Executive Summary – The USA citizens are not secure and something has then concerned about the safety and security of their life and property. Guess what? For the month of April there were 1.2 million Fbi Criminal Background Checks performed at the request of licensed gun dealers regarding a firearms sale. If a person were buying 12 guns there would only be one check. This means the figure could represent more than 1.2 million guns sold for the month. There is also the possibility that the person was turned down and thus no gun was sold, just a check performed. In the previous year for the month of April 2008 940,000 checks were performed. This is a 30% increase. How about next year?

Discussion – The people are scared. Ammo sales are also soaring creating shortages in ammo. We all know it’s their own government the people are fearful of. How long can a country last with a worthless currency, failed businesses, high unemployment, millions of homeless people, and to top it off a President who cannot prove he is qualified to hold the office as a person born in the USA? Not long and the people seem to be aware of this. Seems like they a re waiting for a trigger before it all breaks loose.

Why Guns – A government cannot occupy a country if the general population is armed. The USA is acutely aware of this. During the German occupation of France the USA was dropping firearms into France and the Philippines for the use of the resistance fighters and anyone else who wished to use the guns against the occupying army. This is of course terrorism but since the USA did it, it is never called that.

Here is a picture of the gun called the Liberator that was made by the USA. Tens of thousands of these were made and airdropped into enemy held territory by the US Army during WW11.

The USA made over one million of these nifty little pistols at a cost of $2.10 each adjusted to the USD today it was probably $150.00 each. The pistols were single shot and came with I believe ten rounds of ammo. They shot the heavy hitting, slow moving .45 ACP with full jacket ball ammo. The gun was perfect for someone to walk up on a German or Japanese soldier and execute them with a round through the head. The rounds would penetrate the helmets used at the time. They were smooth bore, free of serial numbers (shocking) short barreled and good for no more than 20 feet in distance, but more realistically 3-5 feet would be the practical range. These guns scared the enemy big time. They had to view every person as a potential threat. The psychological value of these guns was important. It put the occupying troops on edge. They would not be safe wondering around the towns drunk doing their occupying army thing. The gun came with instructions called comic book instructions.

Now lets jump forward to the Vietnam era. The CIA wanted something similar to be used in Vietnam. They developed a similar but a bit more sophisticated gun called the "Deer Gun".

The US government knows that a country cannot easily be occupied if the population is armed. They also knew extremely simple "Saturday Night Special" type guns were enough to thwart the occupying army big time. Now mind you the people in the USA do not have junk pot metal liberator guns that look like Mattel Toy Company made them. They have sophisticated guns in many cases better than what the military has except for maybe the crack units like Navy Seals. The people in the USA also know how to use these guns.

Why An Occupying Army Would Fear the USA Gun Owners – An armed society is a polite society and a free society. Total occupation and enslavement becomes difficult, not impossible just a lot more difficult. The challenges facing an occupying Army from civilian owned sophisticated guns are deep and complex. I will go into some of them. We will cover types of guns and applications.

Pistols – These are not considered a significant military weapon. They are easily concealed which make them threatening. The military helmets and body armor of today defeat the bullets from handguns quite well. One would need to go into illegally hand loading very light, and fast bullets to penetrate body armor. Modern armies on the other hand do have available armor piercing ammo to defeat body armor with their handguns.

Handguns have limited practical ranges. Most people cannot use them effectively over 21 feet. If you try to engage a target at longer distances the time required to acquire a good front sight picture and squeeze off a round increases. Some people can train themselves to shoot a handgun effectively out to 50 feet. I know you can shoot out further but if you get into variables like the target is moving, bad light, taking cover, the target is hooting back etc you realize quickly these are short range weapons. I do understand that there are hunting handguns that can be used to shoot out at long distances even 200 yards but these are also bulky heavy weapons hard to conceal.

Handguns can be used to ambush or bushwhack soldiers as was done in France and the Philippines with these throw away guns. This makes every pedestrian within 20 feet of a soldier a serious threat. The soldiers have to stay alert and watch their back all the time. Hard to do with long hours and troops stretched thin. Drop your guard and thump you are dead. Now come vehicle stops. If the population is armed you have big problems with checkpoints. Two soldiers cannot work a checkpoint. Numerous personnel need to be deployed. Some need to be behind barriers so as to make an ambush seem futile. It is very easy to shoot a policeman or soldier in their unprotected face when they come to the driver window to ask for papers. Just ask any highway patrolman how nervous they get when they walk up on a car at night full of people when they cannot see their hands.

So now checkpoints need to be sophisticated with numerous personnel, think 8-12. This drains resources of the occupier’s big time. They love checkpoints to enforce requirements that the populace register and carry papers always. To get the populace in compliance they need their checkpoints. Now these become burdensome. Also they like roving patrols say two soldiers or police to stop pedestrians and ask for papers. With an armed population this can be dangerous and they need 8 man patrols. When the populace in France would see a single solider they could easily walk behind him and shoot him when a truck goes by to cover noise. They drag the body away a bit and discard the pistol.

