> Imagine if the US suddenly had a dictator
This is why we have the second amendment. And the constitution as the thing to which office-holders swear allegiance to rather than to "the party" or "the president".
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I’m not saying that the outcome would be the protesters would not be successful, in saying that the government would roll in the tanks immediately and without hesitation.
I do not actually agree with the premise that, in this modern day, governments can no longer be overthrown. Civil wars are not won on the basis of "who started with more guns?".
Basically, the US president is in the constant implicit position of being able to hold the entire US hostage from a flying doom fortress† like some kind of supervillain. The only people who can really stop a “crazy president” scenario are people either high up in the Secret Service or the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who would 1. Have the authorization to be in the president’s presence during DEFCON 1, and then 2. Have the personal trust/authority to tell the president’s bodyguards to buzz off for a minute.
† The “doom fortress” part applies more to the subs than to AF1, but if you treat the two as a unit, it works.
Of course not. But the Beijing government is not going to be overthrown from Hong Kong. Hong Kong is very small and very far away from Beijing.
And the whole situation, Hong Kongers protesting the removal of some of their 'special' rights isn't exactly winning sympathy among mainlanders.
Just like it worked out for the US in Vietnam, Afghanistan, and Iraq?
It's made for TV but I thought it did a surprisingly good job. I don't know whether you actually could chase and collide with the plane normally designated Air Force One in an EC-135, but certainly I'd bet on military pilots to give it their best shot if their commander explained the consequences otherwise.
So yeah, the assumption is great but too simplistic. It's the same when people say "if we have guns we can stop mass shooters". Very few (if any) shootings were ever really prevented by a citizen and their gun even when the shootings happened (repeatedly) inside military bases where the shooter was literally surrounded by trained and armed military personnel.
There is no realistic way for Americans to stand up to the entire US State with violence. Not without some very wide spread belief in the failure of the state, believe that would probably be easier to get with non-violent protest (and it still wouldn't be easy).
But that is kind of besides the point. A lot of people are arguing "they may have overwhelming force, so roll over and give them what they want." No thanks?
The U.S. failed in Vietnam and has struggled in Afghanistan since 2001 against insurgents with little more than rifles.
Also, "the world" is too homogeneous a group to predict it would all simultaneously go after China for some single incident.
Who is in the world? What would their motivations be for "reacting" to China? And more importantly, what counter-motivations exist that could sway them from doing so?
If you take all this into account, you'll find the group willing to go "against" China for anything is actually very small.
Edit- Added section responding to the "world" comment.
The more interesting scenario to consider, IMHO, is a civil war between a controlling but “not the US” majority, and a resisting minority. For example: what would happen if there were a modern Red Scare, but one with a basis in reality—i.e., if somehow >50% of the US (including our political leaders) were subverted by China, became believers not just in Communism but in the CCP’s propaganda about Communism necessitating political unification and erasure of separate cultural identity, and so the belief that the US should volunteer to be annexed+absorbed by China?
If the majority of the US believed that... what should the rest of us do, at that point, to stop this from happening? Is the correct answer just “the US is a democratic nation, so if the majority of the population wants the US to stop being a democracy, that’s the ‘democratic choice’, and if you believe in the ‘power of democracy’, you should support it”?
The response from the international community has been crickets chirping.
[1] https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/muslims-...
The US is not a democracy and you have just outlined why. Small autonomous regions were created to limit external influence and allow people to live their lives in peace. A lot of stuff now happens on the national level that was never meant to happen on the national level.
I don't understand this sentiment of "even with guns it's not gonna work so let's just roll over and take it".
If you personally don't think you'll be better off that's fine, but surely you get that if someone WANTS to fight tooth and nail in self-defense he should be given a chance to do so.
After Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq it literally boggles my mind that anyone still believes that.
In fact Afghanistan twice, the Mujaheddin defeated the Soviets the same way.
† Presumably, doctrine for a “Looking Glass” mission would have AF1 plan flight paths that bring them near still-executive-controlled surface missile batteries. Unsure if anything before a modern 5G craft could bring those batteries directly under its targeting control, though, rather than relying on the pilot making contact with living hands on the ground.
"China has now assembled its largest-ever active force of People’s Liberation Army (PLA) troops and other anti-riot personnel and equipment in Hong Kong."
"the reinforcement includes elements of the People’s Armed Police (PAP), a mainland paramilitary anti-riot and internal security force under a separate command from the PLA"
https://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-china-army-hongkong-milita...
Thereby ruining the very thing they want to control and profit from.
That's the thing that the "They'll just send in the army, LOL" folks don't seem to get: bombed out cities and a population under armed guard aren't very economically productive and, on top of that, you need to station military units there to keep a lid on things which is also costly.
But judging from the downvotes most people assume the only thing they need to effectively stop a mass shooter or fight a war is a gun.
The 2nd amendment isn't necessarily a way to win a fight one-on-one. It creates an idea in any leader in government not to even attempt to start killing people by force, because of the potential bloodbath and resistance that would ensue.
IEDs are also pretty effective.
As this vox article states correctly, Hong Kong used to make up 1/5th of their entire GDP. But with expansion and growth in cities across the country, it is now but a minor component of their economy. In the grand scheme of things it isn't a large enough chunk of their economy that they couldn't afford to lose it. Especially not if the balancing act is, bomb this one city and regain political stability vs massive instability for the greater entity.
[0]https://www.vox.com/2014/9/28/6857567/hong-kong-used-to-be-1...
