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Disarming Iraqi Civilians Robert Theron Brockman II observers how not to liberate a country from tyranny and chaos
It seems that the United States government has decided to disarm the Iraqi populace as part of its newly found desire to restore order.
This smells like the sort of thing that could lead to disaster, for all the usual reasons – only outlaws will have guns and whatnot. And if any population needs to be armed as a check on a potentially tyrannical government, it is the population of Iraq.
It almost seems like a clerical error – surely the guys who were the driving force behind the invasion over at Central Command aren’t gun control nuts, are they?
This seems like a good basis for a lively discussion here at Samizdata.
Robert Theron Brockman II
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As much as I am a proponent of gun ownership as a protection against tyranny, and though I had the same initial reaction as you, this is not a situation that can be likened to a civil society’s check on government.
I think it needs to be looked at this way: right now, there is no government. The US military there is basically all they’ve got, and it is an occupying force. So, in a roundabout way, the US military is a “tyrannical” interim government in that it is not elected and will need to force the Iraqis to behave a certain way for a while. To that end, it is useful to them to disarm Iraqis.
I don’t think that this has anything to do with how a final, stable Iraqi government will be set up, hopefully with a constitution which states the right to bear arms. But they have to get stable first.
However, even if I am right, I still don’t like seeing average citizens deprived of arms.
I forgot to ask–does anyone know what gun ownership policies were in place in US-occupied Germany and Japan post-WWII?
“And if any population needs to be armed as a check on a potentially tyrannical government, it is the population of Iraq”
Did they acquire these guns in the last 6 weeks or did they only bring them out from under their beds after the Ba’athist regime fell? If any country gives the lie to the ‘an armed population is a free one’ argument it surely is Iraq.
Obviously what matters is who has the firearms. It’s the same in the United States. Who would oppose the disarming the ghettos?
If 2nd amendment absolutists had any sense they would realize that their position will ultimately result in the disarming of us all.
We should be using the “militia clause” as a vehicle for insuring firearms are in responsible hands: registered, with safety training and liability insurance required, and Draconian penalties for their being in the hands of non-miltiapersons.
The same approach could be modified for use in Iraq. In any event, I think small arms are exempt from the new policy.
We should be using the “militia clause” as a vehicle for insuring firearms are in responsible hands: registered, with safety training and liability insurance required, and Draconian penalties for their being in the hands of non-miltiapersons.
Who decides who is responsible, Theodopoulos? You? I’ll pass. Guns for all non-criminals.
If 2nd amendment absolutists had any sense they would realize that their position will ultimately result in the disarming of us all.
How, pray tell? Plus, it seems you don’t mind selective arming. Once again, it seems like you feel like you can decide who gets arms and who does not. Again, I’ll pass on letting you decide Jack Shit.
Obviously what matters is who has the firearms. It’s the same in the United States. Who would oppose the disarming the ghettos?
So all people living in the ghetto are criminals and should be bereft of the right to self-defense? Not only are you better than the rest of us and can decide who gets guns, you can decide who is a criminal merely by physical location. Your powers are wondrous to behold.
Conrad says, “If any country gives the lie to the ‘an armed population is a free one’ argument it surely is Iraq.”
What I read in the papers was that Saddam was giving everybody guns near the end of his regime and telling the Iraqi population to “resist the invaders.” If that’s true, then I suppose we are lucky that more Iraqis didn’t follow his advice — surely supporting the argument that rational people make rational use of weapons.
On the other hand, Saddam’s regime was benefitting SOMEBODY in the country, just as Hitler’s regime benefitted a great many Germans and collaborators. If the weaons to be confiscated were as commonly kept before Saddam fell as after, then it would seem that the majority of people having weapons would have to benefit from maintaining Saddam’s regime, and be invested in its continuation. That conclusion would suggest that, although many people might have despised Saddam within Iraq, there was still a sizeable — and ultimately dominant — subpopulation that liked him just fine: Saddam might have been genuinely more popular with Iraqis than Westerners assume.
I can’t imagine that Saddam was uniformly despised by his people AND the country was saturated with guns and ammo. If Saddam was despised, his people generally must have been unarmed. If his people were generally armed, then they had to like, or at least tolerate and bear with Saddam.
