If you don’t choose to fight you are choosing death

American Mercenary took the quotes I gathered from the Brady Campaign and explains why they are wrong from an armed tactics viewpoint. And since he has the military officer training to back up his claims I’m strongly inclined to believe his take on the topic.

He lectures us:

Pistols and shotguns actually do a great deal of good against tanks and machine guns.  Because Tanks and Machine Guns can only be pointed in ONE direction at a time (although if count a pintle mounted MG on a tank then a tank could fire in two directions).

If four people have nothing but pistols, and they work together, they can swarm a machine gun nest.  Then they might be three people with pistols and a machine gun.  Then they get two more freedom minded individuals and use the machine gun to set up a base of fire to drive a squad of government goons into taking shelter where the guys with pistols shoot them in the head.  Now they are four people with rifles, pistols, and a machine guns, and likely a few grenades thrown in.

He corrects the Brady’s:

Gun control advocates seem to believe that it is better to live as a slave than die as a warrior.  Unfortunately history has made it clear that such a choice doesn’t exist.  The real choice is DIE as a slave or FIGHT as a warrior.  And yes, sometimes warriors die.  And sometimes warriors are forgotten.  And sometimes we fail to secure the God given freedoms innate in every human.

But if you don’t choose to fight you are choosing death.  How cowardly.

And he concludes:

The Brady Bunch and their ilk seem to be so afraid of “violence” that they prefer unarmed people to be crushed to death by tanks than armed people dying for the cause of freedom.

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7 thoughts on “If you don’t choose to fight you are choosing death

  1. Remember the old Kevin Costner version of Robin Hood? He explains “we can teach even our children to find the chinks in armor.” when trying to rally the outlaws into a fighting force.

    Nothing is invulnerable. It is a military mistake to underestimate or overestimate your enemy. The Brady’s like to think that the .gov is invulnerable only because it serves their narrative.

  2. I like to bring in Gandhi. It drives them bananas because he’s a revered icon on the left, but most of them have no idea what he actually said. For example:

    I do believe that, where there is only a choice between cowardice and violence, I would advise violence… I would rather have India resort to arms in order to defend her honour than that she should, in a cowardly manner, become or remain a helpless witness to her own dishonor.

    […]

    I have been repeating over and over again that he who cannot protect himself or his nearest and dearest or their honour by non-violently facing death may and ought to do so by violently dealing with the oppressor. He who can do neither of the two is a burden. He has no business to be the head of a family. He must either hide himself, or must rest content to live for ever in helplessness and be prepared to crawl like a worm at the bidding of a bully.

    […]

    Nonviolence cannot be taught to a person who fears to die and has no power of resistance. A helpless mouse is not nonviolent because he is always eaten by pussy. He would gladly eat the murderess if he could, but he ever tries to flee from her. We do not call him a coward, because he is made by nature to behave no better than he does.
    But a man who, when faced by danger, behaves like a mouse, is rightly called a coward. He harbors violence and hatred in his heart and would kill his enemy if he could without hurting himself. He is a stranger to nonviolence. All sermonizing on it will be lost on him. Bravery is foreign to his nature. Before he can understand nonviolence, he has to be taught to stand his ground and even suffer death, in the attempt to defend himself against the aggressor who bids fair to overwhelm him. To do otherwise would be to confirm his cowardice and take him further away from nonviolence.

  3. Well okay, but the counterargument is that if we’re already working on a chain of increasing weaponry, why should handguns be the first link? Why shouldn’t we outlaw private ownership of guns and have freedom fighters clunk their oppressors over the head with shovels (or use girls to lure them into hotel rooms full of burly guys, and so on)?

  4. Wolfwood,

    Possession of a tool does not equate to proficiency with the tool. My skill with a variety of hand and long guns will probably translate reasonably well to a tripod mounted machine gun. But skill with a shovel (or knife) will not.

    Just the knowledge that I can hit a man size object from 1000 yards away on my first shot give me a tremendous advantage because I know I have a plausible chance of success taking out the enemy one-by-one without getting hurt. If my odds are only 25% and know the odds of someone on my team getting killed is near 100% it changes things considerably.

    From years of practice and running (sometimes literally) through courses of fire I know how long it takes me to draw a handgun and get off “N” solid head shots at three yards as opposed to 10 yards. With such basic information of time and space I can plan and execute attacks with small teams of similarly skilled people and/or take into account their varying skill levels.

    I know what projectiles and velocities are required to penetrate vehicles, wood, and dirt because I have had a chance to test those sort of things long before the knowledge is really needed.

    With long familiarity with firearms I know what is probable, possible, plausible, and impossible rather than having to learn those things with the consequences of a failed lesson being death for myself and my team.

  5. Personally, I don’t know if I would want to go up against a machine gun nest or a tank while equipped with a rifle or pistol.

    But I do think that a group with small arms could be very effective in keeping food, water, fuel and ammunition away from a tank or machine gun.

  6. Pistols and shotguns actually do a great deal of good against tanks and machine guns. Because Tanks and Machine Guns can only be pointed in ONE direction at a time (although if count a pintle mounted MG on a tank then a tank could fire in two directions).

    So you can point Pistols and Shotguns in two directions at a time?
    hehe.

  7. anon, I will type slowly because you obviously don’t read well.

    The basic tactic of modern warfare is “fire and maneuver.” In the most basic form this means you have a “firing element” that keeps the enemies attention while you have another element “maneuvering” into a position of advantage.

    The point is that a machine gun or tank only shoots in one direction, and if you have a few people you can use the tactics of “fire and maneuver” to close with and destroy the enemy.

    There, that wasn’t so hard now was it? If the US Army can take a raw recruit and spit out an Infantryman in six weeks (doctrinal training time for a war) how long do you think it will take me to take a proficient firearm user and turn out a Partizan? Basic Rifle Marksmanship is two weeks, so now we are down to four weeks. Cut out drill and ceremony and lop off another week. Cut out CBRNE training and lop off half a week. So in two and a half weeks I could teach map reading, mission planning, communication (PACE), tactics for ambushes and raids, first aid, and demolitions. Everything needed to take out a tank or machine gun nest with pistols and Molatov cocktails.

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