[josephdviviano]

The fact is that the dictator would still win. The rebellious citizenry would live a life of absolute misery, just as those in the middle east do.

The 2nd amendment made a lot of sense when weaponry consisted of horses and rifles, not computer-guided missiles. If there was ever a true US dictator, the 2nd amendment would mostly be used by the oppressed to rob, attack, and oppress one another.

[daenz]

>The 2nd amendment made a lot of sense when weaponry consisted of horses and rifles, not computer-guided missiles.

Let me make sure I understand your basic premise: the ability to defend yourself against a tyrannical dictatorship made sense until the government developed better technology, now it's pointless so just give up your guns?

Aside from being completely contrary to the American spirit of defending yourself from tyranny, it's based on the bogus premise that the advanced military technology can be used effectively against its own people. Where is the military going to fire those "computer guided missiles?" Into every rural home and every urban apartment window of everyone they suspect has guns, with thousands of civilian collateral casualties? Are tanks and fighter jets going to roll in and level entire economic hubs like cities? Are they going to destroy their own infrastructure? Are you envisioning "the rebellion" would set up a nice neat base in some remote location for the military to aim its tech at? Do you think the real men and women of the military would follow orders to destroy its own hometowns and families? How long before regional coups? How big do you think the US military is, relative to the armed civilian population? You are also aware that soldiers and police wear recognizable uniforms, while "the rebellion" doesn't?

I don't think you've thought this through.

[Ancalagon]

Well said, I am very tired of these blasé remarks about the second amendment. Sure, the people don’t have tanks, but when the people and the guns out number the tanks 1000:1, and the tank driver doesn’t really want to fight, and those 1000 guns are all playing geurrilla tactics, I like to imagine the people stand a chance.

[sjwright]

And if you could keep all your guns safely locked away until then, that would be great.

–thanks, everyone else.

[Ancalagon]

I know you were being funny, but I actually wholly agree with this statement. Every gun owner should have safes/locks for their guns.

[sjwright]

I was being serious. I don’t have a problem with responsible gun ownership.

Switzerland is a good model. The NRA loves to point at rates of Swiss gun ownership. If the USA implemented all of Switzerland’s gun laws I think you’d be okay.

[bdowling]

If the USA implemented all of Switzerland’s gun laws, a citizen who passes a background check would be able to buy a newly-made full-automatic machine gun that is not allowed in the US outside of law enforcement or military. I’m not sure that is what you’re implying that you’d want.

[mhroth]

Then the USA should also enact obligatory military service. So that everyone would know how to use those guns. And see them as a grave responsibility, not just a right.

[brightball]

IMO every high school should be teaching first aid, gun safety, etc.

[sjwright]

Normalisation of guns is part of the problem.

[homonculus1]

We do! The number of guns used in crime is a statistical whisper compared to the hundreds of millions that are in legal, peaceable private ownership and circulation in the US alone. The empirical view is vastly different than the sensational media representation, which (due to attention and advertising incentives) cherrypicks the extremely rare worst-case events.

[aphextim]

Also take into account even if the military supported this theoretical dictator, many brothers in arms would NOT attack their fellow citizenry mindlessly. Sure there are those who will follow an order no matter what, but many folks would easily defect and help their fellow citizenry.

[josephdviviano]

Yes, I do think that a gap in weapons technology is meaningful.

I love numbers so let's talk about those using the Iraq war as an example.

Here's an estimate of the number of casualties in the Iraq war: https://www.iraqbodycount.org/

Roughly 200k civilians, 90k combatants.

According to wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multi-National_Force_%E2%80%93... 5k western coalition forces died.

Even if these numbers are wildly inaccurate, I don't like those odds. Yes, it is difficult for the army to actually completely squash the insurgency, but there is a very messy grey zone between "winning" and "losing" where those in power relentlessly oppress the rest at relatively little cost to themselves.

I'm not saying, by the way, not to resist oppression, I am simply saying that the weapons that civilians cannot buy are very very scary, and it is probably wise to pick one's battles.

[throwaway8879]

It may be wise to pick ones battles, but it certainly is braver to pick one knowing you will lose. Stupid, but brave.

[Retric]

Insurgents who don’t attack, don’t accomplish anything That’s why civilian insurgents have a horrible track record historically. They need to go on the offensive using poorly trained and poorly equipped troops.

A small armed resistance in the US would be incredibly ineffectual. At best preforming unless but inspiring attacks, but more realistically simply dying in droves.

You can look at hundreds of past insurrections for inspiration, but grassroots military might has almost nothing to do with their success.

PS: Just look back on the US Civil war which included actual defection of large chunks of the military etc. They started with territory and an actual military including trained officers, cannons, and warships yet still lost. Now picture what would have happened if the southern military had stayed with the north.

[UnFleshedOne]

Not everyone who has guns, but everyone who resists. Even worst tyranny has some public support usually. And if people who tend to have guns are more inclined to support your flavor of tyranny (because you purpose-built it that way), you side step most of those problems.

[munk-a]

> Even worst tyranny has some public support usually.

Tyranny always has public support. The evil wizard lord of a kingdom scenario has never and will never occur in reality - someone despised by everyone cannot come into power... That doesn't mean the tyrant has the majority of public support, but I'd find it hard to believe any tyrant has less than 30% when coming to power.

