Quote:
Originally Posted by Checkman
The percentage of the population that will resist an invader is always very small. Most will just try to survive. And that includes the population of Afghanistan. However just because a population is well off and comfortable dosen't mean that it will collapse entirely after an invasion.
For example in WWII there was an active resistance movement in the Netherlands, Beligium and Denmark. It was small and it certainly didn't drive the Germans out (that task fell to the Allied armies), but it was there. Yes they were supported by the allies, but they were active. I would certainly say that those nations were pretty well off.
Most resistance groups don't do very well unless they recieve outside assistance. It just stands to reason because they don't have the resources. If the organization recieves no assistance then eventually it will collapse. It might be bloody and take years, but it will go down.
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Right, but don't you think this undermines much of what pro-RKBAers often say? Size is a very big problem for guerrilla movements. They need to have the support of the population. The conventional army/totalitarian government can seek to undermine this in a number of ways, which is the point of state terror like that which we've seen under many Communist regimes. The only kinds of people who tend to endure in the face of that challenge are those who are very tough and who are willing to put their lives on the line for the guerrillas and not cooperate, no matter what kind of terror the regime uses to coerce them into giving up the rebels' location. That is how these kinds of regimes keep themselves in power - they offer material incentives (usually subsidies on consumer goods) to ensure that the people depend on them for their well-being, and they use state terror to punish anyone who steps out of line or who is perceived as anti-regime.
As for outside assistance, you are correct about this. Most insurgencies either are state-supported, or they have ways of generating funding so that they can buy material on the black market. But this undermines the notion that gun control is part of a plot to disarm the population so that the Democrats can impose a Marxist government on us, or that the 2nd Amendment is really such a valuable "reset" button on the Constitution. If there really were a civil war in the U.S., or an invading army, it's pretty likely that somebody would be quick to capitalize upon the demand for arms by the rebels. In which case, the prior ownership of guns by civilians is pretty much irrelevant, one way or the other.
I think it's also worth remembering that the availability of small arms is almost never correlated with democracy or totalitarianism. There are a lot of AKs and RPGs floating around Iran right now. Many of them are in the hands of the Basji, the local civilian militias that are loyal to the Mullahs. But plenty are also in the hands of the various separatist groups that exist in the country, as well as the leftist MEK (the biggest of the anti-regime insurgent groups). Obviously, the proliferation of guns in the hands of Iranian civilians doesn't seem to have much of an effect on the regime's ability to run its Shi'te theocratic style of governance.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ace Oliveira
You are completely, 100% right about training. There is still the problem with military vehicles, though. Also, what is SOP?
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SOP = standard operating procedure.
As for military vehicles, they are irrelevant in guerrilla warfare. Most insurgencies never bother with them, though some do (especially in Africa).
10-19-2009, 03:48 PM
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