The United States is a democracy. Democracy does not mean only direct democracy. Representative democracy, democratic republics, and federalism are forms of government compatible with democracy.
https://reason.com/2018/01/17/the-united-states-is-both-a-re...
Some counter examples are the Earth Liberation Front (ELF) or possibly even the Kent State Shootings (although there it was the State causing violence).
No matter where the violence comes from, the message tends to get lost from the reaction to the violence. Sure, even Gandhi talked about needing the capacity for violence for non-violence to work, but the moment things break down; the message may still get across or it may be totally drown out.
This is the heritage of gun control in America -- racism and hate written down and codified in law.
If Hong Kong had to rely on force of arms to win its independence, then it's defeat is nearly a foregone conclusion. They just do not have the capacity to stand up to the LARGEST ARMY IN THE WORLD.
Maybe, MAYBE an armed conflict in Hong Kong would sway the U.S. to intervene, but the U.S. is so averse to armed conflict right now and, frankly, today they have a very antagonistic view to foreigners. Not likely they'd be willing to take a bullet for the people of Hong Kong.
If the protestors in Hong Kong take up arms, it will only provide an excuse for Beijing to escalate.
Hong Kong can't much influence whether Tianjin is ruled from Beijing or not. But it can influence whether Hong Kong is ruled from Beijing! Being far away makes it hard for Hong Kong to reach Beijing, and it also makes it hard for Beijing to reach Hong Kong.
For Beijing, the destruction of some parts of one urban may be exactly the price they're willing to pay to maintain their grip.
The difference between the civil rights movement and say, the ELF is that MLK jr, smartly pushed for nonviolence and all armed violence was encouraged only as a retaliatory measure.
I agree that the message can and most likely will get drowned out with escalation to violence, but if the courts fail you, if the state fails you, the only recourse you really have is a credible threat of violence. If that violence is in the form of disruption or rioting or if it's simply, non compliance backed by guns- without that threat, you will be ignored, or worse.
The first link implies that somewhat, but I would guess we need a historian to map the meaning over time.
“You have the watches, but we have the time”
Not quite a tank, but it is an armored military vehicle.
Here's a list of coups. Many were successful. I'm not sure why you are trying to argue that coups don't work. The Arab Spring is a recent example of this very thing, isn't it?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_coups_d%27état_and_cou...
>Very few (if any) shootings were ever really prevented by a citizen and their gun even when the shootings happened (repeatedly) inside military bases where the shooter was literally surrounded by trained and armed military personnel.
The first part of your second assertion that "very few shootings were ever prevented by a citizen," is also easily invalidated by a google search.
https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/08/in-missouri-a-good-gu...
https://www.conservapedia.com/Mass_shootings_prevented_by_ar...
Where did you get that information from?
If they'd rather die free than old that's their choice to make and they deserve to be able to make it.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_mass_shootings_in_the_...
According to it 385 people were killed and 1338 injured so far. 8 of the mass shootings were in schools. Now you're saying that if faced with the choice of having fewer or no mass shootings, and being able to stop a small fraction of them (or worse, stop a large fraction but even the small one still causes thousands of victims) while the rest cause hundreds of deaths and thousands injured you'd pick the second?
As for the coups, I never said they don't work so please don't move the goalposts. I said that the dictator rarely gave up just because his opponents had guns or even the backing of the US military. When I replied to OP's comment it said dictators would back off if faced with armed population.
But if the point you're (contrivedly) trying to make is that guns are not the problem I can only strongly agree. Guns, games, etc. seem to not be a problem in the rest of the western world. So the problem must be something or somewhere else.
Another contributing factor is that mass shootings themselves are rare, and the rate of citizens carrying is low compared to the firearm ownership rate.
First, I don't believe banning guns will stop mass shootings any more than banning drugs stopped mass drug use. There are millions out there and a well kept gun can last a couple hundred of years (and still work).
Second, how will you accomplish the confiscation? You know there are people who will resist. How many police (and bystanders for that matter) will die trying to follow that order? I have no idea, but probably a lot more than zero.
Third, based on how our federal, state and local governments are treating our population, or world for that matter, I don't think removing that sort of deterrent would be advantageous to stopping it. Broken justice system, militarized police, surveillance state, corrupt politicians selling out our livelihoods. Those things aren't naturally going to get better and we can't seem to vote it away very effectively. I don't know what our options are anymore, but these things are likely going to get a lot worse for us.
Fourth, we are living in a surprisingly, unnatural time of peace and prosperity. WWI went from the assassination to full mobilization in a month, followed by depression in Germany, followed by a world depression, resulting in the Nazi's coming to power, resulting in the holocaust and 80+ million dead; all within 30 years. That's peace to holocaust to Cold War between 1989 and now. Drastic change happens fast, and the world is due. Just because a gun ban formula looks attractive now, it very well may not in the near future.
For a starting solution, I think rebuilding our mental health infrastructure would help, but I don't see our generation's politicians doing that. It was before my time, but apparently we had a much better one in the 70s. I can tell you we certainly have a under treated mental health problem today. Do you think Sandy Hook would have happened if Adam Lanza had a facility to live in and be taken care of? There is no way to know, but I think it's unlikely.
https://www.psychiatrictimes.com/trauma-and-violence/guns-vi...
There are people who have been trying to sell a bill of goods about the NRA and gun owners in general for a long time. It simply isn't accurate.