[dmurray]

Someone despised by everyone can come into power when they are born into it. King John of England is a common example, though I don't know how historically accurate.

That said, your point is important and something many people don't seem to understand: those foreign leaders we in the West like to describe as tyrants, dictators, despots, strongmen, etc, are generally at least popular at home, and often adored.

[munk-a]

I don't really accept King John as a counter example. I'd revise my statement above to clarify that only someone with popular support can usurp power - unpopular monarchy can inherit power either because (1) the monarchy as an institution is more regarded than individual monarchs (2) once seizing power a tyrant can usually reduce their popular support and retain that power - the same holds for institutions of power, so the monarchy might not be popular but enough power is gained from and invested in it's continuance that no one wants it to go away[1]. John also may have been a desirable monarch because he was initially a useful idiot and managed to ride luck to transform that initial investiture of some power into a stronger reign.

Lastly, popular support is from the factions, not the people - in medieval europe most of the people had no factional representation politically, all the power had been entirely concentrated in the various estates.

1. See Lord Vetinari in like every discworld book ever.

[samus]

The Nazis started their power grab in earnest after the arsoning of the Reichstag. Even before that incident, public opinion was actually already firmly against the communists. To this day there are debates on who exactly arsoned the Reichstag, but it was suspiciously convenient for the Nazis so they could blame the communists. Soon after this incident, laws were passed that effectively abolished the constitution and granted the Nazi the power they required to establish their rule.

[slg]

Isn't this basically what the fascist in Germany, the communists in China and the Soviet Union, and countless other examples did? It is weird that people think that Americans are somehow a morally superior people to all the other countries that had already fallen down that path. I mean we are already locking up toddlers in cages and I haven't heard a single report of any push back from the people who are controlling those detention camps. World history has taught us that people are perfectly willing to betray or even kill their neighbor as long as you give them a believable enough reason. If anything, I think the overabundance of guns makes things more likely to go to shit quicker rather than less.

[nostrademons]

Surprised you're downvoted. The U.S. already has one civil war in its history, conducted when the 2nd amendment was in force and even more people owned guns than do today. It played out exactly like what the grandparent said was ridiculous: the respective militaries fired into every rural and urban home, set whole plantations on fire, destroyed their own infrastructure, killed their brothers and extended families, fought over their hometowns, and caused thousands of civilian casualties. There were in fact regional coups - really, the whole thing was one big regional coup, with some fractal splitting in the borderlands - but that didn't stop the bloodshed. And eventually, the guy who nobody in the rebellious states voted for won.

War is not rational. People will destroy all sorts of stuff if something close to their identity is under threat.

[diminoten]

The second amendment was nothing then like it is today; until 2008 it has been interpreted to mean the states have a right to raise a militia, not as an individual mandate to possess firearms.

[solidsnack9000]

That is not true, although there is a DailyKos article that says that.

Whatever rights they wanted to give the states in the Constitution, they gave to "the states". The right to bear arms was specifically given to "the people", to prevent disarmament.

[diminoten]

The states are not the same as the people. You literally notice what you wrote is different in the two sets of quotes you have here, right?

[nostrademons]

And yet people did possess firearms - it was pretty necessary when living an agrarian life on the frontier, then as now.

Curious how you think that would alter the conclusion? If anything organized resistance would be more effective then, because you already had state militias and rough technological parity with the military.

[diminoten]

I'm not sure what your point is... both the Union and the Confederacy were "well regulated" armies which issued weapons to their soldiers, in great numbers, and even by then military technology was beginning to outpace simple farm muskets.

I feel like you're treating all guns as equal, when that wasn't true in the civil war and is completely not true now.

[rjf72]

This is the text of the second amendment: "A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed." From its advent until somewhere around the mid to late 20th century it was interpreted universally as an individual right. The founding fathers and others of the time wrote extensively on this and it was not controversial for centuries.

Wiki provides numerous examples of early commentary here. [1] I find the most compelling and clear to be that of Judge Thomas M. Cooley, which I'll include at the bottom due to its length. In brief form: he posits that if the law were constrained only to the militia, and not the masses of people that may comprise it, then it would be quite a pointless amendment as the very government it seeks to protect individuals from could undermine it by inaction or neglect in regards to the formation of that militia.

What happened in 2008 was DC vs Heller. [2] After DC banned guns in 1975, a police officer found himself in a situation where he was able to have a gun during his line of duty but was left unarmed in the increasingly dangerous and deteriorating neighborhood that he lived in. He petitioned the NRA for help fighting the law. They refused, so he went to the Cato Institute. They (Heller along with 5 other citizens) filed suit, it made its way to the supreme court, and the supreme court unambiguously affirmed that it's indeed an individual right.

[1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Amendment_to_the_United...

