# Crafting the Rebel resistance



## Stormcat (Sep 6, 2020)

So the antagonists for my story are a fundamentalist sect who's managed to take over the government. Since not all religious people are fundamentalist in their particular religion, and the fact that there's more than one religion to subscribe to, It's fairly obvious that there will be significant disapproval of this group's coup.

I have all the characters who are members of the resistance, but I have no idea how to organize them. Who's going to fund this endeavor? Who are the men on the ground? Who commits sabotage? Every time I go to Wikipedia to decipher how to run a spy ring, all I come up with is a whole bunch of technical jargon and no insight. Could someone help me decipher what all this means?

EDIT: Since apparently I need to explain this further, I'm *NOT* looking for motivation for this group to be in a rebellion. What I *AM* looking for is information on how resistance forces are run. Historical references are a plus, as I'm writing a story with an approximate WWII -era level of technology.


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## Joker (Sep 7, 2020)

What's the technological/social level of the world?


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## Stormcat (Sep 7, 2020)

Joker said:


> What's the technological/social level of the world?



Think WWII level of technology.


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## MikeDwight (Sep 7, 2020)

There are easy examples to look at on this. What about the White Army in Russia, if the Romanovs were already assassinated and Communism was going to destroy Christianity and start Communism and the White Army wins in 1913, that's basically your premise. I like looking at Dixie in the English World Context. It appears to be most successful about our common World Heritage, Knights, patient exultant mothers, the litany of the Saints, the Authority of Religion in the World.


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## Stormcat (Sep 7, 2020)

MikeDwight said:


> There are easy examples to look at on this. What about the White Army in Russia, if the Romanovs were already assassinated and Communism was going to destroy Christianity and start Communism and the White Army wins in 1913, that's basically your premise. I like looking at Dixie in the English World Context. It appears to be most successful about our common World Heritage, Knights, patient exultant mothers, the litany of the Saints, the Authority of Religion in the World.



Not even close.

My rebels are all secularists and they want this oppressive regime out and to enforce the strict separation of church and state.

I need more information about technical aspects of a resistance movement.


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## MikeDwight (Sep 7, 2020)

Oh! Oh. OK then. I was heading in the wrong direction then... Well... Not that its all black and white, but then why not flip it, so Rasputin some semi-mystic acts like a Priest gets in there assassinates the religious nuts... The Communists want the people in control and to destroy the hierarchy, Monarchs, Capitalists, Priests, its all Hierarchy. Technical aspects of a resistance movement, angry people...?


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## Stormcat (Sep 7, 2020)

MikeDwight said:


> Oh! Oh. OK then. I was heading in the wrong direction then... Well... Not that its all black and white, but then why not flip it, so Rasputin some semi-mystic acts like a Priest gets in there assassinates the religious nuts... The Communists want the people in control and to destroy the hierarchy, Monarchs, Capitalists, Priests, its all Hierarchy. Technical aspects of a resistance movement, angry people...?



Again, you've wound up miles away from the question.

My rebellion has nothing whatsoever to do with the Russian revolution, or communism, or even capitalism for that matter! I just want to know how a resistance movement is organized!


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## Lee Messer (Sep 7, 2020)

A movement starts with three leaders minimum I'd say. One to act like a leader, and the others to act like followers. To recruit others, the followers show up after the main leader begins recruiting someone. They affirm what ever is being said as truth until the group believes they have captured a new follower, and set up an actual formal introduction into the group.

Once enough people are in the movement to make more groups, this process is repeated until there are enough people with skill sets to mass recruit by conducting conferences, or seminars. It is best to recruit people with these skill sets, but you can always hire contractors for the tasks. Today, Sound techs, Marketing consultants, etc. are key for presentation to mass audiences until you can get televised. You can use multiple forms of media for these mass recruitments as well if you can get a bunch of computers.

Once the narrative is set, and you have a few thousand followers, you can then choose a figurehead, and begin setting up large funding instruments. Begin hiring or recruiting Political Strategists, and PR consultants. See if you can get some air-time on other media formats that are traditional to begin to sway public opinion. You will need about half the population to be disarmed about your rhetoric. This way if the military steps in and cracks down, it will force the general public to revolt.

