When the second amendment was written the US had a very small standing army. Further, the populace was armed about as well as any army because they were supposed to BE the army when needed (that whole pesky militia thing). I also should note that it became quickly apparent that a people’s militia sucked as a military force so the US pretty quickly started going to a standing military (point being barely trained militia are no match for a professional army even when armed the same).
Today the US has about 1.4 million active people in the military. The US spends about $600 billion/year on its military. Its military now has all manner of weapons far, far beyond what the citizens can have. And of course do not forget all the other stuff like the NSA and spy satellites and so on they can use that Joe Citizen cannot. It’s not even remotely close a matchup.
There is a gulf a million miles wide between what an armed populace could do against the government in 1791 versus what they can do today.
And yet, during the Revolution the militias were pretty much hit or miss. They were ill trained, by and large, and ill disciplined, though they definitely had an impact. But by the end of the war it was the regular army that was doing most of the actual winning of battles. In addition, again, we aren’t talking about a movie. All of the civilians aren’t going to be on one side of the fight just after the Revolution while the government was on the side of total tyranny. You also have the issue of a fairly sparse population outside of the cities, where most of the armed folks actually were (on the then frontier) as opposed to the more densely populated cities, where folk weren’t as heavily armed by and large.
So, no…I don’t think it’s nonsense. It’s reality and pretty much on par with today. Armed civilians just after the Revolution wouldn’t have faired that well against the regulars, and you’d have regulars on both sides, as well as armed civilians for and against (with a lot on the sidelines)…just like today.
1.4 million…verse 10’s of millions. And this is if the cartoon version comes to pass, and also counting all of the file clerks and REMFs as fighting soldiers. Reality setting in, it would be far less than the 1.4 million (which is all the services as well as all of the MOSs) verse the rest, with the equipment for that $600 billion plus being distributed among both sides, and civilians and their arms fighting on both sides and adding their weight. I think that the civilians will matchup fine except in the cartoon movie version. They will be every bit as much of a factor in some theoretical conflict as their the earliest armed American civilians would have been, had it come to it.
I disagree and have seen no evidence to the contrary. They would both be factors in any conflict, and pretty equivalent factors. Armed civilians, on their own couldn’t overthrow a tyrannical government either in 1791 or 2017, but then they wouldn’t be on their own.
Then thing is you can’t look at our current military and use it as an example of the kind of military we’d have if we had a tyrannical government. Tyrants aren’t stupid. They make sure that their military forces are “politically reliable”. Nobody gets handed a gun unless the government is sure they will follow orders and shoot down civilians.
There is a fair chance the failed coup in Turkey was a false flag operation staged by Erdoğan.
We cannot know for sure (yet) but the coup attempt was pathetic in size/scope and poorly executed (to the point of being inept) and it gave Erdoğan the excuse he needed for crackdowns to consolidate his power.
Hard to believe those units thought they could succeed in a coup all on their own. A coup is a gamble but one would think they would not attempt it without better odds.
But yeah…tyrants have people after them which is what usually makes the tyrant get worse. Even Hitler had an attempt on his life by his own military. IIRC Saddam Hussein’s paranoia was pretty extreme towards the end with numerous body doubles and extreme security measures to even see him.
The evidence is history. A gaggle of armed people is no match for a professional fighting force. Especially when that armed fighting force is leaps and bounds better armed than the gaggle of people.
The best armed Americans could do would be as a nuisance. Killing the odd soldier here and there in terror attacks. Blowing up a marketplace and so on. Things the tyrant and his lackeys would not give a shit about.
If the armed populace ever formed up into a cohesive army and took to the field to have a fight with the US military they’d be demolished. Your movie analogy is assuming the plucky heroes would overcome the vastly superior fighting force. They won’t. They’ll die if they try.
When the Continental Army was a gang of hotheads with their shootin’ irons, electing their own officers, they got their asses kicked all the way to Valley Forge. Only after Steuben applied some well-regulation did they become an effective fighting force. True?
The constitution doesn’t really inoculate you against a tyrannical government. North Korea has a constitution. South Korea had a constitution the entire time they were a military dictatorship. Venezuela has a constitution. As long as you are living in a functional democracy, I agree, we don’t need defense against tyranny but I gotta tell you I feel like we have been inching closer to tyranny over the last several months
I agree, the evidence is history. I simply see the evidence pointing to a different conclusion to the one you are drawing.
They aren’t and, as I said, they never were. But on the other side, they wouldn’t be all alone and facing regulars either then or now.
Yeah, sort of like the Iraqis…just a ‘nuisance’. And, again, they wouldn’t be fighting all alone or in a vacuum. Regular forces would be fighting with them in any realistic scenario, and there would be civilians on both sides as well being ‘a nuisance’. But instead of a few 10’s of thousands, as in Iraq or Afghanistan, it would be millions of folks being a ‘nuisance’, which kind of is a different scale.
