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Vietnam beat the US. The Taliban is beating the US. The US was founded when farmers used guerrilla warfare tactics against the current world superpower. Sout

by ColanR 7y ago

Vietnam beat the US. The Taliban is beating the US. The US was founded when farmers used guerrilla warfare tactics against the current world superpower. South America guerrillas are unbeatable. It's really your position that is untenable.

pietroglyph 7y ago
I think that GP's position is tenable if the tyranny comes slowly. Sure, a country-wide armed insurgency is hard to beat. That's relatively uncontroversial. If most people are comfortable as the water boils around them, however, then the armed insurgency is not going to be country-wide. I think that argument has some basis in history (e.g. Nazi Germany), where the tyrannical government slowly got worse and worse without major internal revolts. On the other hand, there have been times where the people snapped and revolted all at once.
- ColanR 7y ago
  I don't think the GP's position has anything to do with slowly implemented tyranny; the GP is only referring to once the ragtag group has formed, and assessing their chances of success. I think that what you describe as the boiling frog scenario would be the best possible strategy for a government that is concerned about its policies being forcefully rejected if implemented all at once.
- slothtrop 7y ago
  That came to mind as well. We're taking for granted here that much of the population was drinking the kool-aid when the Nazis took power; there wasn't, say, very popular dissent. And that's a more realistic scenario with a tyrannical power. I can't imagine one, at least a domestic one, that manages to hold on to tyranny despite the large part of the population wanting them out. With or without weapons.
- homonculus1 7y ago
  Banning firearms is the water boiling.
slothtrop 7y ago
The U.S. army, while preventing the North from encroaching, were effectively sitting ducks and as the casualties grew so did the anti-war tide at home, until they pulled out and the south was left to their demise. The North, then separated when the U.S. arrived, bordered China, their arms supplier, and had thick jungle cover from the Ho Chi Min trail all the way to the south. While the U.S. took some pot shots at the North through bombing missions they "officially" were never invading. This was an impossible situation from the beginning. > South America guerrillas are unbeatable. Bolivian insurgency failed, Guevara died. They don't always win. The thing of it is the arms involved at the outset are irrelevant. You can't coerce a population largely unwilling to be controlled. Arms (including bombing devices) inevitably make their way into peoples hands. In the event of martial law things would fall into such disarray it's unsustainable. I take issue with the idea that a population needs to be armed a priori with a specific set of weapons in order to repel a "tyranical government", which is a kind of boogeyman idea if I ever heard one. A tyrannical govt, comprised of a minority of people, versus the U.S. scenario is not a likely one. You'd sooner see a civil war, and even that's incredibly unlikely. But then I suppose you'd see gun regulation as evidence of tyranny. The most tyrannical govt I can think of is the Chinese one and they have popular favor with their people. The HK situation shows that popular dissent is powerful with or without weapons.
dredmorbius 7y ago
Vietnam was backed by China and the USSR, the Taliban by Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE. Their most effective weapons tended strongly toward IEDs and RPGs rather than longarms.

by ColanR 7y ago

pietroglyph 7y ago

I think that GP's position is tenable if the tyranny comes slowly. Sure, a country-wide armed insurgency is hard to beat. That's relatively uncontroversial. If most people are comfortable as the water boils around them, however, then the armed insurgency is not going to be country-wide. I think that argument has some basis in history (e.g. Nazi Germany), where the tyrannical government slowly got worse and worse without major internal revolts. On the other hand, there have been times where the people snapped and revolted all at once.

ColanR 7y ago
I don't think the GP's position has anything to do with slowly implemented tyranny; the GP is only referring to once the ragtag group has formed, and assessing their chances of success. I think that what you describe as the boiling frog scenario would be the best possible strategy for a government that is concerned about its policies being forcefully rejected if implemented all at once.
slothtrop 7y ago
That came to mind as well. We're taking for granted here that much of the population was drinking the kool-aid when the Nazis took power; there wasn't, say, very popular dissent. And that's a more realistic scenario with a tyrannical power. I can't imagine one, at least a domestic one, that manages to hold on to tyranny despite the large part of the population wanting them out. With or without weapons.
homonculus1 7y ago
Banning firearms is the water boiling.

slothtrop 7y ago

The U.S. army, while preventing the North from encroaching, were effectively sitting ducks and as the casualties grew so did the anti-war tide at home, until they pulled out and the south was left to their demise. The North, then separated when the U.S. arrived, bordered China, their arms supplier, and had thick jungle cover from the Ho Chi Min trail all the way to the south. While the U.S. took some pot shots at the North through bombing missions they "officially" were never invading. This was an impossible situation from the beginning. > South America guerrillas are unbeatable. Bolivian insurgency failed, Guevara died. They don't always win. The thing of it is the arms involved at the outset are irrelevant. You can't coerce a population largely unwilling to be controlled. Arms (including bombing devices) inevitably make their way into peoples hands. In the event of martial law things would fall into such disarray it's unsustainable. I take issue with the idea that a population needs to be armed a priori with a specific set of weapons in order to repel a "tyranical government", which is a kind of boogeyman idea if I ever heard one. A tyrannical govt, comprised of a minority of people, versus the U.S. scenario is not a likely one. You'd sooner see a civil war, and even that's incredibly unlikely. But then I suppose you'd see gun regulation as evidence of tyranny. The most tyrannical govt I can think of is the Chinese one and they have popular favor with their people. The HK situation shows that popular dissent is powerful with or without weapons.

dredmorbius 7y ago

Vietnam was backed by China and the USSR, the Taliban by Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE. Their most effective weapons tended strongly toward IEDs and RPGs rather than longarms.