Regardless of time period, the recruitment still has to start somewhere, and there are a few math points to consider about political sway. You will only need maybe 10% of the population to actually outright agree with your narrative, and maybe 3% of the population to actually be active followers. I've heard different numbers, but it's subjective, and an estimate based off of previous events in history. The Nazis did it, as did the communists. America started this way. The French revolution may have different reasons but the organization always develops with orchestrated and organized recruiting combined with mass social engineering. Cults are formed the exact same way.


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## Joker (Sep 7, 2020)

https://alt.fan.heinlein.narkive.com/UWJ3jm95/the-moon-is-a-harsh-mistress-cell-structure


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## Lee Messer (Sep 7, 2020)

Social network analysis is a very good way of picking targets within a finite population. It is important to understand who is in closest proximity socially to others, and to understand these connections. Lets say we want to recruit Tom Hanks because we believe his viewpoints are not far from ours. We wouldn't just knock on his door like a couple of Jehovah's Witnesses or Mormons. The Church of Scientology has used social network analysis in the past.

It works like this. You attribute a positive or negative value to the subject matter. Could be as simple as "Do they like cats". The more commonality you find between two individuals who have contact with each other, the stronger the connection. Don't approach them directly. Analyze their adjacent nodes in the network structure, and target them for recruitment. Look for the ones who talk the most, as the others will follow them easily. The ones that are the most vocal hold the most sway over that node. You will want to sway their opinion first.

Then, you will want to recruit them at almost the same time. Which people again? In this case it's all of Tom Hank's surrounding nodes. Once they're turned, They will recruit him for you. Now Tom Hanks will join the cat lover's society for enlightenment cult. If he doesn't, he'll feel like an outsider.

This is how you get specific skill sets and talents into your organization.


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## Stormcat (Sep 7, 2020)

Lee Messer said:


> Once enough people are in the movement to make more groups, this process is repeated until there are enough people with skill sets to mass recruit by conducting conferences, or seminars. It is best to recruit people with these skill sets, but you can always hire contractors for the tasks. Today, Sound techs, Marketing consultants, etc. are key for presentation to mass audiences until you can get televised. You can use multiple forms of media for these mass recruitments as well if you can get a bunch of computers.



remember i'm working with WWII era-tech, so there can't be anything like television or even advanced computers. I suppose print would be a good idea, I recall some of the WWII anti-Hitler Propaganda the US snuck into Germany.

But Recruitment isn't my prime concern here. I have all the members necessary for this resistance, Now I need to give them something to do. What sort of activities could they do to get people to view them favorably and the Fundamentalists unfavorably?


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## MikeDwight (Sep 7, 2020)

What do people do, just resist random things, you either set up a "Handmaid's Tale" or "Martin Luther King Jr." Religion Resistance type movement... I originally thought you were making an atheist incrowd like Lenin Communists with an outcrowd Christian resistance White Army.


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## Stormcat (Sep 7, 2020)

So now I have an idea of what I want my rebels to do before triggering the big bad revolution:

-Sabotaging work projects, also organize strikes and demonstrations
-Working with existing organizations to acquire supplies and funding
-Humanitarian aid
-Political resistance to organize things after the revolution
-Armed resistance
-Espionage
-Counter propaganda and press, also forging documents
-Getting political prisoners into hiding/ helping them escape the prisons
-Secret schools to train new recruits/general life skills


Now, I need to figure out a way to get the different factions of this resistance to talk to each other. Any advice?


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## Joker (Sep 7, 2020)

Stormcat said:


> So now I have an idea of what I want my rebels to do before triggering the big bad revolution:
> 
> -Sabotaging work projects, also organize strikes and demonstrations
> -Working with existing organizations to acquire supplies and funding
> ...



They'd kick it up the chain to the leaders, who would in turn pass the info back down the chain to the other cells. Cells shouldn't know about other cells, lest someone rat them all out.


