[morsch]

I'm not involved in any armed popular uprising, but I do sometimes go on mountain hikes, would these fit the bill there? Like when the group separates and you try to stay in contact over a few kilometers (no line-of-sight). We had some cheap radios along a few years ago, no idea what kind of technology, but the reception was useless.

[sliverstorm]

Everyone needs to be ham licensed, and you would probably want to identify a mountain repeater you could use. Given those two things, sure!

[morsch]

It's not entirely clear to me that such radios require a ham license (see discussion below). I'm not in the US, anyway, so it doesn't really matter to me. But since I have no idea what a mountain repeater is, these kinds of radios might not be suitable to novices.