[TheForge] coffee and guns

[ries]

On Dec 17, 2007, at 1:21 PM, Andrew Vida wrote:




And finally, Jim is spot on.  The ONLY thing keeping government from  
running wholly roughshod over us is the fact that we are pretty well  
armed.  Were it otherwise, the few rights we retain would probably  
have flown away decades ago.

	-Andy



Andy, you are a great guy, but you are completely FOS on this one.
No war in history has been won by small arms alone, and the ONLY  
thing keeping government from running roughshod over us is the  
constitution and our rule of law- GUNS HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH IT.

Any serious government, equipped with helicopters, tanks, jets,  
napalm, AC-130's, Bradley's and Strikers and Predator drones, along  
with the money to buy a few billion rounds of ammo a month, laughs at  
the small arms owned by individuals in the USA.
Without a foreign nation supporting us against our, or any other  
government, we would be toast in two weeks.

The successful guerilla wars of the last 5 decades or so were all  
only successful because a large industrialised nation, be it China,  
the USA, or the Soviet Union, supported the guerillas with a steady  
flow of new weapons ( in real combat, guns wear out very fast-  
machine gun barrels may last one day sometimes, and even a very well  
maintained assault rifle has a short lifespan) ammo, and, most  
essentially, crew served weapons.
Without medium to heavy machine guns, mortars, rpg's, surface to air  
missles, and hundreds of tons of explosives, all of which are in very  
short supply in private hands in the USA, you have about a snowball's  
chance in hell of surviving a few days against the average big city  
police department, much less a real army.

With all that stuff, and bucketloads of US dollars, the likes of  
Osama and his Mujadeen in Afghanistan were a public relations  
annoyance to the soviets- but they didnt win any war- they just  
convinced politicians at home to pull out.

Koresh had 50 caliber rifles, full auto weapons, and a reasonable  
supply of ammo for a private individual in the USA. He and his  
managed to kill a few feds by surprising them, but in a war  
situation, his seige would have lasted 2 hours, not 51 days.
A couple of runs by F-15's with 500lb bombs, and it would have been  
over by lunch.

So if the government actually decided to flex the incredible force it  
has as the largest military power on earth, no amount of deer rifles  
and glocks and shotguns would make much difference.

This has nothing to do with our second amendment rights- its just  
pointing out that the private ownership of weapons in the USA has no  
impact whatsoever on our internal freedoms- the Yemenis own more  
weapons per capita than we do, and they live in a feudal, religious  
state of opression, where you can pretty much shoot anybody you want,  
but a woman cant walk down the street unescorted.

Guns are good for a lot of things- but their mere presence does not  
mean freedom, democracy, or a hands off government.

ries
Ries Niemi
Industrial Artist
http://www.riesniemi.com/