OPSEC)
• Neighbors and community security
• Fallback locations and distributed supplies
• Why redundancy matters in security too

The goal isn't to turn your property into a fortress. It's to build a homestead that gives you warning, time, information, redundancy, and options when normal systems aren't available.

Disclaimer: This episode is for general educational and entertainment purposes only. It is not legal, law-enforcement, firearms, tactical, or professional security advice. Laws regarding weapons, self-defense, property protection, surveillance, barriers, alarms, and other security measures vary by jurisdiction. Always follow applicable laws, manufacturer safety instructions, and accepted safety practices. Nothing in this episode should be interpreted as encouraging illegal activity or intentionally harming another person.

🎙️ Listen to the Podcast: https://open.spotify.com/show/4YdMrZ4oWTPKv4YrcZgExg 📲 Follow Us: 🔹 https://survivalandbasicbadasspodcast.com/ 🔹 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/share/g/15wU8rw6hS/Don't let uncertainty overwhelm you. We deliver practical tips to help you and your family navigate what is coming. Join the email list and check out the shop @ survivalandbasicbadasspodcast.comThe Survival and Basic Badass Podcast is available on Apple, Spotify, Podurama, and wherever you find great content. As always, this show is for entertainment. We are not to be considered doctors, financial advisors, or lawyers, and it's not legal, financial, or health advice.

#Preparedness #HomesteadSecurity #Prepping #GridDown #Homesteading #SelfReliance #EmergencyPreparedness #Survival #OffGrid #HardToDisrupt

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What happens to your home when the power goes out and the HVAC stops?

In this episode of The Survival and Basic Badass Podcast, Chuck and Kevin take on off-grid climate control—how to keep your home cooler in the summer and warmer in the winter when electricity isn’t available.

Long before central air and heat pumps, people designed homes around the climate. We look at some of those old-school solutions and how they can be combined with modern preparedness to build a home that’s much harder to disrupt.

We get into passive cooling, high ceilings and transom windows, whole-house and solar-powered fans, night flushing, awnings and shutters, insulation, thermal mass, adobe and earth-sheltered construction, summer kitchens, earth tubes, wood stoves, firewood planning, and concentrating heat where you actually need it.

We also talk about something that gets overlooked in preparedness: adaptation. Sometimes resilience isn’t about producing enough electricity to run everything exactly as you do today. It’s about designing your home, changing your habits, and reducing how much energy you need in the first place.

Because when the grid goes down during a 100-degree summer day—or in the middle of a freezing winter night—your generator isn't the only thing standing between you and trouble.

Build a Life That’s Hard to Disrupt.

🎙️ Listen to the Podcast: https://open.spotify.com/show/4YdMrZ4oWTPKv4YrcZgExg

📲 Follow Us:

🔹 https://survivalandbasicbadasspodcast.com/

🔹 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/share/g/15wU8rw6hS/Don't let uncertainty overwhelm you. We deliver practical tips to help you and your family navigate what is coming. Join the email list and check out the shop @ survivalandbasicbadasspodcast.comThe Survival and Basic Badass Podcast is available on Apple, Spotify, Podurama, and wherever you find great content.As always, this show is for entertainment. We are not to be considered doctors, financial advisors, or lawyers, and it's not legal, financial, or health advice.
Preparedness | Self-Reliance | Homesteading | Off-Grid Living | Grid-Down Survival

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Iran, war, $7 diesel, government spending, AI, religion, school lunches—and a world that increasingly seems to make no sense.

In this episode of The Survival and Basic Badass Podcast, Chuck and Kevin sit down for an unfiltered conversation about Iran, military strategy, rising fuel prices, oil and energy security, and the economic uncertainty that eventually works its way down to every American household.

Because geopolitical problems don't stay overseas. When fuel gets more expensive, so does moving food, building materials, equipment, and just about everything else we depend on.

From there, the conversation goes exactly where you'd expect: government spending, America's priorities, artificial intelligence, feeding kids at school, Christianity, politics, hypocrisy, and whether we've all just decided to hit the button and see what happens.

