http://www.sierratimes.com/03/05/30/guestoped_gm.htm
Disarming The People Of Iraq
By Gary Marbut
I am disturbed by the reports that the U.S. government is disarming the individual citizens of Iraq.
I recognize that there is an issue about the safety of our military personnel in Iraq (and I have a son in the military, so I don't take this lightly). Still, it could be argued with equal validity that there's a safety issue for police (and/or others) inside the United states if we are allowed to keep our guns, so all of us ought to be disarmed, too - only police and military should be allowed to possess firearms, the policy the United States seems to be imposing in Iraq.
I have little problem (assuming we are in Iraq for the right reasons, which is another discussion altogether) with the U.S. military depriving Iraqi military units and military personnel of military hardware, including tanks, fighter aircraft and crew-served weapons, such as heavy machine guns, mortars, motorized rifles, etc.
However, that's about where I would draw the line. Our military in Iraq is confiscating the small arms most commonly available for personal protection there - AK47s and Beretta pistols.
Every human being has a natural right to life. A person may be deprived of that right to life if he attacks another person (self-defense); or if a person commits a sufficiently heinous crime, and is judged according to careful rules, he may forfeit his life as a punishment or deterrent. But innocent, non-attacking human beings all have a right to their own lives and to whatever property they've earned.
That right to life and property clearly includes a right to defend one's life or property. If you or I deprive another of his ability to defend himself against attack, we incur an absolute obligation to defend that person ourselves, at least as well as he could have defended himself had we not disarmed him. If we do this collectively, as a nation, the principle remains the same.
There are lots of innocent civilians in Iraq who have a legitimate need to protect themselves and their families from the rampant thuggery there. Our military in Iraq, like our police in the United States, have no ability whatsoever to protect every individual, or even a significant number of individuals.
Since we cannot protect them, we must not deprive them of the means of protecting themselves - to do so is highly immoral. If we may not morally prevent people from protecting themselves here in Montana, we may not do it in Iraq, everything else notwithstanding.
Further, there are good and bad people in Iraq, just like here. In the disarmament of Iraqi civilians, there is a presumption that the bad people will give up their guns, making the place safer for everyone. Of course, this rationale is wrong. We know better. The bad people will be the last to give up their guns, and they will always be able to get more.
Without doubt there is an argument to be made about the safety of our military personnel in Iraq, just as there is an argument that strict gun control makes it safer for police in the United States. However, ask any veteran cop if he feels safer in Washington, D.C., where no law-abiding person may have a gun, or in Montana, where lots of people have guns. The answer, of course, is that cops feel much safer in Montana.
Cops feel safer in Montana because the number of good guys with guns far outnumber the bad guys with guns. In fact, it is much more dangerous to be a thug in Montana than in Washington, D.C., specifically because so many good guys in Montana have guns (and the will and knowledge to use them appropriately).
Extrapolating this to Iraq, U.S. troops in Iraq would clearly be safer if all the good people had guns. How, you ask, do you tell the good people from the bad people, so you can make sure the good people get guns? The answer is, you can't. The best you can do is assume that the good people far outnumber the bad people, as they do in most any culture, and just give guns to everyone. After that, it becomes a simple matter of mathematics, and the ranks of the bad guys will shrink from attrition faster than the ranks of the good guys.
This is why it is a bad idea to disarm the civilians of Iraq. It is immoral, it places our troops at greater risk, and it is repugnant to the concept of individual freedom, one of the announced reasons for our presence in Iraq.
Finally, there is no doubt that every place in the world where tyranny has gained sway, that tyranny has been preceded by disarming the general population. Given this absolute and unquestioned history, how must it be perceived by the people of Iraq (and the people of the world) for the United States to be busily disarming the individual people of Iraq?
Gary Marbut is president of the Montana Shooting Sports Association.
Disarming The People Of Iraq
By Gary Marbut
I am disturbed by the reports that the U.S. government is disarming the individual citizens of Iraq.
I recognize that there is an issue about the safety of our military personnel in Iraq (and I have a son in the military, so I don't take this lightly). Still, it could be argued with equal validity that there's a safety issue for police (and/or others) inside the United states if we are allowed to keep our guns, so all of us ought to be disarmed, too - only police and military should be allowed to possess firearms, the policy the United States seems to be imposing in Iraq.
I have little problem (assuming we are in Iraq for the right reasons, which is another discussion altogether) with the U.S. military depriving Iraqi military units and military personnel of military hardware, including tanks, fighter aircraft and crew-served weapons, such as heavy machine guns, mortars, motorized rifles, etc.
However, that's about where I would draw the line. Our military in Iraq is confiscating the small arms most commonly available for personal protection there - AK47s and Beretta pistols.
Every human being has a natural right to life. A person may be deprived of that right to life if he attacks another person (self-defense); or if a person commits a sufficiently heinous crime, and is judged according to careful rules, he may forfeit his life as a punishment or deterrent. But innocent, non-attacking human beings all have a right to their own lives and to whatever property they've earned.
That right to life and property clearly includes a right to defend one's life or property. If you or I deprive another of his ability to defend himself against attack, we incur an absolute obligation to defend that person ourselves, at least as well as he could have defended himself had we not disarmed him. If we do this collectively, as a nation, the principle remains the same.
There are lots of innocent civilians in Iraq who have a legitimate need to protect themselves and their families from the rampant thuggery there. Our military in Iraq, like our police in the United States, have no ability whatsoever to protect every individual, or even a significant number of individuals.
Since we cannot protect them, we must not deprive them of the means of protecting themselves - to do so is highly immoral. If we may not morally prevent people from protecting themselves here in Montana, we may not do it in Iraq, everything else notwithstanding.
Further, there are good and bad people in Iraq, just like here. In the disarmament of Iraqi civilians, there is a presumption that the bad people will give up their guns, making the place safer for everyone. Of course, this rationale is wrong. We know better. The bad people will be the last to give up their guns, and they will always be able to get more.
Without doubt there is an argument to be made about the safety of our military personnel in Iraq, just as there is an argument that strict gun control makes it safer for police in the United States. However, ask any veteran cop if he feels safer in Washington, D.C., where no law-abiding person may have a gun, or in Montana, where lots of people have guns. The answer, of course, is that cops feel much safer in Montana.
Cops feel safer in Montana because the number of good guys with guns far outnumber the bad guys with guns. In fact, it is much more dangerous to be a thug in Montana than in Washington, D.C., specifically because so many good guys in Montana have guns (and the will and knowledge to use them appropriately).
Extrapolating this to Iraq, U.S. troops in Iraq would clearly be safer if all the good people had guns. How, you ask, do you tell the good people from the bad people, so you can make sure the good people get guns? The answer is, you can't. The best you can do is assume that the good people far outnumber the bad people, as they do in most any culture, and just give guns to everyone. After that, it becomes a simple matter of mathematics, and the ranks of the bad guys will shrink from attrition faster than the ranks of the good guys.
This is why it is a bad idea to disarm the civilians of Iraq. It is immoral, it places our troops at greater risk, and it is repugnant to the concept of individual freedom, one of the announced reasons for our presence in Iraq.
Finally, there is no doubt that every place in the world where tyranny has gained sway, that tyranny has been preceded by disarming the general population. Given this absolute and unquestioned history, how must it be perceived by the people of Iraq (and the people of the world) for the United States to be busily disarming the individual people of Iraq?
Gary Marbut is president of the Montana Shooting Sports Association.