Under other circumstances they can upgrade their junk gun for a good rifle and handgun by shooting the soldier. So now soldiers have to travel about armed and in pairs when off duty as a minimum, to avoid execution by the people they are occupying. This is a big psychological stress on the soldiers. It is one thing to know they are not wanted, it is another matter to know the people will take every opportunity to kill them and have the guns to do it with. For an army to be effective the soldiers must be in agreement with the officers who must be in agreement with the generals who must be in agreement with the political leaders. If any piece is missing, it does not work.

Look at the USA in Vietnam as a model of a breakdown and a lack of agreement. The USA soldiers were constantly encountering armed citizens conducting terrorism against them. Morale was bad. Soldiers become poorly motivated; drug and alcohol use was high. Soldiers were killing their officers in the field, often called fragging although they shot them as well. The USA lost and abandoned the occupation. A determined armed population will make life miserable for an occupying army.

Shotguns – These are deadly close quarter weapons. The most popular is the 12 gauge which fires 9-12 balls of lead generally about the size of a .32 caliber pistol bullet. Shotgun slugs are also available which is perhaps more useful for hunting large animals. The armor of soldiers does stop buckshot. Problem is the buckshot spreads in a pattern and hits places of the body not covered by armor like extremities.

Shotguns are effective for most shooters out to 75 feet. Good hits from a shotgun are hard to survive. There are a lot of semi-automatic shotguns that will fire 8 rounds of shotgun ammo in perhaps 3 seconds or less. That is 100 balls of buckshot flying at your target. If you do the math this is very comparable to full automatic fire, even better. These are effective weapons for ambush and counter ambush. They were so used in Vietnam although there in pump mode which resists dirt more but makes firing multiple rounds slower. There are many thousands of semi-automatic shotguns in the USA in private hands with countless rounds of ammo.

Shotguns are also effective in stopping groups of people from entering your premises. One would get behind cover and start throwing lead at the intruders trying to come through a door or window. It is hard to advance into such a barrage even with armor. Semi-auto and pump shotguns owned by civilians that an army is trying to occupy and control are not something any military wishes to encounter. I would say in the USA they are at least a few hundred thousand pump and semi-automatic shotguns. Then there are double barrel shotguns, bolt-action shotguns and single barrel shotguns.

There are a lot of trained professionals who will think nothing about engaging an adversary with a full auto assault rifle if they have a pump or semi-auto shotgun. Some experienced urban police will fire the 12 gauge into the concrete a few feet in front of the adversary so that the buckshot with bounce off the cement into the feet and legs of the adversary causing them acute pain and impairing their ability to walk. This disables them enough for you to finish them off while they are screaming, limping or rolling on the ground or else you can capture them. Curiously the same can be done with a 9 MM full auto assault rifle. Shotguns can be fitted with special chokes to tighten their grouping out to 100 yards bringing the shotgun into a militarily significant range weapon.

There are other chokes often referred to as duck bill chokes that will horizontally spread the buck shot out so as to enable one to shoot two or even three adversaries with one shot of 00 buckshot. This turns the shotgun into an even more deadly ambush and counter ambush weapon. One can also get specialty shotgun ammo. This can be illegal in places. They have two large pieces of buckshot with a 12-inch piece of piano wire welded to each ball. This can cause the piano wire to cut a person badly when the balls spread especially their internal organs. Body armor would not work reliably on this ammo.

Other ammo causes the shotgun to turn into a flamethrower for about 2-3 seconds throwing fire out for about 40 feet. Imagine trying to breech a doorway and running into a wall of fire. There are slugs made of very soft lead that mushroom a lot to cause massive wound channels. There is ammo with spikes loaded into it. We could keep going the list is long for specialty shotgun ammo. Shotguns are a real headache for an occupying army.

Regular Hunting Rifles – This is a serious threat to an occupying army. Hunting rifles are effective at ranges out to 500 yards especially with high power scopes. The person shooting them needs to have some skills of course but most hunters do. There are many millions of so equipped hunters in the USA. The hunters also have the bush craft skills enabling them to move about in the wilderness quietly. And undetected. They have camouflage clothes. The regular military rifles issued to a soldier are usually not very useful past 100 yards by most of the soldiers.

Maybe some could use the weapon out 200 yards and a few to even 300 yards. The point is a hunting rifle like a common Remington bolt action 30-06 can work well out to 300 yards and for some even out to 500 yards with a good scope. The soldier can be outgunned by sniper activity. Snipers do not always have to hit live targets. They can hit refrigerators, radiators of cars, motor blocks, generators, air conditioners, water tanks, tires, radios, heaters, fuel supplies, transformers, telephone equipment, and so forth. Snipers can also target moving or parked vehicles. and the same for aircraft and marine vessels. This torments the soldiers when moving about.