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## Lee Messer (Sep 8, 2020)

I think at that tech level at the time they were heavily using code to communicate. Radio communications would often be the key communication medium for mass audience or special operations as well. It wasn't as simple as morse code either. Phrases like the moon is brightest in the mid sky over Venice tonight. Of course, I don't know exactly what the phrases were, but this is how British OSS got messages to saboteurs and stranded commandos behind enemy lines. It would also be the most likely way of passing secret propaganda messages through the organization's different factions. They would simply turn their radios to specific frequencies at specific times based on the encoded instructions from the last message received.

This method is still used today with encryption technology. They called it cryptography, I think.


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## Matchu (Sep 8, 2020)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QnXPqUU6fI0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QnXPqUU6fI0

Rebel SW messaging for your fanatics


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## Stormcat (Sep 8, 2020)

Lee Messer said:


> I think at that tech level at the time they were heavily using code to communicate. Radio communications would often be the key communication medium for mass audience or special operations as well. It wasn't as simple as morse code either. Phrases like the moon is brightest in the mid sky over Venice tonight. Of course, I don't know exactly what the phrases were, but this is how British OSS got messages to saboteurs and stranded commandos behind enemy lines. It would also be the most likely way of passing secret propaganda messages through the organization's different factions. They would simply turn their radios to specific frequencies at specific times based on the encoded instructions from the last message received.
> 
> This method is still used today with encryption technology. They called it cryptography, I think.



Any ideas where I could learn more about Cryptography?


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## Lee Messer (Sep 8, 2020)

Stormcat said:


> Any ideas where I could learn more about Cryptography?



A movie. Only take about two hours. It's called "A beautiful Mind"

The plot requires a crash course into Cryptography of that time period you are using. The film provides that to the viewer. From there you should easily be able to understand any research you find in Wikipedia. That should be enough to get you going.

You may want to pick up "The Davinci Code" as a supplement. It's another form of hiding messages. I'm a 32nd degree Mason, and I can tell you it would help give your work some originality. Hiding messages is really a creative effort, and the more original the method, the more secure your message will be. Freemasons are all about hiding messages. I still find new ones from time to time.


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## Stormcat (Sep 8, 2020)

So now I have a new question.

Referring back to my list of "Things these rebels will do" Should I have each task be a separate "cell"? I have a character who is the shadow leader of this resistance, and obviously, if his true identity is discovered the whole thing falls apart and the terrorists win. So! Could he assign a trustworthy comrade to be the head of each "Division" reporting directly to him and all their underlings are in the dark about the true leader, Or should he soley manage everything under an alias to hide his true nature and the immediate underlings still don't know who he is?


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## Joker (Sep 8, 2020)

Stormcat said:


> So now I have a new question.
> 
> Referring back to my list of "Things these rebels will do" Should I have each task be a separate "cell"? I have a character who is the shadow leader of this resistance, and obviously, if his true identity is discovered the whole thing falls apart and the terrorists win. So! Could he assign a trustworthy comrade to be the head of each "Division" reporting directly to him and all their underlings are in the dark about the true leader, Or should he soley manage everything under an alias to hide his true nature and the immediate underlings still don't know who he is?



Micromanagement can only end in disaster. I don't care how smart he is, no one human being is an expert in more than a handful of fields. It also makes it far more likely to trace things directly to him.


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## Stormcat (Sep 8, 2020)

Joker said:


> Micromanagement can only end in disaster. I don't care how smart he is, no one human being is an expert in more than a handful of fields. It also makes it far more likely to trace things directly to him.



Ah, so the top "Cell" can't be just one person. More like the Board of a company. So that makes my "leader" the equivalent of CEO.

Now off to assign roles to the other board members.


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## Lee Messer (Sep 8, 2020)

Stormcat said:


> Ah, so the top "Cell" can't be just one person. More like the Board of a company. So that makes my "leader" the equivalent of CEO.
> 
> Now off to assign roles to the other board members.



Good enough. Quote from "Babe" - "That'll do pig. That'll do."


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