Bitcoin Forum

i was just pondering what would happen to bitcoin in the event war broke out in this country (USA).   the initial thought that crossed my mind was that if the network was down people wouldnt be able to spend or accept bitcoins if bitcoin was the defacto currency.  thats the downside, but a major benefit would be that it would take a World War on a very large scale to cripple the entire network / bitcoin economy.  So as long as you kept your wallet.dat safe, you could theorhetically escape to another country where the network was not affected and still have all of your savings intact. The bitcoin network would also be beneficial in the rebuilding of a post war nation as well as nations suffering from natural disasters.  just think how much faster and efficiently we could have sent financial aid to japan after the earthquake/tsunami by cutting out middlemen with sticky fingers.

The sort of war we should expect on US soil will likely be 4th Generation warfare; likely civil war as the remnants of the US Empire start seceding from one another. Such a war would likely be one of secessionists against federal troops. In some cases, you'll have a rebel city breaking away. (Remember that the Revolutionary War had only minority support in the beginning, something like 10%.) In such a scenario, expect organizations of the Hezbollah model running the show. They'll have a vested interest in maintaining the creature comforts of modern life, or be faced with some unhappy citizens. The vast majority of Americans will go with whoever keeps them comfortable. So maintaining cable TV, water, sewer and INTERNET connections will be paramount. I'd think such a rebel organization would want to build a mesh network throughout the city with multiple satellite connections so as the network remained as decentralized as possible. If not, and the enemy knocks out the internet, who cares? A city in the middle of a low intensity conflict (look at Baghdad following the toppling of Saddam) will have a lot of other shit on their plate. But even then, I'm sure SOMEONE will be able maintain an internet connection, somehow, providing a link to the Bitcoin network and allowing for the exchange of money. This would probably fall under the control of the local Hezbollah-like militia. It would simply be another one of the services they provide (along with social services, city works, death to the enemy, etc.)

The possibility of network 'shutdown' or isolation has been discussed last year. The discussion tends to focus on reconnecting the block chain (and people double spending on each side of the 'digital curtains').

http://forum.bitcoin.org/?topic=661.0

Suppose I do not spend my bit coins, but keep them on a USB stick buried under the house. The pre-isolation transactional history should be safe as long as the original block chain is in effect, even if there are major post-isolation-and-block-chain-merging transactional issues regarding competing block chains. What seems likely is that if the isolation is long enough, the client/nodes will be re-programmed to accept only the 'local' block chain even if a longer block chain joins the network. If you believe both WWIII will occur and bitcoins will survive, then you might be able to double or triple your money by hoarding long!

try to do that with the US Dollar -  defect to another country during or after a war and have your US dollars be worth anything.. yeah, you could save up a bunch of gold, but how would you carry it all? if you could carry it all, how confident would you feel that you would not be robbed along the way?

If I'm in a place and that place doesn't have internet I'm leaving that place (with my bitcoins in my pocket).

Obviously all the above scenarios are absurd.  The next major war on U.S. soil will be either:  World War Z (The Zombie Apocalypse), a world wide robot (or rabbot) uprising, or an alien invasion of our solar system.  In these scenarios digital or paper money will be worthless.

You would need an awful lot of money to buy more gold than you could carry. Alternately you could go with high value bills like the 500 Euro.

If, during this hypothetical war, it is possible for a dishonest bitcoiner to spend either side of the digital curtain, why would it not be possible to join the block chain either side of the curtain?

In the very worst case, a copy of the block chain could be transported by USB stick, and broadcast.

There would be a lot of chain reorganisations, and confirmations would probably need to be 100 (or whatever) instead of 6; but such is the price of doing business in a warzone.

Bitcoin is pretty resiliant I think.

It was actually about 3% of the population that actively supported the US revolution, with about 30% of the population as 'fellow travelers', another 30% were loyalists to the crown of England, and the rest really didn't care either way.

http://sipseystreetirregulars.blogspot.com/2009/02/what-is-three-percenter.html

During apocalypse, what has universal and undeniable value? Food, energy. What is a good storage of value? Spam, batteries.

Kerosene is better than batteries.  It keeps longer, has a much higher energy density, and is cheaper on a joule per fiat currency unit basis.

If battery power is a concern, get one of these...

http://www.techdigest.tv/2011/06/everybody_needs.html

Ha! That's great. Though, I think I'll pick up a military grade solar panel. But it does look like oil is an excellent storage of both value and energy. Both of these are charts are evidence to me that the fiat currencies have been revving up for hyperinflation:

http://www.mongabay.com/images/commodities/charts/crude_oil.html
http://goldprice.org/charts/history/gold_10_year_o_usd.png?0.7884277222602255

And rice and soy beans give you a more useful nutrient spectrum at a much higher density.