Hunting rifle bullets are hard to stop with armor. If the hunter uses serious bullets not hollow points, things like core lok Remington bullets designed to stay together after impact, then the armor becomes less effective. These bullets can rip through engine blocks. When you get into the heavier hunting caliber bullets armor becomes less and less effective. Body armor usually will not stop hunting bullets, especially the heavier calibers. Hollywood portrays snipers as those killing humans but a lot of what they do is to destroy equipment of the enemy. This number one keeps the enemy undercover for minutes to hours after the shot(s) are fired.

The enemy is on edge for days afterward. The destroyed equipment can destroy the will and comfort of the enemy. Their will to fight then starts to diminish. I do know that many thousands of gun owners in the USA are familiar with sniper techniques. All you need to do is go any gun show and you too will know this. They have shooting schools in the USA for the last 25 years that have been teaching sniper methods to civilians. Hunting and sniping is not so different anyway. So a country with millions of so equipped hunters is a major big time headache to an occupying army.

High Powered Rifles – There are numerous rifle calibers that are all considered high power in the USA. These guns deliver a heavy bullet at high velocities. These bullets will penetrate a lot of material and armor. These rifles are also effective out to 1000 yards with some training and practice. This is a major nightmare for an occupying army. The sniper can get them and the chances of them getting the sniper are close to zero. There are a massive amount of such rifles with high-powered scopes in the USA with countless rounds of ammo.

.50 Caliber Rifles – In the last twenty years many people have started to buy .50 caliber rifles. This is not a hunting gun unless you hunt dinosaurs. The round is a 750-grain bullet. A 30-06 is usually a 150 to 180 grain bullet for comparison. This round usually travels in excess of 3000 feet per second. Stopping this round with a armor in its normal configuration usually requires explosive armor usually found on tanks or heavy armored military vehicles, which is only good for one shot. Forget body armor or light vehicle armor. Now the custom loaders in the USA have improved this round.

One way to get there is to use a sabot. This is a plastic insert, which allows the .50 caliber case to expel a much lighter bullet, think 250 grains. This bullet would now move at over 5000 feet per second. This is also done with lesser rounds like the .308 and 30-06 for instance. Forget anything but explosive armor stopping these high-speed rounds. There is a lot of this ammo floating around in the USA. Another way is to use molybdenum metal in the bullet. This metal is extremely hard and rips through obstacles like sheet metal, armor plating etc. The bullet weight can be the same or one could use a sabot with the molybdenum bullet and I doubt anything short of explosive armor on tanks would work against it.

They have been selling molybdenum .50 cal bullets for 15 years now. Have no idea how many there are in the USA. One with some training and practice can hit a melon at distances of up to a mile with a .50 caliber rifle and a good scope. The military has been using them for years. The sniping value is amazing. Three or four people with these rifles can terrorize a military base with 5000 troops. Think what 3 or 4 people with 50’s can do with another 12 people with regular hunting rifles. The troops would sit inside and crawl around when they had to move or else go about in armored vehicles.

Then comes the destruction of heaters in winter, electrical generators, water supplies, refrigeration for food, gas supplies, vehicles, and aircraft on the ground, air conditioners in summer, and so forth. See an armed country cannot easily be occupied and if it is occupied the army will often give up and leave. The Russians in Afghanistan. The USA in Vietnam are examples of this. They leave a lot of death and destruction in their path but they eventually leave.

Assault Rifles – The people of the US have a massive mount of assault rifles. Most are in semi-auto mode. They can engage a military on equal small arms footing. Not a pleasant thought for an enemy. The first priority of an occupier would be to round up the guns. Better yet get the guns before they go in.

Night Optics – The people in the US have been buying night vision devices for about 25 years now. They have night vision rifles, scopes, and night vision glasses and binoculars. This is a real headache for an army trying to occupy it. They better equip all their occupying troops with these devices.

Body Armor – Countless people in the USA have been buying body armor for 25 years. Most can only stop handgun ammo with their armor. A smaller amount of people has armor that will stop assault rifle rounds. Very few people have armor that will stop armor piercing ammo. Enemy soldiers would be confused and bewildered by a population that is not only heavily armed but also has body armor.

Armor Piercing Ammo – In the USA it is legal to own armor piercing ammo in rifle calibers. There are millions and millions of rounds of such ammo being stored in the USA. Of course this is a major headache for an occupying army. Imagine when their troops realize the civilians can defeat their armor, even their heavy-duty armor.

Summary – This should illustrate why the USA presently would be a nightmare to occupy for an Army. Why the US government wants take the guns away from the people has no good answer, does it?

-Aurelia Masterson, www.panamalaw.org