Shooting Down A Gun Argument

Twitter Thread: (@JohnKaminar)

Folks, bear with me for a minute, please. I want to address a point that is often made by gun rights advocates, but which is a fallacy that civilians may not realize.

In the interest of full disclosure, I served 30 years in the Army and Army Reserve, I’ve taught marksmanship in the Army and supervised firing ranges and arms storage/security, and am a gun collector who supports the 2nd Amendment in that I believe that a law abiding citizen has the right to be armed if he or she so chooses, but I also believe that this right – like all of our rights – carries with it significant responsibilities.

So, my point: we often hear people say that since we trust an 18-year old soldier to carry an M-16 (the military version of the AR-15), then we should be comfortable allowing 18 year old private citizens to carry one.

But here’s what those folks are NOT telling you:

1. No brand new enlistee in the Army (or any branch of the military) is given a firearm on Day 1 of his/her service. They receive quite a bit of training in firearm safety before they ever are allowed to handle the weapon – even if they grew up around guns and know all about them.
2. When they do get to handle their M-16s for the first time, there are no bullets ANYWHERE around. After being trained in firearm safety, they are then trained on the weapon itself without ever firing a live round. They learn how to handle it, carry it safely, disassemble it, clean it, check it for functionality, and reassemble it.
3. When they finally do get to fire the weapon, they are closely, CLOSELY supervised by their sergeants and officers. In fact, when the trainees go to the firing range for the first time, there are almost as many sergeants on the range as there are trainees. And some of the sergeants are assigned the specific responsibility for ensuring everything is done according to Army safety regulations.
4. Once the recruits finish their training and join their units, they NEVER get to carry their firearms around. Those weapons are kept in the unit arms room under double lock and key – each weapon is locked into its storage rack and the arms room itself is locked. And the arms room is protected by an alarm system.
5. No soldier of ANY rank can simply go to the unit armorer (the sergeant responsible for the arms room) and say, “Gee, Sergeant, may I please sign out my M-16? I feel like exercising my 2nd Amendment right today by carrying my rifle around just because I can.” No, the troops only sign out their weapons for authorized purposes, such as marksmanship training or field exercises, and when they do that, they are ALWAYS under the supervision of a sergeant – usually under the supervision of several sergeants and a few officers, to boot.

So, friends, that’s the rest of that story. Those 18 year old soldiers whom we trust to carry an assault rifle are doing so under conditions so tightly regulated as to make any gun rights activist blanche in anger.

The military recognizes that those weapons are so deadly that they never allow soldiers to just carry them around on the installation.

Those are the facts of the matter. So the next time one of your gun rights advocating friends tries to feed you that particular line, you can refute them with the facts.