Syria, not just no...

Hell no.

How many times do we have to go down this road before we learn the lesson? Understand me, the lesson I'm talking about is not that "war is not the answer", or that we can't "impose our will" on another country. Sometimes war IS the answer, and there is no doubt we have the capability to impose our will on anyone we want, with the exception of maybe China. Maybe.

The lesson I'm talking about is two-fold.
1. America lacks the will to win.
2. The "world community" is a bunch of ungrateful bitches and doesn't deserve our help.

Let me start with 2.

Fuck you motherfuckers. That's all I have to say to the "world."

We've been fighting and dying on behalf of Europe and Asia since WWII. What has that gotten us? In Europe, a bunch of ungrateful bastards who have 5-week vacations and free health care, which they can't really afford, but have been able to get away with because they haven't had to provide for their own security for 70 years. So FYMF. We should do what they all say they want us to do and stop meddling around in their business.

We have been fighting and dying on behalf of Muslims around the world since at least the '91 Gulf War, and what has that gotten us? A bunch of ungrateful bastards who seem to want to kill us more the more we help them. So FYMF. We should do what they all say they want us to do and stop meddling around in their business.

Let me clarify something. No one else can do what we can do. No one else has the capability we have. If we disengage from the world, it will become a much more dangerous place. I don't want to see this happen. I joined the Army 25 years ago because I believed, and still believe, we are the good guys and we keep the world safe.

"People sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf."

George Orwell 

Early in my career I went to West Germany (when it was still West and East Germany), and the Soviet Union was still our enemy. Wish I had kept my SMLM card for a memento. http://www.3ad.com/pio/memorabilia/soviet.mission.htm

Did the Europeans love us and shower us with gratitude for keeping them safe at great expense to our country and personal sacrifice to ourselves? 

FUUUCK NO! They protested outside the main bases, and sometimes outside our little kaserne. So FYMF.

Same thing happened in Korea, protests all the time. FYMF.

Interestingly, the Israelis I met during the Gulf War were awesome. Once the war ended, and we were allowed off base, we were heroes to those folks. They loved us, I never bought a single beer. (Not that we were strictly speaking "allowed" to drink, but it was a different time...)

Now the individual Muslims that I met in Iraq in '91, and in early 2003, were also very grateful and happy we were there. Same with the Kuwati people. We all know how it turned out in Iraq, and as grateful as the Kuwaitis were for us saving their country in '91, I don't see them sticking up for us much now. I suppose I should be grateful they let us keep bases there.

I didn't deploy to Somalia, Kosovo or Bosnia, but those were also missions to save Muslim people. I'm sure I'm missing some examples. 

And of course the end result of 20 years of saving Muslim lives? 9/11 and Benghazi. FYMF.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not looking for all these people to bow down and kiss our collective ass. But how about not attacking us? Or being so fucking smug, Europe. 

You know what though? It's not even them that I'm most upset with. It's us. 

This brings us to 1.

We will never win another overseas war that requires more than a few weeks of combat or any kind of real fighting. We have no heart, and we have no stomach for it. The American character has changed. (Not for the better.)

If anyone attacked us here at home we would wipe them out, no doubt. But I can't imagine a circumstance where we commit troops to an overseas war and go all 12 rounds. We snatched defeat from the jaws of victory in Iraq in about the 10th round. (Afghanistan was a pure waste of time and lives, let's not even talk about that.)

And that's were we are on the Syria debate. The right thing to do is go in there and punish Assad, and by punish I mean drop a bomb directly on him. Let the chips fall where they may after that. And we would have to deal with the fallout, but that is what we should do.

But we won't. We no longer have the stomach to do what needs to be done. We don't believe that the world is a dangerous, violent place. Assad kills 100k people and we "tsk" and flip the channel. We kill ten villagers by mistake while trying to stop a terrorist who has killed thousands and we are monsters!

This debate reminds me of 2002. When I left for Iraq in April 2003, I was fired up. We had the support of Congress, the people were with us, we were the Good Guys going forth to slay the dragon! Everyone agreed we were doing the right thing.

When I came back in May 2004, (coincidentally an election year), we were the stupid victims of Bush, fighting a mistake war based on a supposed lie.

 “You know, education, if you make the most of it, if you study hard and you do your homework, and you make an effort to be smart, uh, you, you can do well. If you don’t, you get stuck in Iraq.” Said the same guy who had voted to send us to that war. 

It was like a punch in the gut. Fuck all y'all, congress. 

So that's it. Between politics and our weak stomachs, we should never enter any conflict anywhere but our own shores. I hope we stay out of Syria because I don't want any other Soldiers to go off to war thinking they are going off to fight a righteous battle, only to come home and be told how stupid they were to believe in anything, most especially America.

Why does anyone need an AR-15? I'll tell you.

So I laid out my view in Part 1 that guns = freedom.

Now I'd like to answer the question: "Why does a civilian need an AR-15 or a 30-round magazine?"

First we have to agree that individual citizens have the right to defend themselves. If you are of the mind-set that no civilian needs any gun at all then there is no point talking about the AR-15 is there?

You may believe that a gun in the house makes one less safe. There are studies that support this idea. I don't think they are persuasive though, because they include uses of the gun for suicide and domestic violence.

Suicide is a symptom of mental illness, in my opinion, and guns don't cause it. Domestic violence is a criminal act. It seems odd to blame the gun ahead of time for mental illness and criminal behavior. A gun is a force multiplier, and I freely admit, it works both ways. A gun can make a suicide attempt more likely to succeed and an act of domestic violence more deadly, but it's not causing either of these by itself.

Antibiotics are good medicine, but when used incorrectly can make infections stronger and more deadly. Guns are similar and the key phrase is: "when used incorrectly."