Sure, in a movie playing in your head. The reality, however, is that if enough of the populace was willing to rebel to the point of bloodshed then so would the military and police. Wouldn’t be nearly as cut and dried when both sides have tanks, both sides have APCs and jets and both sides have armed civilians.
You have it totally backwards and are responding to a strawman. I never said that the civilians would be the ‘plucky heroes’ or that they would have to ‘overcome the vastly superior fighting force’. You seem to not have understand my argument at all, sadly. You seem to be under the impression that such a struggle would be black and white, with the evil civilians with their nasty guns simply on one side and the unbeatable US military on the other, and civilians coming out so that the military could pound them and be home by supper time, Papa Dragon out. Reality isn’t quite like that, and in the US no such rebellion would be close to that black and white.
Neither will a couple of AR-15’s when the tyranny’s army comes after you.
Are you going to be the first one in the thread to warn against “tyranny” who is actually willing to define the term in anything resembling a useful way?
Usually when this topic (rebellion) comes up, I hear about this liberal fantasy version where all the gun owners line up in a field like colonial soldiers and wait to get strafed by A-10’s. This time has been no different.
Me personally I picture little clusters of gun-owners going all terrorist cell and not being noticed until they attack something. Then the cops descend and a gun battle occurs. Then, if the cops are blown away by the heroic terrorists, the national guard will be sent. And if the subsequent battle takes more than about ten minutes somebody’ll drone strike their house. This repeats ad nauseum, with little uncoordinated outbreaks of violence that are quickly stomped out, to no significant lasting effect.
The true fantasy scenario I’m hearing being floated is the one where the army splits into competing factions in order for it not to be the evil civilians with their nasty guns simply on one side and the unbeatable US military on the other. In actuality, while you might see military units stalling and holding fire when told to slaughter civilians, you’re not going to see entire units turning and cutting loose on their brethren, or rolling their stolen tanks down Pennsylvania avenue.
Which brings to mind the other problem with gun owners cutting loose with their home defense handguns to fight tyranny - the US is simply too damn big. In order to effectively seize control of it you’d need a truly huge coordinated fighting force - you can’t just take Washington DC, reinforcements would storm in from elsewhere. And before you could organize and mobilize that huge coordinated fighting force somebody would notice or somebody would squeal, and then there would be arrests and disappearances and all the other things you’d expect from the tyranny you’re proposing you’d be fighting.
Eh, it’s at least a good bit more plausible than “If the armed populace ever formed up into a cohesive army and took to the field to have a fight with the US military …”,
I gave some examples in an earlier post with several recent examples from around the world where portions of the military sided against the tyrant: Libya, Venezuela, and Turkey. What makes you think “you’re not going to see entire units turning and cutting loose on their brethren”? That’s precisely what we’ve seen elsewhere.
The more common scenario I see discussed would have the goal of simply denying the (tyrannical) federal government effective control, at least while the fed .gov still exists as an effective organization, not “effectively seize control” themselves or coordinate a huge fighting force.
You mean aside from oaths, loyalty, and military camaraderie? I tend to assume that the kind of large hardware the US military operates requires enough of a support staff that it would be implausible for anybody to attempt to assault Washington with them without somebody squealing, at which point the remainder of the military would storm the compound with the aim of reclaiming or neutralizing the stolen hardware and quelling the rebellion. If the betrayal doesn’t involve tanks, drones, and planes, then I imagine they’d soon find themselves on the target end of such; I don’t get the impression that the military is fond of traitors. Particularly if we’re presuming the government has gone all tyrant and already purged the upper levels of the military of rebellious generals and such.
What does that mean, exactly? Scattered terrorist activity? Inhabiting federal buildings for brief periods? Storming military bases?
Oh, I don’t know. Most conservatives probably don’t think about it much at all. Those few that do almost certainly have widely varied ideas, but “leaderless resistance” seems to be a common recurring theme.
A not-uncommon quote I’ve seen repeated, from Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, is:
I’m not particularly imaginative or well-armed, but even I can think of more effective tactics and techniques for ambushing security personnel than “in the downstairs hall … with axes, hammers, pokers, or whatever else was at hand”
You have it totally backwards and are responding to a strawman. I never said that the civilians would be the ‘plucky heroes’ or that they would have to ‘overcome the vastly superior fighting force’. You seem to not have understand my argument at all, sadly. You seem to be under the impression that such a struggle would be black and white, with the evil civilians with their nasty guns simply on one side and the unbeatable US military on the other, and civilians coming out so that the military could pound them and be home by supper time, Papa Dragon out. Reality isn’t quite like that, and in the US no such rebellion would be close to that black and white.