School Shooting in Connecticut

[vamos scorcho]

 

I've yet to hear a good argument, to why Americans finds it necessary, to have guns easily accessible for everyone *looks at Smettingham*.

 

I know we already had this discussion in a previous thread like this. But I still honestly can't comprehend it, it just seems surreal to me that civilians should be caring firearms. And fuck if it's something you grew up with and it's part of you're culture or whatever, it's just a bad excuse. It makes no sense that people should be allowed to have guns.

 

What, are you still scared the Russians are coming or something?

I mean there's hunting I guess. It would be annoying for people who have spent their whole lives on the sport of guns to have it taken away from them, especially for olympic athletes and such. and plus how can u be a gun'sbraster without gun's?

 

 

 

I'm going to have to agree. We need stricter gun control. And that's it for me. I usually say, "Jefferson and the people who created this country would disagree," but my position has changed. It just needs to be stricter. I don't trust the Republican party not to instill some sort of mega-fascist state at some point, and that's why I've always said, "if this happens, we would really wish that we hadn't let them take away our guns."

[goDel]

If you're serious than write letter to your state governor (or whatever the main political chief of your state) explaining how you feel abut the gun laws in your state. Don't just complain about politics. Do something. Make your voice heard to those he's jobs it is to listen. And also understand that the gun-lobby is (apparently) very powerful. If not, those medieval gun laws would have been a thing of the past for years now.

 

Big money doesn't always win. See Obama vs. Romney. It doesn't happen often, but this time around, big money has lost.

 

Sorry if I sound pathetic. But the thing is, all these arguments are becoming pretty predictable and generally a waste of time, imo.

[Adieu]

 

If I had a kid going to school I would feel much more at ease knowing there are lots of armed people around my child able to protect them.

 

No you wouldn't. In fact, only an idiot or somebody without kids would even think that, let alone say it or write it.

 

 

 

Armed professionals or no protection whatsoever...I'll take the former. You know I'm probably a fucking idiot though. I'm glad that you are smart enough to know what I think and feel though.

[gmanyo]

 

 

If I had a kid going to school I would feel much more at ease knowing there are lots of armed people around my child able to protect them.

 

No you wouldn't. In fact, only an idiot or somebody without kids would even think that, let alone say it or write it.

 

 

 

Armed professionals or no protection whatsoever...I'll take the former. You know I'm probably a fucking idiot though. I'm glad that you are smart enough to know what I think and feel though.

 

Well I think that most families would be very uncomfortable knowing that there is a gun in every room there child is in at school. Just because a teacher has a gun doesn't mean a kid can't get ahold of it, or that a teacher is going to be safe with it, even if they are trained to be. The things are literally made for killing, and when used improperly they can kill things unintentionally. I guess I could see giving teachers tasers; no reason for a lethal weapon for self protection. In fact, why does anyone need a gun for self protection? Are guns actually easier to protect yourself with than a wide-spray taser anyway?

[sweepstakes]

I don't trust the Republican party not to instill some sort of mega-fascist state at some point, and that's why I've always said, "if this happens, we would really wish that we hadn't let them take away our guns."

 

This is the country whose "liberal" party barely bats an eyelash before signing off on multi-billion dollar contracts for more fighter jets when we already have the planet's biggest military. If our military forces start attacking civilians on American soil, do you really think the weapons available to civilians will suffice to defend against them? No. You'd be fucked. Your guns would not save you. And anyway, at that point, most, if not all, of the soldiers would realize how fucked the situation would be and would refuse to act as soulless machines for killing innocent people. I have a little more faith in the people of the military than that.

[Adieu]

 

The way I see it is that the only option is to

A) Make gun application extremely thorough

B) Cut down on people selling guns between each other

C) Arm many more people at schools and other public facilities.

 

If I had a kid going to school I would feel much more at ease knowing there are lots of armed people around my child able to protect them. As of right now public schools are too easy a target for shooters like this. I don't think that restricting gun laws is going to help too much and I'm not okay with the idea of an unarmed populous for numerous reasons. If we stopped the war on drugs and took a 1/4 of the money and put it towards "Gun Management" we could probably solve this issue for the most part. As it stands schools are too easy to infiltrate and harm people.

 

Although that guy's comments are in poor taste he is right about the bottom line. People are less likely to shoot up a place where they know they are going to get shot back at.

 

I also think easier access to marijuana and shrooms might go a long way in increasing people's empathy towards one another.

 

I don't think the type of weapon has anything to do with it, but it would be great if banning handguns had a positive effect. I just don't think the tool is the issue.

I honestly am not concerned about gun laws because of these shootings. It's the "whoops, left the gun out and my kid got ahold of it!" that scares me. Or the kids stealing the teachers' guns in rough neighborhoods. I mean, then EVERY crazy kid who could do a shooting can have access to a gun; just take the teacher's!