[2] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/District_of_Columbia_v._Heller

Full quote of Judge Cooley:

"It might be supposed from the phraseology of this provision that the right to keep and bear arms was only guaranteed to the militia; but this would be an interpretation not warranted by the intent. The militia, as has been elsewhere explained, consists of those persons who, under the law, are liable to the performance of military duty, and are officered and enrolled for service when called upon. But the law may make provision for the enrolment of all who are fit to perform military duty, or of a small number only, or it may wholly omit to make any provision at all; and if the right were limited to those enrolled, the purpose of this guaranty might be defeated altogether by the action or neglect to act of the government it was meant to hold in check. The meaning of the provision undoubtedly is, that the people, from whom the militia must be taken, shall have the right to keep and bear arms; and they need no permission or regulation of law for the purpose. But this enables the government to have a well-regulated militia; for to bear arms implies something more than the mere keeping; it implies the learning to handle and use them in a way that makes those who keep them ready for their efficient use; in other words, it implies the right to meet for voluntary discipline in arms, observing in doing so the laws of public order."

[jcranmer]

> In brief form: he posits that if the law were constrained only to the militia, and not the masses of people that may comprise it, then it would be quite a pointless amendment as the very government it seeks to protect individuals from could undermine it by inaction or neglect in regards to the formation of that militia.

It should be noted that the Bill of Rights was originally interpreted to only limit the actions of the federal government, not the state governments. It should also be noted that one of the major events on the road to the American Revolution was the British government's attempts to disarm the militias in Massachusetts, which resulted in the Battles of Lexington and Concord, so the theory that the government might permit the militia but outlaw its arms was not mere theory but an actual historic act well-known to the drafters.

The modern controversy is whether or not the right in the Second Amendment is a right to keep arms is inherently a military right [1] or if it protects personal arms entirely separate from military contexts. The text isn't particularly helpful, and I suspect in large part because for the people who wrote it, there wasn't a separation between the right to personal use versus the right to military use--if you could use them, you were a member of the militia.

[1] I'm using military as a catch-all term here, which would include militia, civil defense, police, and other similar occupations. In the 18th century, these duties would have been performed by the military or the militia, as dedicated police forces had yet to be invented.

[diminoten]

Thomas M. Cooley and you are both right, the Second Amendment is now completely useless, as it was written in a time when individual states operated their own militias who were actively being disarmed by the "tyrannical" government at the time. Now they don't and therefore aren't being disarmed, so it can go away entirely.

Trying to warp this specific Amendment written 220+ years ago to serve as guidance for modern times is a farce, and has been manipulated by special interests into causing the murder of hundreds of thousands of people.

Thomas M. Cooley recognized that, but didn't draw the better conclusion; that the Second Amendment needs to be revoked.

2008 was a substantial setback, but it isn't the end of the conversation. The Second Amendment will be the thing our grandkids shame us most about.

[rjf72]

In the instances you mention, the government tended to pass gun control or confiscation before engaging in widescale tyranny. In 1938 Nazi Germany passed a gun control law that effectively gave 'true Germans' vastly more gun rights (which had been compulsory rescinded at the end of WW1) yet, they it simultaneously prohibited Jews from owning any weapon - even knives. [1] The holocaust began in 1941.

In 1924 in the Soviet Union all firearms were banned except for smoothbore shotguns which pose minimal In the danger outside of close range. [2] This was greatly expanded with increased penalties and also eventually applied to knives as well. The culling of opponents and directed starvations began around 1929 leading to the deaths of millions of Soviets.

In 1966 China laid out the foundation of their now famously strict gun laws. That was the same year that Mao began the "Cultural Revolution" leading to the deaths of millions of Chinese.

Ultimately their civilians, by the time the worst came, had no way to pose any resistance. And so they died.

---

As for our situation, I think we can appeal to the declaration of independence: "Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security."

You're comparing a transient discomfort for a relatively tiny number of people entering the country illegally, to events where millions of citizens were systematically and intentionally killed or starved to death by their governments.

[1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disarmament_of_the_German_Jews

[2] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_control_in_the_Soviet_Unio...

[3] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_control_in_China

[slg]

Directly from the Wikipedia article you linked:

>The Jews of Germany constituted less than 1 percent of the country's population. It is preposterous to argue that the possession of firearms would have enabled them to mount resistance against a systematic program of persecution implemented by a modern bureaucracy, enforced by a well-armed police state, and either supported or tolerated by the majority of the German population. Mr. Carson's suggestion that ordinary Germans, had they had guns, would have risked their lives in armed resistance against the regime simply does not comport with the regrettable historical reality of a regime that was quite popular at home. Inside Germany, only the army possessed the physical force necessary for defying or overthrowing the Nazis, but the generals had thrown in their lot with Hitler early on.

You could even argue that armed push back from the Jews would have resulted in more popular support for their extermination and would have hastened and worsened the Holocaust.

>As for our situation, I think we can appeal to the declaration of independence...

The Declaration of Independence is irrelevant here. We aren't talking about any legal, moral, or ethical reason for opposing despots. We are talking about it from a practical perspective. It is wildly less practical today than it was in the 18th century because the growth in military might of today's government has far outpaced the firepower available to the citizenry.

>You're comparing a transient discomfort for a relatively tiny number of people entering the country illegally, to events where millions of citizens were systematically and intentionally killed or starved to death by their governments.

And just like with the earlier examples, things start slow. The temperate of the political water in the US is rising and like a frog, no one has yet jumped out of the pot. That doesn't spell doom yet, but it also doesn't forecast great things if the political environment continues to worsen.