I personally subscribe to the “arm the people at the last minute” theory, but this also requires the “rational population” conclusion to be true for the most part. Thus, MOST of the armed Iraqis do not need to be disarmed. There are some terrorists and Saddam regime loyalists still out there, and THEIR arms are a danger to US forces, not to mention the Iraqis. Does this fact justify universal disarmament? If the US were truly bringing freedom to Iraq, wouldn’t it be better to train the armed Iraqis to defend themselves and their communities from ANYONE who would deny them freedom? Surely, the majority of armed Iraqis who are not a threat to the US could definitely be an (effective) threat to the terrorists and Saddam loyalists… at least, one would think so…
Last MB heard, it was the full-auto types, mortars, grenades, rockets, etc., that was being looked for and taken away from the populace, not every last gun of any kind.
My understanding, the strong verbal phrasing nonwithstanding [and confusing], is that the new policy is aimed at limiting the open carrying of arms and their use for “traditional” purposes [such as firing into air], rather than the actual confiscation of arms from people’s homes. Thus, keeping a gun at home will be tolerated, as it provides no offensive capabilities to its owner; however, people carrying AK47s or higher would have them taken away…
I am not sure how I feel in general about this policy — it is too poorly formulated and is rife for abuses by all parties.
Theodopoulos,
Please see Illinois Constitution Article XII and Arizona Constitution Article 16.
There may be other states in the Union that define the militia similarly, but these are the only two states in which I have lived for some time.
To save you some time, here is the excerpt from the Illinois Constitution:
“The State militia consists of all able-bodied persons
residing in the State except those exempted by law.”
It seems that *at least* these two states have a very broad definition of the militia. (Note, no exceptions were made for persons living in ghettos.)
10 USC Sec. 311
(a) The militia of the United States consists of all able-bodied males at least 17 years of age and, except as provided in section 313 of title 32, under 45 years of age who are, or who have made a declaration of intention to become, citizens of the United States and of female citizens of the United States who are members of the National Guard.
(b) The classes of the militia are –
(1) the organized militia, which consists of the National Guard and the Naval Militia; and
(2) the unorganized militia, which consists of the members of the militia who are not members of the National Guard or the Naval Militia.
A little bumper sticker politics; Political power comes from the barrel of a gun, so lets make sure everyone has one.
I find this idea that you absolutely need a gun to protect yourself kinda strange. Are people paranoiac or is the USA a dangerous place to live?
It comes from a fundamental distrust of the government, which includes the police forces. If you get in a jam (for example, someone breaks into your house and means to do you harm), there’s no way in hell the cops will show up in time to take care of the badguy.
In fact, the US Supreme Court has gone so far as to say that the police’s duty is NOT to protect individual citizens but society as a whole (2 ladies were in their apartment, rapist busts in, while raping 1 lady, other calls the cops, cops show up, badguy answers the door, says everything is OK, cops leave, he goes back to raping. Ladies sue cops, cops win). No, I can’t find the citation right off the top of my head.
And as soon as I said it, I did a Google search and found this complete with citations. Aint the internet great?
Actually, according to the papers, they’re allowed to keep small arms (presumably hanguns and non-automatic rifles).
I just keep thinking back to apartheid South Africa, where anyone could have a gun… as long as they weren’t Black.
Had every Black adult been able to own an AK47, apartheid would have been dead in six weeks — instead, it dragged on for thirty years.
I would like to think that the Iraqis were just given their firearms in the last days before the war, as that would not bring the efficacy of weapons in preserving a free society into question. However, looking at the pictures over the last month or so, I have a hard time believing that these people only just made their first contact with firearms recently. They just don’t look as if they are new to guns.
Imagine, for contrast, handing out about 1000 or 2000 M-16s with a full magazine each at an NEA convention. That is a scary thought-not because of the threat to home schooling but because of the threat to bystanders without cover. This is not the image I am seeing in the news from Iraq.
So – since I fervently believe the right to bear arms is a fundemental safeguard for all our other liberties – How did Saddam manage to tyrannize this bunch?
I tend to think there is another ingredient beside having a weapon available: the will to use it. In the Gulag Archipelago, Soltzenitsin said one of the things many of the prisoners regretted was not resisting the NKVD goons who came to take them away to prison. They would drive up to a rabbit warren of a tenement, arrogantly stroll in and arrest the victim. Soltzenitsin said, as I remember, that they couldn’t understand why they hadn’t just broken the NKVD skulls with a crowbar, and buried the bodies. The punishment wouldn’t have been any worse and the NKVD would have been more circumspect in the future.
