Self Defense

This another inalienable right, but how it’s done has evolved and expanded beyond its simple principles.

The principle is to prevent others from killing you and your family. Tribes formed as groups of families to maintain food and shelter to survive. Tribes had trained their members to be warriors to defend the tribe from attack by rogue tribes. These tribes had chiefs who lead the tribe in battle and kept the peace within the tribe. Leaders of tribes and clans have typically decided disputes and worked for the good of the tribe to ensure its survival. Often the oldest son of a chief would be trained to replace the chief using the monarchy model.  But chiefs have also been chosen by acclimation by the members or chosen by elders.

The evolution of domestic self-defense can be seen in the “Wild West” in the 1800s in the US. Initially, settlers were responsible for protecting themselves. They all had guns and used them to hunt food, but also used them to protect their ranch. They would fight rogue Indians who attacked them first. If their attackers had larger numbers, settlers would often lose. They would be killed or captured. The newspapers reported massacres of settlers by Indians and the government responded by establishing Army Posts to house cavalry to police the Indians.

The settlers also faced the threat of violence by rogue ranchers who had more people who could threaten and attack their smaller neighbors. This criminal activity was countered by establishing circuit courts in the West to ensure that criminals who were a threat to private property would be dealt with.  They tried horse thieves and cattle rustlers, but also rogue ranchers who threatened their neighbors.

Life in the East in the US in the 1800s that involved the development of cities with large populations collected local taxes and hired police forces to deter violence and keep the peace. This prompted citizens to put their guns away. As the West developed, small towns hired a sheriff and larger towns established the police force.

By the end of the 1800s, Indians were on reservations and criminal rogue ranchers became bankers and lawyers. The “Wild West” was over and the US became “gentile”. 

We now realize that the police cannot prevent crime, they only deter it by catching criminals and locking them up. Our personal safety is still up to us and we’re trying to do this without guns.

Wars of expansion

Those European explorers who were sent to America in the 1400s to claim land for their monarchies and bring back gold were initiating wars of expansion except for the French, who had no interest in farms and ranches, but preferred to use America as a source of material like fur. The British and the Spanish and Portuguese were more interested in land ownership by military force.

The Mexican War in 1846 was a “war of expansion”. We paid them some money for taking their land and now they want it back.

The Indian Wars were “wars of expansion”, because we pushed them off the land they had been using and put them on reservations and they are still there.

Defense from Invasion

The evolution of US defense against foreign invaders was more a matter of inventing more effective weapons and tactics.

We fought the Revolutionary War, the War of 1812 and the Mexican War in 1846 with muskets, canons and wooden ships.

The telegraph was invented in 1840, implemented in 1844 and we laid the Atlantic cable in 1866.

In the Civil War 1860, we had railroads to supply troops, hot air balloons and the telegraph.  By 1862, we had the Gatling gun and iron-clad ships. By 1885, we had developed the machine gun. In 1910 we had a semi-automatic pistol. 

In World War I, 1917 we had artillery, mortars, flame throwers, crude tanks, aircraft and submarines.  We spent $30 billion on WWI and put it on the Debt and it’s still there.

We entered this war when US ships were sunk.

After World War I, the US economy boomed, because our factories had not been damaged. We were able to update our infrastructure and expand the availability of electricity.

In World War II, 1941 we had better versions of the same weapons plus the Atom bomb. We also invented radar and adopted rocket technology to develop missiles and update our aircraft. After World War II, the US economy boomed again for the same reason, but the technologies we advanced during the war were applicable to non-military opportunities.

In the 1970s, we experienced terrorist acts and later saw a Muslim migration of Europe and began to suspect this in the US with the UN Refugee Resettlement Program. We already had illegal migrants in the US and in 2018 began to address the threat of being invaded ant taken over by migrants.

Military Foreign Aid

I regard the use of the US military for any reason other than the defense of our borders from foreign invasion as military foreign aid. These are all wars we fight that do not pose an existential threat to the US.

I could argue that any war that didn’t involve an invasion of the US was military foreign aid.  The US government has considered any attack on a US vessel as an act of war and have done so since the Barbary Wars from 1801 to 1815. This would also apply to the Spanish American War in 1898 with the sinking of the Maine and World War I in 1917 with the sinking of the Lusitania.

We sent troops to Korea in 1950 to protect them from being taken over by the Communists and ended up with a truce and two Koreas. 

We spent a fortune on the Vietnam War in the 1960s and 1970s to protect them from being taken over by the Communists.

We spent $trillions on wars to prevent Communism, but now we have more Communist countries than ever.

We formed a coalition in 1990 to save Kuwait from invasion by Iraq. We invaded Afghanistan in 2001 in reaction to the terror attack on the Twin Towers in New York. We invaded Iraq in 2003-2011 looking for weapons of mass destruction. We spent $7 trillion on Middle East “nation building” and it was totally wasted.

We just finished fighting ISIS Muslim terrorists in Iraq and Syria and terror attacks on Western countries are routine.

It’s clear that we need to reexamine our strategies to allow us to lead in keeping the peace without going broke.

Norb Leahy, Dunwoody GA Tea Party Leader