I mentioned the Kurds and the Catalans because they are on different parts of the spectrum. The Kurds have been historically treated like shit and also murdered en masse, but right now enjoy many freedoms but not all the freedoms they wish to have. The Catalans live peacefully in a democratic society, but many were forcibly prevented from exercising a democratic right to vote this weekend.
This is essentially the rationale behind the right to bear arms. Without them, you look at Catalan, then the Kurds, then the Rohingya. Then you look no more, because you're dead or faced with indentured servitude.
Both the Kurds and Catalans would be an insurrection if they went for it, and these hypothetical uprisings would be a bit different than...
1) US Independence
2) Vietnam War
...these. A foreign power occupying another land is different than an insurrection. In the latter, it's possible to lose the battles yet win the war so long as the battles end up being too costly for the power trying to occupy. (Warfare's changed a bit since American independence, so I'm mostly focusing on more modern times.) But it is brutal on the locals. Tons of Vietnamese died fighting the US, and the US kept piling up tactical victories. The Tet Offensive was a tactical loss for the Vietnamese and a huge manpower drain, but did start to force a strategic US withdrawal. After all, Vietnam was an ocean away and not integrally important to the US.
That is not true of insurrection. The two sides aren't squaring off across any distance, and at least one side sees themselves in full control of the territory and will fight to keep it that way. Shays wanted to overthrow a tyrannical Massachusetts government, look how well that turned out for him. The Confederacy wanted to leave the Union, look how well that worked out for them. The IRA in Northern Ireland, FARC in Colombia, the Tamil Tigers in Sri Lanka, Communist vs Nationalist Chinese, Chechnya, etc etc. It's not simply a game of waiting out until the other side gets tired and goes home because
they already are home. To win requires either the upper hand in numbers, like the Communist Chinese did since the war against Japan was more costly on the Nationalists, or foreign support,
and the willingness to see a brutal fight through.
It's why I think the Kurds will rise up and the Catalans won't, weapons handy or not. The Kurds could gather foreign support for themselves and would fight more or less as one entity against separate powers for their independence and self-determination from countries that have kept them separate and oppressed, whereas the Catalans are wealthy, part of a first world nation, and isolated; neither the EU nor the US would come to their aid if it came to war with Madrid, and other foreign powers that may or may not want to help would be risking an awful lot to ship arms to the Iberian peninsula, to say nothing of the devastation such a war would bring.
There is also the very real example of the Battle Of Athens, Georgia, right here in the US in 1946. Armed citizens rebelled against a brutal, corrupt local government and law enforcement entity - and won.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Athens_(1946)
Some tidbits from that I found quite interesting:
- The GIs recognized that they had broken the law, and that Cantrell would likely receive reinforcements in the morning, so the GIs felt the need to resolve the situation quickly...For the veterans it was win before morning or face a long time in jail for violating local, state and federal laws.
- The deputies knew little of military tactics, but the GIs knew them well.
- Governor McChord moved to activate the national guard but quickly rescinded the order.
- The new GI government of Athens quickly encountered challenges including the re-emergence of old party loyalties. On January 4, 1947, four of the five leaders of the GI Non-Partisan League declared in an open letter: "We abolished one machine only to replace it with another and more powerful one in the making."[36] The GI government of Athens, Tennessee collapsed.
- The Non-Partisan GI Political League had replied to inquires by veterans elsewhere in the USA with the advice that shooting it out was not the most desirable solution to political problems.
It's definitely an interesting story, though.
It's also worth noting that relatively speaking, American citizens are currently *less* well armed in comparison to the US military than we have historically been. American citizens used to routinely own the equivalents of battleships - large, extremely well armed merchant vessels, fully capable of laying siege and waste to coastal towns and cities. At one point the armed merchant marine had several multiples of the firepower of the entire US Navy; some armed US merchantmen even defeated or saw off front line units of the British Navy. This was considered normal.
I, for one, am glad it no longer is normal. Imagine one of these lone wolves with a cruise missile.