I also recall stories about the Jews in Germany when the Nazis took over. They didn’t resist, for the most part, even after the liquidations became apparent.
I suspect that one of the reasons for Saddam’s exceptional cruelty was that cowing an armed population was both possible and absolutely necessary to his survival.
The lesson for free people should be clear. While it would be crazy to resist every traffic cop or fire marshal, each of us ought probably to give some thought to the question of where our individual point of no return is located. What specific oppressive action will make us willing to lose everything in order to resist? Then, having decided, we ought to communicate that information to our government and our fellow citizens.
Without that deliberate and thought out decision, there may be nothing, the right to bear arms notwithstanding, to keep us from sliding into the plastic shredders.
Johnny Cheese says, “peaceful taxpayers with guns, good. Terrorcrats with guns, bad.”
The first two paragraphs from the article cited in the original post:
“Iraqi citizens will be required to turn over automatic weapons and heavy weapons under a proclamation …
The aim of the proclamation is to help stabilize Iraq by confiscating the huge supply of AK-47’s, machine guns, rocket-propelled grenades and other weapons that are used by criminal gangs, paramilitary groups and remnants of the Saddam Hussein government.”
Sounds reasonable to me.
Doug Collins:
>> I have a hard time believing that these people only just made their first contact with firearms recently. They just don’t look as if they are new to guns…
Most every military-age male in Iraq had to join the military. That’s where they learned.
Also, my understanding was that Saddam handed guns out only to the Baathists. A good choice, but not good enough.
These are very tired arguments (about the unrestricted right to bear arms). It’s obviously monumentally stupid to require more training, registration, licensing and liability insurance on automobiles than on firearms. No?
I am ex-infantry (very “ex”) and own firearms. I see a distinction between my ownership of these instruments and ownership by my local gang-banger. Do you?
You may not believe 2nd amendment absolutism is a danger to American firearms possession in general, but if the slaughter in our cities resulted in bodybags being off-loaded at Travis AFB there would be riots in the streets. Sooner, rather than later, the U.S. public will quite likely decide that a general prohibition is better than a general “right” to bear arms. Does history (U.K.) have relevance in this case?
I’m not interested in old legal interpretations of the wording in the 2nd amendment. The “militia clause” could be an instrument to divide the good guys from the bad guys. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think it will happen. That’s why I’m buying stock in companies that manufacture shovels and cosmoline. Should you?
Does history (U.K.) have relevance in this case?
No.
The Dunblane massacre was used as an excuse to greatly extend a process that had been under way for almost a century in Britain, regardless of the fact UK murder-with-gun rates were and are far lower than in the USA. That does seem to rather undermine Theodopoulos Pherecydes’ theory that lots of gun crimes are what leads to lots of gun laws. I fear the truth is rather more sinister.
With respect to arming people in South Africa – I note that the well armed White population of Zimbawee haven’t stood a chance against overwhelming opposition.
Having a gun is a help, it isn’t magic.
Dave: oh, are the white Zimbabweans well armed? I’ve always wondered.
How come we never hear of them firing a shot, but occasionally see pics of some hapless farmer hacked up with a machete? Are the potential consequences of firing into an approaching mob more frightening than the mob? Is it all down to spotty reporting?
Or is this all to complicated to tack on the end of a long, marginally-related thread?
Doug Collins already mentioned this, but here is a proper excerpt:
“How we burned in the prison camps later thinking: What would things have been like if every police operative, when he went out at night to make an arrest, had been uncertain whether he would return alive? If during periods of mass arrests people had not simply sat there in their lairs, paling with terror at every bang of the downstairs door and at every step on the staircase, but had understood they had nothing to lose and had boldly set up in the downstairs hall an ambush of half a dozen people with axes, hammers, pokers, or whatever was at hand? The organs would very quickly have suffered a shortage of officers and, notwithstanding all of Stalin’s thirst, the cursed machine would have ground to a halt.”
Alexander Solzhenitsyn, author of The Gulag Archipelago
Tim Newman:
Thanks for the quote. My memory didn’t do it justice.
With reference to the above commenst on arming Iraqis and why if they had weapons they didn’t topple Saddam- they had a damn good try back in 1991. Unfortunately AK’s work about as well against tanks and attack helicopters as spears do against rifles. Provided, as with rifles, that the better armed side knows how to use it’s kit. The Republican Guard did.