 

 

 

I mean I did't necessarily say that guns would be in the hands of teachers. We could just have more policeman patrolling schools or guarding the entrances like they do at courthouses. If a person or student steals someone's gun and wants to try and rampage a school there will be loads of other people with guns who could shoot them. Thus, lessening the chances of someone being stupid or crazy enough to grab a professional person's gun and also minimizing possible damage. I haven't heard of this being a reoccurring problem for officers otherwise we would probably hear about it. Something as simple as a safe that only recognizes authorized personnel's fingerprints might be a possible solution. Teachers regularly "carrying" firearms seems like a bad idea, but some sort of access might not be so bad. Obviously, there aren't easy answers to these types of problems. The trick really is to scare people away from schools when they consider doing something violent like this sort of in the same way that we deter people from robbing banks.

[joshuatxuk]

If you're serious than write letter to your state governor (or whatever the main political chief of your state) explaining how you feel abut the gun laws in your state. Don't just complain about politics. Do something. Make your voice heard to those he's jobs it is to listen. And also understand that the gun-lobby is (apparently) very powerful. If not, those medieval gun laws would have been a thing of the past for years now.

 

The gun lobby is so powerful and misguided it's actually drawing criticism from gun ownership advocates. NYC mayor Bloomberg wrote a quite scathing article about how counter-productive the NRA has become. They have morphed into a gun manufacturing lobbyist group, which is why they oppose sensible measures like mental health checks and regulating gun show sales, things that the NRA supported years ago.

 

There was enough opposition to a GOP measure in Texas that would allow concealed guns on campus that the bill actually died last session. This would of literally FORCED all state universities to allow concealed gun owners with the vague, hypothetical argument that it would make the campus "safer." I actually recall a Republican Senator ripping apart at the logic of the bill piece-by-piece with an array of questions: "how many students could bring a gun on campus? how many concealed gun owners are enrolled in school? etc." and determined a campus of say, 40,000 students less than 1,000 would even be able to bring a gun, if they choose to, and not all would ever be on campus at the same time. The effect would be negligible That's even assuming they could react to a shooting scene in a competent manner, which is highly unlikely, before the campus police could take action. (Who at the University of Texas at Austin btw have AR-15s and an armored vehicle in their arsenal).And this is the same bill Gov. Perry touted as "emergency legislation."

[SR4]

I've yet to hear a good argument, to why Americans finds it necessary, to have guns easily accessible for everyone. *looks at Smettingham*

 

I know we already had this discussion in a previous thread like this. But I still honestly can't comprehend it. It just seems surreal to me that civilians should be caring firearms. And fuck if it's something you grew up with, and it's part of you're culture or whatever... it's just a bad excuse. It makes no sense that regular people should be allowed to have guns.

 

What, are you still scared the Russians are coming or something?

 

tl;dr version of my rant: I don't want guns to be easily accessible, but it's more complicated than that.

 

I'd love to respond to this.

 

Again, I am only supporting the second amendment due to pragmatism, not due to moral belief. To me the Second Amendment was clearly designated to the raising of militia or national guard functions, and/or for practical purposes such as hunting and protection from other miscellaneous threats (remember, the US in the 1780s-1790s was half swamp, half unregulated territory with hostile natives and unclear territorial boundaries, half dense woodlands and hunting grounds....i know thats 3/2's, but just bear with me here).

 

I do not own a gun, nor would I ever wish to own a gun, other than for hunting purposes. I am against the idea of everyone owning a handgun, much less an assault rifle...but I believe that in the interest of both parties it might help to find a middle ground (far more extensive background checks, shit, psychological profiles, large taxes on handgun ammunition, etc.)

 

 

While this may seem hard for some people to understand, don't take this the wrong way, but if you are not from the US or from an area within the US (mostly rural communities), you might not completely understand the seriousness and complex nature of gun control. This has been an idea pushed amongst generations of Americans that strengthens with each successive decade. This is not a unified culture that is willing to wholesale acknowledge the validity of an across-the-board gun ban; if you don't believe me go talk to some prairie ranchers in the midwest or woodsmen in the middle of West Virginia. These are people that firmly believe that the 2nd Amendment applies to large guns/non-hunting rifles, etc., and they are not willing to negotiate.

 

Yes its ridiculous and yes I don't approve of it, so let me re-iterate just to be clear: I am not in favor of assault rifles, and if it were within a different society I would approve and am ethically in agreement with an across-the-board handgun ban. But the United States is in a unique and disturbing situation; I can unilaterally guarantee, and perhaps others around here who have lived in these areas can agree with this, that if the government outlawed guns in the United States, that you will have a very, very bloody period of confiscation. There are a lot of people in the United States that would have absolutely no qualms in blowing an FBI agent's head off if they believed their 2nd Amendment gun rights were being threatened.

 

The political culture of the current times certainly only helps to make this divide seem that more realistic: even if we were to go on the premise that these gun-nuts were completely delusional and paranoid, can you expect the situation to improve without bloodshed regardless of the overall moral righteousness of it?

 

I do however support the right to own hunting rifles. Believe it or not there are still large portions of the American population that hunt regularly for their food sources...without bringing animal ethics into it, there are other practical considerations. For instance, if you are a livestock rancher and you have a wolf or pack of wolves attacking and killing your cattle, are you supposed to wait for the Animal Control Services to drive a hundred miles over to your ranch to subdue/kill the wolf? What about your loss of cattle? Should the rancher be compensated by the public?