[rjf72]

Let's take a single eccentric artist and vegetarian of no meaningful background, wealth, or power. By his 30th birthday our artist was no better off and his life's greatest achievement was working as a low ranking courier during WW1. What are the odds that this arist would go on to become one of the most important and powerful individuals in history and one who would come to within a hair's breadth of dominating the entire modern world? It's never wise to speak in certainties in regards to alternate histories.

One of the few things we can say for certain is that tyrants don't like having their targets armed. Would having arms have saved the Jews, the Soviets, the Chinese, etc? That's impossible to answer. But it'd certainly have given them more options and opportunities, rather than fewer.

[Sandman]

> the ability to defend yourself against a tyrannical dictatorship made sense until the government developed better technology, now it's pointless so just give up your guns?

Basically, yes. Do you honestly think people would have any chance against probably the most powerful army in the world? Sure, they could try fighting a guerilla warfare, they'd even inflict some casualties against the enemy but it's unlikely that in the end they'd succeed against an army that is professional, highly skilled, better equipped, has better offensive and defensive capabilities, knows a lot more about tactics and logistics and has trained for this type of situation on a daily basis.

> Are they going to destroy their own infrastructure?

Would they even consider it their own infrastructure? Or would they consider it infrastructure currently held by rebels, which needs to be either seized or destroyed?

> Do you think the real men and women of the military would follow orders to destroy its own hometowns and families?

I suspect a lot of them would destroy towns if they we're told that these are now enemy bases. This has been repeated in many parts of the world throughout the history, even recent one. If they wouldn't, they'd be defectors and it really wouldn't matter whether the war was fought with modern weapons or sticks and stones.

[huntie]

It wouldn't work as you imagine because it would be far too expensive for the government. In the Middle East it works out because none of our infrastructure is affected by the war; so our GDP, and thus tax revenue, is still strong. In a civil war where the government is bombing its own infrastructure the cost for each kill will skyrocket and the effect on the economy will be catastrophic. Fighting a defensive war is immeasurably cheaper than an offensive war as the defenders value the lives of their soldiers much less than the offenders do. Also keep in mind that a rebel faction could very easily sabotoge critical infrastructure like electricity which would be very difficult to repair in a timely manner.

Relying on very expensive advanced weaponry is the modern equivalent of relying on mercenaries, and Machiavelli told us why mercenaries are bad.

[CapricornNoble]

>>>Do you honestly think people would have any chance against probably the most powerful army in the world?

You are placing waaaay too much faith in technology. Look at the Saudis: one of the worlds highest military budgets, and stockpiles of first-rate western hardware.....they are getting absolutely routed by Houthis, who run up desert mountains with just sandals, an AK, and a mouth full of stimulants.

>>>Sure, they could try fighting a guerilla warfare, they'd even inflict some casualties against the enemy but it's unlikely that in the end they'd succeed against an army that is professional, highly skilled, better equipped, has better offensive and defensive capabilities, knows a lot more about tactics and logistics and has trained for this type of situation on a daily basis.

What is the data that is driving you to this conclusion? Are you ignoring pretty much every counter-insurgency experience the US has had for the last 50 years? [2][3]

>>>I suspect a lot of them would destroy towns if they we're told that these are now enemy bases.

I suspect you don't know actual American military personnel very well, especially officers and NCOs, and how seriously we take the Laws of Warfare, AND the Constitution.

[1]https://www.snafu-solomon.com/2019/09/pics-of-houthi-rebels-...

[2]https://foreignpolicy.com/2019/02/05/why-america-lost-in-afg...

[3]https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/united-states/2015-0...

[Sandman]

> I suspect you don't know actual American military personnel very well, especially officers and NCOs, and how seriously we take the Laws of Warfare, AND the Constitution.

You're right, I don't. But, if Americans don't need to fear that they'll have to fight the US Army, why have the 2nd amendment at all? Who would they need to protect themselves against?

[behringer]

Rioters, rogue police, vigilantes, rogue militas, nazis, militaries commanded by those that are not upholding the constitution. Honestly your argument makes it more sensible that we should open up restrictions and allow more lethal weapons.

[justsubmit]

> Sure, they could try fighting a guerilla warfare, they'd even inflict some casualties against the enemy but it's unlikely that in the end they'd succeed against an army that is professional, highly skilled, better equipped, has better offensive and defensive capabilities, knows a lot more about tactics and logistics and has trained for this type of situation on a daily basis.

Have you heard of the Viet Cong?

[dragonwriter]

> Have you heard of the Viet Cong?

The one that got basically wiped out despite foreign backing (though the regular army that was their most direct supporter—the North Vietnamese Army—intervened and ultimately won the war after they were crushed)? Yeah, heard of them.

They kind of prove (or at least demonstrate) the point the grandparent post was making, though.

[coryfklein]

> Where is the military going to fire those "computer guided missiles?"

Blowing up a home or two harboring a "terrorist cell" during a meeting I'm sure will be deterrence enough for a lot of those gun owners.

> Are they going to destroy their own infrastructure?

The infrastructure is the exact kind of ground that can be held much more securely against pistols and rifles using the U.S.'s advanced weaponry.

> Do you think the real men and women of the military would follow orders to destroy its own hometowns and families?

