Nadine Strossen's rationale for the ACLU's abandonment of the right to keep and bear arms is: "What it [the pro-gun position] comes down to is the very strong belief that having a gun in your home is something that can ultimately fend off the power of a tyrannical government. I find that really unpersuasive in the 20th-century context. Maybe it made sense in the 18th century."
Recent history offers numerous examples of lightly-armed men able to inflict grievous damage on vastly superior forces. Afghanistan's mujahadeen, initially equipped with archaic Lee-Enfield bolt-action rifles, stalled the Soviet Red Army for many years before receiving the advanced weapons from the West that finally tipped the balance of power in their favor. Chad's desert fighters managed to repel Moammar Gadhafi's tanks by the insanely brave expedient of shooting-up enemy supply convoys, mounting Libyan anti-armor weapons thus captured on their Toyota pickup trucks, and then charging the invaders in packs. In the former Yugoslavia, 5,000 Croat defenders carrying hunting rifles and Kalashnikovs were able to protect the city of Vukovar against 25,000 army troops and Chetnik irregulars backed by Soviet T-84 tanks and heavy artillery for eighty-nine days before they depleted their ammunition supplies and were overrun.
LF