That’s called the “insurrectionary theory” of the Second Amendment. Discussed in this old thread.
Yes. The Iraqi people, nowadays, are well-armed with automatic rifles – and were under Hussein’s rule. It made no difference. “You have rifles? Fine, the goverment has heavy machine guns, tanks, armored personnel carriers, flamethrowers, assault helicopters, mortars, grenade launchers . . . Now shut up and pay your taxes!”
Honestly, I don’t even think they’d try to take the guns from your average citizens.
Because the average citizen wouldn’t do dick with his guns.
They’d sit at the window cleaning their handguns while their neighbors are arrested.
They’d drive past the gay bar where the patrons are being rounded up and sent to camps, and then go hunting.
A large portion would actively support any evil regime you’d care to name, and an even larger protion couldn’t be bothered to do anything about it. There’s no reason to take guns away from the majority to try and disarm the minority of insurrectionists. Not when the government has overwhelming power and a willingness to use it.
What makes you think that the people would have to fight the military? The people are the military. If the country came apart the military would divide as well. That would make it much less of a massacre than the OP seems to think it would be, because they’d also bring their equipment and training with them.
What about citizens’ militias?
I recall a doper who started an “Ask the Militia Guy” thread. Oh, I just found it. Here it is.
No offence Crafter_Man, but Citizen’s Militias are exactly the sort of people that give recreational/sporting shooters, hunters, and collectors a bad name.
Some of the stuff in that other linked thread seems a bit… extreme for me. Let’s just say that there’s no way you’d be allowed a Gun Licence in Australia if you made those views known to the police, or even the governing body of most shooting or hunting clubs.
Have you read David Brin’s novel The Postman, by any chance?
Since a lot of people are citing David Koresh and the Branch Davidians as proof that the American people are willing to take up their guns and shoot it out with the big, bad government agents, it’s worth taking a deep breath and assessing what actually happened with regards to the sect at Mount Carmel. Anti-government movements have used it as propaganda. In their version of events, Koresh and his followers were some sort freedom-loving, libertarian/anarchist people who only wanted to live peacefully without interference from the federal government, and they only took up arms and started killing people once the government’s jack-booted thugs came to do whatever the government’s jack-booted thugs do.
This is a work of fiction.
David Koresh was a cult leader and a religious fanatic. He was not a freedom-lover. He was a freedom-hater. His goal was to establish a religious theocracy. He believed that God would shortly be arriving to slaughter everyone on Earth except for the members of his own little cult, and he intended to fight on God’s side. Long before the first federal agent showed up at his door, he had already shot a rival cult leader. He was amassing a huge stockpile of illegal weapons, planning terrorist attacks, and raping and molesting children for years before the ATF was finally summoned to take him down.
Luckily, Koresh and his pals are not good representatives of how the typical American gun owner feels.
Was owning an AK legal back when Hussein was in power?
AFAIK. Legal or not, practically every family owned one.
It’s far easier to resist a blatently evil foreign enemy at the end of long supply chain with nearly no local support. A tyrannical US government at home would have far fewer worries about logistics, much more public support, and much less willingness for the public to consider it evil no matter what it does.
I think you’re underestimating how seriously some people would consider an attempt at disarming the civilian population. Take another look at one of those Red State/Blue State maps from the last election. Lots of the Red States are largely rural. In some of those areas, disarmament ranks slightly below sodomizing children on the scale of undesirable activities. If you’ve spent most of your life in urban areas, you might be very surprised at the visceral reaction this would cause.
Also seem to be assuming the military would all march in lockstep with the plan, which is far from certain. As noted above by Airman Doors, I’d expect some significant defections from the military and from local law enforcement. A “hunting rifle” is still a powerful weapon. It may not have the magazine capacity or full auto capability of a military weapon, but it can still reach out and touch somebody from a half mile away or further. An insurgency doesn’t have to engage in pitched battles. Even a handful of snipers can slow an army’s advance tremendously. Then there’s the National Guard to consider. You could see mostly intact guard units joining the insurgency, leading to a general revolt.
If the government were serious about disarmament, they could probably accomplish it, eventually. But it would be a very costly endeavor…and might be the last action attempted by the existing government.
Really? Why is that? Please explain.
My right to keep and bear arms is inalienable. Its existence is not contingent upon “permission” from anyone or anything, including the government. So it looks like I won’t be moving to Australia soon. 
I’m no expert on US gun control law, but I believe you’re rather mistaken. You can alienate yourself from your right to keep and bear arms in any number of ways, such as by committing a felony.
Crafter_Man ain’t necessarily talking about law.
Wait a minute. I live in Missouri, & I think that’s what we already have!
I think the real answer is that in much of the USA, the police & the gun-owning populace get along pretty well. Many police forces would simply neglect to strictly enforce gun laws unless a gun popped up in some other crime, or look for some peaceful way to get guns off the street. Many citizens would find the killing of a cop far more offensive than a cop doing his job (& it’s not that hard to hide a gun, rather than use it to murder a police officer, who you may know personally).
There are some anti-state cranks, like the “Christian Identity” crowd, who hoard unlicensed guns & get in shootouts with cops, but that’s not a hypothetical; that already happens, & they are a pathetic minority in any case.
A lot of pro-gun people are also “law-&-order conservatives.”
Aren’t the circumstances that’d dictate that such things would happen so remote?
A whole lot of shit would have to go down first before anything like this would come close to maybe perhaps remotely happening.
Yes. “Maybe perhaps remotely”.
Multiple problems with this ever taking place much less wondering if people will fight back.
Airman is right about the military. They are citizen soldiers and as such, reliability in executing such an order is not certain. Compliance by local police forces is also uncertain since they would be disarming/arresting/shooting the same neighbors which they have kids in the same school with or have other community ties with.
This is not even taking into consideration that some states may simply choose secession instead of having the federal government walk over their citizens. Texas comes immediately to mind. One can only imagine what might happen when federal agencies attempt to start disarming citizens in El Paso or Amarillo.
Something that also comes to mind is that the same law enforcement agencies that can’t secure the US borders, are losing the war on drugs and have let many inner cities turn into war zones are somehow going to turn into the Gestapo overnight and start disarming US citizens? Highly doubtful. Forget Joe Sixpack in suburbia and wait till they start going after street gangs to disarm them.
There is a very fundamental point that needs to be stressed in these debates - the right of the people to own firearms and defend themselves is critically important, because it flows out of the idea that absolute power derives from the people - that government exists through the consent of the people. Vesting the people with the right to stay armed and defend themselves is a constant reminder of just who runs who.
Some people believe that people should be vassals of the state - that the government is their protector, their nanny, their parent. That they are essentailly serfs, to be told what to do and how they must live. ‘Enlightened’ people and elites run society, and whatever freedom people have is freedom that is granted by the all-powerful state.
But America was founded on opposite principles - that the people are ultimately free, and that government only exists to the extent that it represents the will of free people to have some order in their society. Constitution and bill of rights does not describe what rights the people have - it describes the limits of the government.
Taking away the essential right of people to defend themselves and to maintain arms to take up against the government should it run amok is profound statement that the power ultimately rests with the people. The day the U.S. government forces citizens to lay down their arms and accept the protection of the state will be the day that the nature of that government changes in a very fundamental way.
Whether that defense is practical or not, or discussions of tactical issues arising out an actual defense plan are wholly beside the point.
But defend themselves from the state?! It’s no state at all, is it, if the people have an acknowledged right to resist it with armed force?