See the Arab Spring for reference on this one

> How long before regional coups?

I'm sure a civilian populace will experience war fatigue waaay before a trained, well paid, well fed military.

You're coming up with a hypothetical scenario where it's the entire US government against the entire populace. In the real world it doesn't happen that way - the populace is divided between the rebels and the government supporters.

Besides, look at today's political climate: most of the gun owners are the one's backing our most authoritarian leader! If, somehow, we were to slide into dictatorship you can be sure the leader would make whatever promises necessary to get the gun toters on his/her side.

[CapricornNoble]

>>>Blowing up a home or two harboring a "terrorist cell" during a meeting I'm sure will be deterrence enough for a lot of those gun owners.

Why would you draw that conclusion, when pretty much every available case study (re: drone strikes and terrorism) clearly shows otherwise?

>>>Besides, look at today's political climate: most of the gun owners are the one's backing our most authoritarian leader!

Is he really our most authoritarian? How authoritarian would you rank him compared to Obama, the first President to order a drone strike to kill an American citizen without due process? [1]

[1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anwar_al-Awlaki

[coryfklein]

> when pretty much every available case study (re: drone strikes and terrorism) clearly shows otherwise?

I'm pretty sure I read those case studies differently than you do. Why, do you suppose, the military continues to make drone strikes if they are ineffective?

> How authoritarian would you rank [Trump] compared to Obama

Waaaaay more authoritarian. By his own admission, even. Trump praises, celebrates, and socializes with dictators on a much greater scale than Obama.

And if the single largest signal you're drawing from Anwar al-Awlaki's killing is that Obama is authoritarian, then I think you need to step back and examine that situation more broadly.

[daenz]

>If, somehow, we were to slide into dictatorship you can be sure the leader would make whatever promises necessary to get the gun toters on his/her side.

This demonstrates to me that you understand the political power of an armed citizenry, the same group that you used the first half of your post to discredit by suggesting "blowing up a home or two" would be enough to suppress them.

[coryfklein]

It's reductionist to say the armed civilians have no effect whatsoever. But my last point was to emphasize that "armed civilians" are not a protection against dictatorship.

I still believe that, even if he failed to persuade the gun owners, a dictator's armies win against an armed populace.

[Clubber]

You are talking about war like it's like a football game. You have one, and when the time's up, it's over. You have a clear winner and a clear loser based on the scoreboard.

Wars are comprised of many battles, which may or may not cause one side to "win." Wars are over when both sides agree to stop. What compels a side to agree to stop? Many, many things. The US won every major battle in Vietnam, yet there isn't a clear cut winner. The CSA probably would have been an independent nation had Lincoln not been reelected in 1864, a victory Lincoln himself didn't think would happen.

The point being, an insurgency, yes, ultimately wants to "win", but winning includes things like protecting food / water, freer movement, slowing down an advance, creating safe areas, disrupting the enemies ability to wage war as effectively, or just general annoyance of the enemy. If this can go on until the opponent ultimately loses the will to fight, or offers acceptable concessions, it's a victory. It doesn't have to be an overwhelming, parade-in-the-streets type victory, it just has to make the enemy lose the will to fight the insurgency.

[CharlesColeman]

> Blowing up a home or two harboring a "terrorist cell" during a meeting I'm sure will be deterrence enough for a lot of those gun owners.

By deterrence, did you actually mean motivation?

Killing someone's family and friends often radicalizes them, and I would say it very rarely pacifies them.

I mean look at the example of the HK protests: the police didn't stop them by kicking some people's teeth in [1], they actually fueled them by doing that.

[1] https://www.nytimes.com/video/world/asia/100000006702862/hon...

[coryfklein]

No. I believe that the sum total effect would be deterrence - sure some would radicalize and may throw themselves suicidally against the regime, but I believe the majority would give way to their desire for self preservation.

Why does the USA order strikes on terrorist targets, knowing full well there will be blowback? Because, on the whole, the strategy works.

[CharlesColeman]

> No. I believe that the sum total effect would be deterrence - sure some would radicalize and may throw themselves suicidally against the regime, but I believe the majority would give way to their desire for self preservation.

Your belief is contradicted by recent evidence.

> Why does the USA order strikes on terrorist targets, knowing full well there will be blowback? Because, on the whole, the strategy works.

No, it doesn't. They've been doing that for 20 years in Afghanistan, and we still have headlines like:

"Afghan government controls just 57 percent of its territory, U.S. watchdog says" (2017)

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2017/02/02...

"As talks to end the war in Afghanistan continue in Qatar this week, and amid continued political disarray in Kabul, there seems to be one clear trend on the ground: The Taliban are consolidating control. The longer the war drags on—now in its 18th year—the more the balance of the conflict tips in the insurgent group’s favor. While there has been fierce debate in the West and in government-controlled areas of Afghanistan about what peace talks with the Taliban mean for women’s rights and the future of Afghan democracy, the view from Taliban-controlled areas suggests a harsh reality that few in the international community seem prepared for: If peace talks succeed, the Taliban will effectively formalize, and likely expand, their control over vast swaths of the country. If peace talks fail, however, the outcome will likely be far worse, with renewed fighting and a precarious government in Kabul."

https://foreignpolicy.com/2019/07/04/afghanistan-taliban-pea...

