Monday, December 01, 2008

Lesson From Mumbai: Keep the Gun Handy

Recall, for a moment, the Columbine massacre: several dozen heavily-armed police outside the school, listening to gunfire inside.

You heard and saw echoes of that in Mumbai; the difference was only that in Mumbai, as in most recent mass-killings, the aggressors were Muslim.

Vox puts it starkly:

The truth is that no one will protect you – not the police, not the part-time security guard, not the staff of whatever business you are patronizing and not the national armed forces. You must take responsibility for protecting yourself, and the only means to do that is to ensure that you are appropriately armed whenever you intend to go out in public regardless of what the local laws might say.

Muslim terrorists have proven, again and again, that they intend to kill, and kill a lot. The appropriate response is to kill them. Waiting for a response from 9-1-1 is likely to be fatal.

UPDATE: See John Lott's entry for more on India's gun controls.

14 comments:

grumps said...

It tickles me to see you put stock in this gunfighter fantasy of yours.

A pocket pistol against well-armed, prepared-to-die foes means that you're dead 10 seconds later than you might have been without the handgun.

Amy said...

That's still 10 seconds, grumps. And you might just take a few of them with you.

I know in a liberal's fantasy world, the police are able to teleport to a crime scene and save the day.

In reality, that doesn't happen and several legal cases have set precident that police have no obligation to STOP or PREVENT crime.

But don't try arguing the right to self-defense with a liberal. That's one right (and a real one) they just can't understand.

Dad29 said...

Really, Grumpy?

Just 10 seconds, eh? And you know this with moral certitude because of.....what, exactly?

What's a "pocket pistol," Grumpy? I mean, Mossad agents use .22LR pistols, and they kill folks with them regularly.

Surely you can do a little better than make stuff up based on zero knowledge.

TerryN said...

The real fantasy is believing a well-armed, prepared-to-die foe isn't going to react to the sound of gunfire coming at him. 10 seconds is a lot of time to change the outcome of lots of situations.

Dad29 said...

"...well-armed, prepared to die..."

We can grant his wish.

You and Gwumpy seem to think that: 1) the armed citizen has only a pop-gun pistol handy; and 2) the well-armed citizen knows NOTHING about duck-and-cover.

Big assumptions.

fishaddict said...

Grumps you watch too many movies. I constantly, quietly explain the idiocy of a main character, armed with an obviously inferior weapon kill an adversary and leave the weapons, extra ammo, and comm devices. All you need to do is get one of them and suddenly you have an upgraded arsenal. The interesting thing is that for a while at least you as the underdog have the element of surprise, largely because the usual assumption is that the perpetrator is the only armed individual in the area.

grumps said...

Wow, fish. You've got McLanitis, too.

A pocket pistol, Daddio, is what your average tourist would have been likely to have had on them in the hotel lobby when the shooting started. It's pretty hard to swallow that every single tourist targetted last week was ex-Mossad.

Hell, they'd have been just as likely to pull a Plaxico as to execute any of your cowboy fantasies.

Amy said...

Hell, they'd have been just as likely to pull a Plaxico as to execute any of your cowboy fantasies.

But at least they would have had that opportunity, grumps.

You, on the other hand, clearly prefer to have the police (and the coroner) clean up the mess after the fact, and usually to the detriment of the innocent victim and his/her family.

Dad29 said...

Who said anything about TOURISTS, Gwump-o?

Plaxico is not germane, of course, and that's why you bring it up.

I'll grant you that if you're a tourist in an area being hit by Muslim terrorists, you're in deep trouble.

But not if you're at home--or most places in the USA.

As to "fantasy," perhaps you missed basic combat training.

I didn't.

TerryN said...

"The real fantasy is believing a well-armed, prepared-to-die foe isn't going to react to the sound of gunfire coming at him."

My point was you're better off with the gun, no matter the size, than without it.

The extra 10 seconds grumps is so sure is about is a lot of time to stop the threat.

Ans as far as Plaxico? There's always going to be an idiot in a large population.

Anonymous said...

Put it in perspective. Can you imagine if the Shitheads for Allah had tried this in say, Houston? Or Miami?

Of course, in Wisconsin, the outcome would have been the same since Pol Pot Doyle is afraid of an armed citizenry.

Display Name said...

I was led here by the commentary at this link.

What is their likely training? I assume any good invader must train for the possibility that there might be someone in the target crowd with a weapon. I would assume the invader's priorities include protecting themselves as well as carrying out their strategic and tactical goals. Don't they attack first anyone who threatens them the most?

Even if it were legal to carry a gun, what percentage would choose to do so? Wouldn't the terrorists simply adjust their tactics to compensate? They're already willing to risk their lives to accomplish their goal... which may only be to inspire fear and mayhem. They have the advantage of preplanning and group communication. The random crowd doesn't. One terrorist attracts the attention of the minority of the crowd who's carrying a weapon. Half of them pull and aim. Boom-boom-boom, he's dead and the shooters are probably shocked. The other terrorists reveal themselves and quickly pop many or all of the very surprised gun-toters. Presto. Is this hypothetical scenario any less fanciful to believe?

Dad29 said...

One can play "what-if" games all day long with this.

The question is: would a population which is ALLOWED to carry for self-defense have changed the outcome in Mumbai?

(Certain other bloggers want to blow this all out of proportion...)

And I maintain that the answer is "Yes, the outcome would have been different."

Certainly, when you have 20 well-trained suicide-shooters, it is reasonable to conclude that there will be deaths. It's likely that someone with a handgun will be one of the victims.

On the other hand, if there were 20 military-trained civilians in the train station who could then "pick up the ball" in a self-defense mode after terrorist #1 goes to meet the virgins, who knows?

My point: it is immoral to deny people the right to self-defense (and the defense of others.) THIS is what allows Muslim terrorists to kill 195 or so, unimpaired.

Anonymous said...

@Foust...as usual, your logic is coherent only to, well, no one.

@Dad...I agree. The idea being that if you are going to go down, the idea is that you take as many of the bad guys as you can before you assume room temperature.

The Mumbai shooters counted on surprise value and lack of CITIZEN response.

As I stated earlier, these shithead would have had NO chance in a place like Houston, Miami, etc. I.E. people allowed to protect themselves.

"If I'm going down, you won't be alive to appreciate it."

Works for me.