It's opinion, satire, dark humor, and two Navy veterans trying to make sense of a world that doesn't always cooperate.

And underneath all of it is the preparedness question:

How do you build a life that can handle disruption when you have absolutely no idea what's coming next?

War. Fuel prices. Inflation. Supply chains. Politics. Technology. You don't have to correctly predict the next crisis if you've built a life that's hard to disrupt.

🎙️ The Survival and Basic Badass Podcast

🎙️ Listen to the Podcast: https://open.spotify.com/show/4YdMrZ4oWTPKv4YrcZgExg

Build a Life That's Hard to Disrupt.

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What happens when the power goes out and doesn't come back on? What happens when hospitals, pharmacies, communications, and emergency services are no longer available? Tom explains why real medical preparedness requires more than a first-aid kit and why knowledge, training, medications, and the right emergency medical supplies can become critical during a long-term disaster or grid-down situation.

We also discuss human behavior during major disruptions and why understanding people may be just as important as understanding the threat itself.

If you're interested in prepping, survival, emergency preparedness, EMPs, grid-down survival, artificial intelligence, medical preparedness, homesteading, self-reliance, or becoming less dependent on fragile systems, this is a conversation you don't want to miss.

🚑 Learn more about Dr. Tom Brophy and Dr. Prepper Medical:
https://drpreppermedical.com/

Build a Life That's Hard to Disrupt.

🎙️ Listen to the Podcast: https://open.spotify.com/show/4YdMrZ4oWTPKv4YrcZgExg

📲 Follow Us:

🔹 https://survivalandbasicbadasspodcast.com/

🔹 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/share/g/15wU8rw6hS/Don't let uncertainty overwhelm you. We deliver practical tips to help you and your family navigate what is coming. Join the email list and check out the shop @ survivalandbasicbadasspodcast.comThe Survival and Basic Badass Podcast is available on Apple, Spotify, Podurama, and wherever you find great content.As always, this show is for entertainment. We are not to be considered doctors, financial advisors, or lawyers, and it's not legal, financial, or health advice.

This episode is for educational and informational purposes only and is not individualized medical advice. Seek qualified medical care whenever available.

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What happens when the water stops flowing?

Whether it’s a power outage, contaminated municipal water, drought, equipment failure, or a long-term grid-down situation, water is one dependency you can’t afford to ignore.

In this episode of The Survival and Basic Badass Podcast, Chuck and Kevin break down practical ways to build a water supply that’s harder to disrupt. We cover rainwater collection, how much water you can actually collect from a roof, storage tanks and barrels, gravity-fed systems, wells, 12-volt solar well pumps, hand pumps, shallow well points, ponds and surface water, and the importance of testing and treating the water you plan to use.

More importantly, we look at water as a system. Having a well doesn't help much if you can't pump from it when the power goes out. Stored water eventually runs out. A backup that depends on the same thing as your primary system may not really be a backup at all.

The goal isn't to predict the disaster. It's to identify what your life depends on and build alternatives before you need them.

Build a life that's hard to disrupt.

Topics include:
• Rainwater collection and storage
• Wells and off-grid pumping
• 12-volt and solar-powered well pumps
• Hand pumps and shallow well points
• Gravity-fed water systems
• Water testing and contamination
• Backup water sources
• Building redundancy into your homestead water supply

Learn more about the Hard to Disrupt approach at hardtodisrupt.com.

The Survival and Basic Badass Podcast — practical preparedness, self-reliance, homesteading, and building systems that keep working when everything else doesn't.

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Who controls America’s money, and how much influence does the Federal Reserve have over inflation, interest rates, debt, banking, and the everyday cost of living?

In this episode of The Survival and Basic Badass Podcast, we share our opinions and personal perspectives on the Federal Reserve, the U.S. monetary system, government debt, central banking, inflation, and the declining purchasing power of the dollar.

We discuss how decisions involving interest rates and the money supply can affect mortgages, credit cards, employment, savings, retirement accounts, housing prices, and the cost of basic necessities. We also examine the relationship between government, banks, large financial institutions, and the American taxpayer.