[cwkoss]

> Blowing up a home or two harboring a "terrorist cell" during a meeting I'm sure will be deterrence enough for a lot of those gun owners.

Like cutting the head from a hydra, this would spawn dozens of new "terrorist cells" in response. Military is made from the citizenry, and without moral authority, command would lose power and become opposed by many of their own forces (in addition to the general populace)

[fiter]

I find the strength of your argument unconvincing. It's possible that is how it will play out, but it's possible it will also play out differently. My expectation is that uncertainty is part of the second amendment calculus.

[vorpalhex]

During the cold war, both Russia and the US developed a post-strike strike capability (basically a response if your enemy nukes you first which in turn destroys your enemy). The US called this a 'second strike' capability, and Russia called this the 'deadman's hand'. Most commenters since have simply referred to it as "mutually assured destruction" or MAD.

Here's the thing - from an ethical standpoint, it never makes sense to actually fire it. If you're dead, well, you're dead - there's no sense in murdering millions of citizens of an enemy nation.

At the same time, by its very presence, you've made it very seemingly difficult for your enemy to ever engage in a nuclear first strike because they'd be signing their own death warrant.

Could the US military defeat a bunch of armed citizens? Well, purely by the numbers, probably. It'd be really bad for morale though, and a lot of innocent people would die, and realistically, there's not really much of a country left at that point anymore. Without a check, the Government can do whatever it wants because it always has a cheat card, but with the check, the government has to at least pretend to respect the citizens.

> ...it has been said that democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others that have been tried from time to time

[jancsika]

I still don't understand the argument.

Compare

* armed citizenry gathering illegally and getting slaughtered by a superior military force

* weaponless non-violent citizenry gathering illegally and getting slaughtered by a military force (which would have been superior to the citizens if they had been armed)

You've already conceded that the armed citizenry is no match for the military. At best your point about morale is equally true in both cases. At worst arming the crowd gives a boost to military morale because armed opponents gives them a way to rationalize their slaughtering.

Finally: if the slaughter of innocent citizens still matters to a critical mass of other citizens, it's vastly more powerful for them to hear that the citizens had been unarmed. And if there is no longer a critical mass of other citizens to organize against the military, then you're screwed either way.

I just can't figure out what the benefit to arms would be in this case, especially given that there obvious downsides to arming a population.

[vorpalhex]

> You've already conceded that the armed citizenry is no match for the military

That's not what I said. I said the military probably wins numerically. For what it's worth, numerically the civil war should have been over in about 6 months and an entirely lopsided victory by the Union. "Probably" should most certainly to be understand as "the most likely but not certain outcome". The US probably would have won Vietnam if they had continued fighting another decade - would it have been worth it though?

And the time element is part of the issue. It turns out if you show up, massacre of a bunch of unarmed folks in a day or two and then do a halfway decent job of suppressing it, well, Tiananmen square.

In the US, when we've had the military fire on citizens, the response was a bunch of upset, armed citizens said "We'd really like to see due process happen." And then unlike Tiananmen, the perpetrators were arrested and tried in a civilian judicial system because that was less terrible than an armed population getting rather upset.

Remember, this is the whole reason why the founding fathers were pro individual ownership of firearms - they had been the victims of military massacres, military troops being quartered in private houses, and eventually their own government hiring mercenaries to enforce the peace through force. Part of why the British chose to hire foreign mercenaries for swaths of the war instead of use their own troops was because they were concerned about morale and defections. Likewise, the first thing the British wanted to do once things started going south was to lock up all the ammunition and arms so the citizens couldn't put up any trouble.

[dsfyu404ed]

>Here's the thing - from an ethical standpoint, it never makes sense to actually fire it. If you're dead, well, you're dead - there's no sense in murdering millions of citizens of an enemy nation.

Everybody does not die in a nuclear war. You want your survivors to have a better chance. Leaving whoever nuked you mostly untouched is highly counterproductive to that.

[vorpalhex]

I am sure the enemy nation doesn't care about the stick and stone huts your heavily cancer prone survivors will be building after they rediscover the bow and arrow. When you launch total nuclear war you are well past the "Let's invade and take their land" bit.

[codeddesign]

Essentially you are saying to sit back and watch because there is nothing you can do about it. The point of the 2nd amendment is that you have the right hold a militia and bear arms against an oppressive government. Whether you will win or not is not the argument, but rather that you have the right to protect and defend yourself as the oppressed. While it’s easy to sit on a couch relaxed and watching the news all while saying “we should get rid of guns”, it’s a lot different story to be in the midst of a contention or oppression.

[crispyambulance]

The 2nd amendment is effectively a lifestyle hobby.

We are very, very far away from a civil war or anything resembling what is going to happen in Hong Kong. But if things do ever start to skid in the wrong direction, we'll end up doing the same thing that others have done.

Put up a fight with or without "militias", and then after it's crushed, when the economy collapses, money is worthless, and crazed libertarian warlords rule the land... mass migration. The irony will not be lost on latin America.

[spaginal]

Every war goes to the streets in the end. No amount of tanks or missiles stops this eventuality. At some point you are going door to door with guns. You can't just bomb people from far away with a few missiles and wipe your hands clean of it and call it a day.

