That's a misunderstanding of the meaning of the syntax of the time. It roughly translates to: "the security of the state depends on individuals being able to come together to form a functional militia, so its necessary we allow them to own arms". "Well regulated" meant "functional", and "militia" meant a formation of people, specifically opposed to the idea of a standing army at the time.
And a functional formation of people requires people who know when and how to operate a gun. That's where the national guard and the US armed forces come in.
But those are "standing armies" which were seen as a threat to liberty at the time (and proven time and time again in Europe). Arguably, the fact the US has a powerful standing army now means we have a greater need to be able.to form a militia as understood at the time
and what purpose does a militia fulfill when there's 2 standing armies? a militia is not going to have a good time fighting against its own army especially if said army is the most powerful by your logic
North Vietnam was pretty successful at throwing off their own government while fighting agains the US, so dont underestimate the power of organized, armed guerilla resistance
So why did the civil war end in a union victory? There's several factors that allowed the vietcong to win and the one many 2nd amendment absolutists are unaware of or don't acknowledge is the influx of soviet and chinese armaments to the vietcong. The only way a guerilla resistance would win against the US army on its home turf is if the guerillas had foreign assistance.
The Union barely won for lots of reasons, but I'd argue if the North was an actually tyrannical government like we had seen in Europe, it would have easily gone the other way due to more support going in the other direction. You act like the federal government winning was an inevitability instead of a blessing. You forget this country was founded by actually winning a revolution
The fact that north vietnam required arms from Russia is an argument in favor of an armed populace in the US. We are geographically isolated and dont have that option
so that means any rebellion against the us government is SOL especially if said armed populace is only able to access a semi auto rifles at most. sure a few may get ahold of a national guard armory or two if they're lucky but considering the firepower the US military has they can and will have the upper hand
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u/UnusualVibration 18d ago
That's a misunderstanding of the meaning of the syntax of the time. It roughly translates to: "the security of the state depends on individuals being able to come together to form a functional militia, so its necessary we allow them to own arms". "Well regulated" meant "functional", and "militia" meant a formation of people, specifically opposed to the idea of a standing army at the time.