This episode is intended as commentary, education, and entertainment. It represents the opinions of the hosts and should not be considered financial, investment, legal, or professional advice. Some subjects discussed are debated, and listeners are encouraged to research the Federal Reserve and monetary policy independently and reach their own conclusions.

Topics include:

• What the Federal Reserve does
• How money and debt are created
• Inflation and the value of the U.S. dollar
• Interest rates and the banking system
• Government spending and the national debt
• Financial preparedness and self-reliance
• Reducing personal debt and financial dependency
• Why economic resilience belongs in every preparedness plan

Preparing for disruption is not only about food, water, power, and security. Financial knowledge, manageable debt, savings, and multiple layers of resilience can also help you build a life that is harder to disrupt.

The Survival and Basic Badass Podcast covers prepping, survival, self-reliance, homesteading, off-grid living, emergency preparedness, economic uncertainty, government policy, and the uncomfortable conversations other shows avoid.

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What happens when the grocery store stops being reliable?

In this episode of The Survival and Basic Badass Podcast, we continue the Build a Life That’s Hard to Disrupt series by tackling one of the most important preparedness systems of all: food.

Food storage is important, but eventually stored food runs out. Real food security means developing the ability to produce food yourself—and building multiple systems so one failure doesn’t leave you hungry.

We talk about practical ways to build a more resilient food supply, including gardening, greenhouses, chickens, rabbits, food preservation, and producing food on your own property. More importantly, we look at how these systems can work together to reduce your dependence on grocery stores and fragile supply chains.

This isn’t about predicting whether the next disruption will be an EMP, economic collapse, cyberattack, natural disaster, supply-chain failure, or something completely unexpected.

It’s about asking a better questions

If the normal food system stopped working tomorrow, how long could you keep producing food?

We’ll discuss:

• Building a garden that actually contributes to your food supply

• Using a greenhouse to extend your growing season

• Chickens for eggs, meat, and a renewable food source

• Rabbits as a practical small-scale livestock option

• Preserving what you grow and produce

• Creating redundancy instead of relying on one food source

• Turning your property into a productive part of your preparedness plan

• Building food systems that are useful during emergencies—and ordinary life

You don’t have to become completely self-sufficient. The goal is to become less dependent, more capable, and harder to disrupt.

Stop preparing for one disaster. Start building systems that keep working when life doesn’t.

🎙️ The Survival and Basic Badass Podcast

Build a Life That’s Hard to Disrupt

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 Kevin Started Talking…

This episode started out as a perfectly reasonable conversation about food production, preparedness, and building a life that’s hard to disrupt.

Then Kevin started talking.

What followed includes questionable opinions, dark humor, wild speculation, things somebody probably read on the internet, and several moments where Chuck attempts—sometimes successfully—to steer the conversation back toward the original topic.

IMPORTANT LEGAL-ISH DISCLAIMER:

The Survival and Basic Badass Podcast is produced for entertainment, commentary, and educational purposes only. Nothing in this episode should be interpreted as instructions, encouragement, or advice to commit a crime, harm another person, manufacture anything illegal, overthrow anything, assassinate anybody, open an interdimensional portal, summon the Nephilim, or otherwise turn a casual Saturday into a federal investigation.

Statements made by the hosts are their own opinions and may include humor, sarcasm, exaggeration, speculation, incomplete information, or claims that have not been independently verified. References to individuals, companies, governments, products, events, or suspiciously inexpensive meat should not be interpreted as factual allegations unless clearly identified and supported as such.

We are not lawyers, doctors, physicists, intelligence analysts, livestock inspectors, nuclear scientists, or experts in interdimensional travel.

We are two guys with microphones.

This episode contains explicit language and adult humor. Listener discretion is advised.

Somewhere underneath all of this is actually a pretty good conversation about food resilience, raising your own food, knowing where it comes from, and becoming less dependent on systems you don’t control.

Welcome to So Kevin Started Talking…

Build a life that’s hard to disrupt.

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