The only effective bombing campaign that subdued a citizenry outright in military history were nukes, and if we ever crossed that line as a nation where the government nuked it's own citizens to quell rebellion, we are never coming back from that as a nation. It would leave a scar on humanity. Whatever would be left of the United States after that event would curse the people that did it.

So to your point, the 2A is not antiquated, if the US government had any interest in having an intact territory, at some point it would need to get face to face with the people, and the presence of firearms in the citizenry acts as a check against this possibility, and an escape option for the citizens of it ever got there.

[dsfyu404ed]

>The only effective bombing campaign that subdued a citizenry outright in military history were nukes

The firebombs and the nukes didn't subdue the citizenry. They were still willing to follow their cause to the death. You can't win against that unless you're going to kill each and every last one of them.

The nukes showed their leader that his people would be destroyed with little cost to the enemy and convinced him to call it off.

[tenaciousDaniel]

I just don't see any historical evidence that superior weaponry always wins, whereas there are plenty of examples to the contrary. So I don't know why it's a "fact" that the dictator would still win.

[x86_64Ubuntu]

The exceptions prove the rule, as well does the entirety of New World colonization.

[enraged_camel]

Except the US military doesn't just have superior weaponry. It also has superior training, superior discipline, superior logistics, superior intelligence, superior force projection capability, superior everything.

Unlike the Taliban or the Viet Cong, the US citizenry, even armed, would be like chaff.

edit: so many downvotes. I guess I hit a sore spot. I'm sorry the truth hurts, guys and gals. :)

[tenaciousDaniel]

I'm not disagreeing with you over the difference in skill/training/etc. The Viet Cong and Taliban are obviously superior than the average American citizen. But I doubt that their respective victories were because of their military prowess. They turned the battlefield into an un-winnable game by requiring the military to effectively destroy the country in order to win. By the time the superior military wins, there's very little value left. War isn't just a game of who has the bigger guns and better soldiers.

If we descend to such a state where an American president is (a) willing to completely annihilate the population, (b) can either bypass congress or get their approval to do so, and (c) can mobilize our military to perform the annihilation, then perhaps your point is correct.

I wouldn't exactly hold my breath on that.

[dragonwriter]

> The Viet Cong and Taliban are obviously superior than the average American citizen. But I doubt that their respective victories were because of their military prowess.

The VC were utterly crushed, leading the NVA to get more directly involved in the South rather than using them as a catspaw. To the extent that the combined operation had success (which it clearly did) it was because of the NVA—a regular army—and the backing they had even further up the Communist food chain.

[refurb]

Not sure why you’re downvoted as this reflects the historical record.

During Tet, the VC was crushed and ceased being an effective fighting force in the south. The NVA was forced to pick up the slack.

The eventual takeover of south Vietnam was by conventional military forces.

[manfredo]

Will those superior logistics stay in place when mountain passes are swarming with insurgents, and railways are getting bombed left and right? What good will the advanced weapons be when the insurgents are blending into your own taxpayers?

[malandrew]

> Except the US military doesn't just have superior weaponry. It also has superior training, superior discipline, superior logistics, superior intelligence, superior force projection capability, superior everything.

You assume that all members of the US military would fight on behalf of the government. All members of the armed forces swear an oath to the US Constitution, not the federal government, so it's pretty much certain that a non-trivial proportion would defect from the will of the government if the orders were contrary to the oath sworn to the US Constitution. At that point, that superior training, discipline, logistics, intelligence, force projection, everything is also in the hands of the insurgency against unconstitutional orders.

[jki275]

The US citizenry includes an absolute fuckton of former military.

You're simply wrong, it's not "the truth".

[dragonwriter]

> The 2nd amendment made a lot of sense when weaponry consisted of horses and rifles

Around the time of the founding, there was privately-owned field artillery (and rifles were still in limited deployment).

The second amendment made sense when calling up the militia/posse comitatus was an essential feature of how the government at all levels dealt with internal and external security threats, such that it was not planning to meet such needs with fully professional forces is most cases.

Note that this was true, in both internal and external cases, for much of the life of the Republic though less so over time; for external security the idea was essentially written off after Vietnam with the adoption of the all-volunteer force. For internal security it's just about as dead, though there's not an equivalent milestone.

[jboggan]

We still have privately owned field artillery, among other things:

https://youtu.be/qtFczo5ZCwY?t=934

[magduf]

The 2nd amendment made sense when the enemy was a group of people across the ocean (the British), and other groups of people from across the ocean that they hired as mercenaries (the Hessians). Keeping the common people armed to be used as foot-soldiers in case of foreign invasion is not a bad idea if invasion is a serious concern; Switzerland still does this to this day.

For protecting against your own government, it really doesn't make that much sense. Your own government has to have support of your own military, which gets its members from the population: the military is made of your own neighbors. If your military is committed to the government and doesn't mind shooting their own family and neighbors, then you have a problem that arming people with small arms isn't going to solve: the rebels just aren't going to be that numerous. More likely, the military isn't going to support this action at all, and will mutiny and either implode as different factions within the military fight each other, or the military will stage a coup and take over the government (this has happened before many times, in other nations). In short, if the military supports the dictator, the armed opposition really has no chance of winning. If the opposition has a chance of winning, they don't need weapons because the military isn't going to support the dictator.