It just seems odd to argue that "in homes where a gun is used, it is more likely to be used against the owner..." because to me, when a gun is used it represents the failure of an entire system of defense. We each set up our defenses, whether we choose to include guns or not. We pick what we hope is a safe neighborhood (if we can afford to), we lock our doors with deadbolts, we keep a light on out front and in the back, maybe we put in an alarm system, etc... All this is done to protect ourselves and our families. Some people choose to include a gun in this system of defense as a last resort.

These studies also fail to take into account the many uses of guns for defense where no shot is fired. This is the vast majority of cases and if these numbers are included, you see that most guns never even get fired in the home.

If it comes down to using the gun, all those other systems have failed and your gun is your last line of defense. Chances are it's all going to come out badly. That's the reality of violent crime. I personally would like to keep fighting until the end, no matter the outcome, rather than just lay down and take whatever is coming just because the criminal got past my locked door.

To argue that domestic violence and suicide should be included in the discussion about whether guns make more or less safe ignores the fact that the perpetrator of these acts of violence has been invited in past all our defenses, knows exactly where we keep our guns and, in the case of suicide, we are not fighting against them. I would argue that this is another discussion entirely.

In any case, if you believe owning any gun is wrong or unjustified, stop reading now. If you believe that a shotgun or handgun is reasonable for self-defense, but an AR-15 is a military weapon that no civilian needs, keep reading.

What are your choices for self-defense weapons? It pretty much comes down to rifle, pistol or shotgun. I'm not going to go deeply into the characteristics and ballistics of each. Let's say you are a small-framed woman, or an older man who has lost some strength over the years, what is the best choice for you?

Any one of the options can be a good choice, but let me make the case for the AR-15. A shotgun can be overwhelming for a small or weaker person. It kicks and has a limited capacity - try not to miss! Contrary to popular myth, you can't just wave it in the general direction of your target and pull the trigger and hit it. You still need to aim.

A pistol must be aimed and controlled and, in the calibers that will stop a bad guy, can also be overwhelming for smaller or weaker folks. A pistol requires the user to practice regularly. If you are not going to practice, you are not going to be able to use it effectively when the time comes.

The AR-15 eliminates some of these problems. It fires a high-velocity .22 caliber round. Yeah, that's right, this scary military assault rifle fires a little tiny bullet, more precisely it's a .223. If you have no idea what I'm talking about, read this. (And if you have no idea what I'm talking about, you shouldn't be making passionate arguments against it, should you? Lol.)

Why does the military use such a small round? Studies done after WWII and Korea showed that most bullets fired in combat miss. Whether due to fear and adrenaline making troops aim shaky, or just trying to hit moving targets, the majority of the bullets fired just miss.

Most troops back then carried heavy rifles that fired a .30 caliber round or even a .45. These bullets are also relatively heavy and so a guy couldn't carry all that many of them. The powers that be decided that the common Soldier should carry more bullets, and a rifle that could fire more of them between reloading. So they had to go with a smaller caliber. Soldiers still argue about the wisdom of this move.

What I'm talking about here is the evolution of firearms (or Arms, if you like.) In the Revolutionary War the musket calibers were .62 and .45 and .69, so we have seen bullets get smaller and smaller.

So the AR-15 has evolved as a compromise between weight, stopping power and the ability to fire many rounds between reloading. It's a pretty good compromise and so it makes a good offensive and defensive weapon. The technology involved is not significantly different than any other semi-automatic rifle, but the packaging is unique to it's purpose.

In any case, because it is such a small caliber, the AR-15 has very little "kick" when fired. I remember one of my drill sergeants in basic training demonstrating this on the range by putting the butt of an M-16 (the real assault rifle version of the AR-15) against his, um, groin, and pulling the trigger several times. This was done to show the recruits that the rifle wouldn't hurt them when they fired it.

Imagine trying to do that with a 12 gauge shotgun. This is a distinct advantage when teaching someone to shoot, especially if that person is small or weakened by age or illness. It is also an advantage when using the weapon in an actual defensive situation. Little recoil means it's easier to keep the weapon on target between shots.

Another huge advantage for home defense is that you have a 30-round magazine. Most criminals use pistols, that's a fact. (Why they are trying to ban a class of rifles when pistols are used in most crime boggles my mind.) So the criminal usually has between 8 and 18 rounds, if you have 30 available without reloading, you have the advantage.

And you need all the help you can get, right? I mean the criminals know when they are going to strike, what they are planning to do, and they already have their weapons out and ready when they strike. (Even if that weapon isn't a gun, they are ready to go when they break into your house.) You, on the other hand, are not expecting to have to defend yourself, you are probably asleep. Everything you do is a reaction after the attack has begun. You need every advantage you can get.

A couple other points, you fire the AR-15 with both hands which means it's easier to aim. You can mount a flashlight on it which gives you another advantage over the bad guy breaking into your house. It's scary looking, so it's less likely you will have to fire it. And the fact is, once you learn to use it, you don't really have to practice as much with it as you do with a pistol. Of course, you SHOULD practice regularly, by all means. But because it is so simple to operate and it is really "point and shoot," and because you have 30 rounds, practice is less necessary.

Of course there are many considerations in choosing a self-defense weapon that I haven't talked about. Things to think about like do you share walls with neighbors or children and need to worry about your defensive bullets penetrating and hitting innocent bystanders. I believe that in many cases the right answer is not owning any guns at all. Not everyone should have guns in their house.

My point is that there are rational and compelling reasons for civilians to own an AR-15 with 30-round magazines. The AR-15 is not inherently offensive or defensive in nature. A person has to determine which role the weapon is going to play.

The key element in any use of a gun is always, always, always the person.