[celdon25]

Imagine if the armed forces were equipped with smart weapons that could be disabled remotely for this very reason, and imagine if the government hired mercenaries to fight rebels instead of using its own armed forces?

[kleton]

The Hessians fighting against Washington's army were not mercenaries, they were feudal levies from the House of Hanover's continental holdings.

[Mirioron]

No way would the dictator win. The US military relies on a huge amount of logistics. Fighting happening on US soil would severely undermine that. You can't exactly bomb your own cities with B-52s, because that's where the bombs are made. The US military would draw maybe a few million people - the rest of the populace would still be over 300 million people with a gun for every single person. Furthermore, it's virtually impossible for the military not to split under a dictator that fights their own people.

[brightball]

But in the US there are as many guns in circulation as people. If you’re assuming even 20% of citizens hold those firearms you’re looking at an armed opposition that numbers over 60 million people.

It doesn’t matter how advanced your technology is, there’s a certain point where numbers win.

You’re also assuming that military personnel themselves wouldn’t defect and side with their fellow citizens in such a situation, which would also make a lot of the same technology available to the hypothetical resistance.

When you look at those numbers, it becomes clearer why pushes to disarm the population when there isn’t a problem present such a huge threat to the country.

[merpnderp]

You're talking about maybe a million combat soldiers, before the massive attrition due to fighting against the Constitution, against 10's of millions of insurgents, all with a surplus of light weapons. It's not like those computer-guided missiles will have a target, as like most insurgencies there won't be many set piece battles.

[Mirioron]

And even if you have a target against the insurgents, the target is likely going to be next to some service member's home.

[oblongx]

or like you know, protect themselves from others...

[bdowling]

Who is the occupying army in this scenario? Is it the US Army, made up of citizen volunteers, being asked to oppress their fellow citizens? Or is it an invading army or an army of mercenaries, in which case what side is the US Army on?

[reroute1]

This is assuming that the military and all constituents would follow martial law, which I think is not at all a certainty.

[PhasmaFelis]

There's an interesting sci-fi dystopia in there, maybe. Everything up to light machine guns are available with no restrictions to anyone who wants to buy them. The government constantly talks up the sanctity of the right to bear arms, and the importance of being prepared at all times to defend innocents against <insert scapegoat group here>. The dystopian military enforcers wear bulletproof powered armor, and private ownership of any weapon that can pierce that armor is a "grievous threat to public order," punishable by summary execution.

[yonaguska]

That's not far off from reality. It's illegal to sell armor piercing ammo, but not illegal to buy it or possess it. And certain municipalities(my own local one) are looking at regulating the sale and possession of body armor. Which to me is more egregious, as body armor is inherently not a weapon. Nor is it a force multiplier against law enforcement, as fully automatic weapons could be construed as. And it has practical uses in the sporting world. I know more than a few people that choose to wear body armor at public ranges as extra insurance against the potential stupidity of those around them.

[CapricornNoble]

>>>The dystopian military enforcers wear bulletproof powered armor, and private ownership of any weapon that can pierce that armor is a "grievous threat to public order," punishable by summary execution.

Which sounds like a deterrent.....until the insurgents use autonomous vehicle technology to pilot dump trucks full of fertilizer explosives into the enforcers.

https://hugokaaman.com/2017/02/14/the-history-and-adaptabili...

https://hugokaaman.com/2019/03/13/islamic-state-the-cross-pr...

https://www.armyupress.army.mil/Journals/Military-Review/Eng...

[PhasmaFelis]

Well, it's dystopian sci-fi. Of course there's got to be some way to hit back against the oppressors.

On the other hand, if your battle plan involves using up an entire truck for each enemy soldier (or squad?) neutralized, I feel like you're gonna have a hard time scaling that up to open warfare.

[CapricornNoble]

With the number of Ford F-150s in the US (or Toyota Tacomas in the Mid-East), it scales reasonably well when either used for targeted assassination of High Value Targets, or as the opening barrage of a combined-arms attack. Considering total costs of employment (vehicle modifications, including explosives), it's cheaper than air support and more accurate than traditional tube artillery.

[solidsnack9000]

War is not actually a contest to see who is strongest. If it was, then the strongest nations would always fight to the finish and the weaker nations would always be defeated and utterly subjugated. Clausewitz was not the first person to notice that this didn't always happen, nor the first to conclude that war must be viewed as an extension of politics.

As such, dictatorship and imposition of rule through force has to be considered in light of other political options. Oppressive government does not generally start with an all out war to subdue the populace, using strategic weapons like missiles and bombers. Insurrections are managed with lighter arms not because totally destroying the enemy is not a military option but rather because it is not consonant with the relevant political goals.

The right to bear arms isn't about what you do for all out war -- that's when you move from citizen soldiers to building armies -- it's about trimming the distribution at the lower end and improving the odds of the citizenry being able to make it up the food chain in a reasonable amount of time. (Knowing what guns are actually called is a surprising advantage there.) Even Hitler started small, and disarmed the citizenry early.

[nyolfen]

someone should let the taliban know