 

It sounds silly, and im rambling a bit, but I still maintain that the whole gun rights issue in the United States is immensely complicated, and its progressed past a simple "guns are good/guns are bad" argument.

 

 

 

If you're serious than write letter to your state governor (or whatever the main political chief of your state) explaining how you feel abut the gun laws in your state. Don't just complain about politics. Do something. Make your voice heard to those he's jobs it is to listen. And also understand that the gun-lobby is (apparently) very powerful. If not, those medieval gun laws would have been a thing of the past for years now.

 

The gun lobby is so powerful and misguided it's actually drawing criticism from gun ownership advocates. NYC mayor Bloomberg wrote a quite scathing article about how counter-productive the NRA has become. They have morphed into a gun manufacturing lobbyist group, which is why they oppose sensible measures like mental health checks and regulating gun show sales, things that the NRA supported years ago.

 

There was enough opposition to a GOP measure in Texas that would allow concealed guns on campus that the bill actually died last session. This would of literally FORCED all state universities to allow concealed gun owners with the vague, hypothetical argument that it would make the campus "safer." I actually recall a Republican Senator ripping apart at the logic of the bill piece-by-piece with an array of questions: "how many students could bring a gun on campus? how many concealed gun owners are enrolled in school? etc." and determined a campus of say, 40,000 students less than 1,000 would even be able to bring a gun, if they choose to, and not all would ever be on campus at the same time. The effect would be negligible That's even assuming they could react to a shooting scene in a competent manner, which is highly unlikely, before the campus police could take action. (Who at the University of Texas at Austin btw have AR-15s and an armored vehicle in their arsenal).And this is the same bill Gov. Perry touted as "emergency legislation."

 

 

 

 

absolutely. If the NRA ever had a practical social purpose, it died a long, long time ago. The NRA is nothing but a gun-centrist wing of fundamentalism and needs to die a horrible death.

[Adieu]

 

I don't trust the Republican party not to instill some sort of mega-fascist state at some point, and that's why I've always said, "if this happens, we would really wish that we hadn't let them take away our guns."

 

This is the country whose "liberal" party barely bats an eyelash before signing off on multi-billion dollar contracts for more fighter jets when we already have the planet's biggest military. If our military forces start attacking civilians on American soil, do you really think the weapons available to civilians will suffice to defend against them? No. You'd be fucked. Your guns would not save you. And anyway, at that point, most, if not all, of the soldiers would realize how fucked the situation would be and would refuse to act as soulless machines for killing innocent people. I have a little more faith in the people of the military than that.

 

 

 

I think you greatly underestimate the kind of firepower civilians have and also the lengths people will go to for survival. My concerns would also be for scenarios such as we were invaded and we need to resort to guerrilla warfare to take our country back. I take a better safe than sorry approach to things concerning armed citizens though. I would venture to guess that if we started restricting guns that armed crimes would go up as well.

[luke viia]

I think you overestimate the kind of firepower civilians have, lol. We certainly don't have drones to strike our government with.

[HoA]

-

[gmanyo]

 

 

The way I see it is that the only option is to

A) Make gun application extremely thorough

B) Cut down on people selling guns between each other

C) Arm many more people at schools and other public facilities.

 

If I had a kid going to school I would feel much more at ease knowing there are lots of armed people around my child able to protect them. As of right now public schools are too easy a target for shooters like this. I don't think that restricting gun laws is going to help too much and I'm not okay with the idea of an unarmed populous for numerous reasons. If we stopped the war on drugs and took a 1/4 of the money and put it towards "Gun Management" we could probably solve this issue for the most part. As it stands schools are too easy to infiltrate and harm people.

 

Although that guy's comments are in poor taste he is right about the bottom line. People are less likely to shoot up a place where they know they are going to get shot back at.

 

I also think easier access to marijuana and shrooms might go a long way in increasing people's empathy towards one another.

 

I don't think the type of weapon has anything to do with it, but it would be great if banning handguns had a positive effect. I just don't think the tool is the issue.

I honestly am not concerned about gun laws because of these shootings. It's the "whoops, left the gun out and my kid got ahold of it!" that scares me. Or the kids stealing the teachers' guns in rough neighborhoods. I mean, then EVERY crazy kid who could do a shooting can have access to a gun; just take the teacher's!

 

 

 

I mean I did't necessarily say that guns would be in the hands of teachers. We could just have more policeman patrolling schools or guarding the entrances like they do at courthouses. If a person or student steals someone's gun and wants to try and rampage a school there will be loads of other people with guns who could shoot them. Thus, lessening the chances of someone being stupid or crazy enough to grab a professional person's gun and also minimizing possible damage. I haven't heard of this being a reoccurring problem for officers otherwise we would probably hear about it. Something as simple as a safe that only recognizes authorized personnel's fingerprints might be a possible solution. Teachers regularly "carrying" firearms seems like a bad idea, but some sort of access might not be so bad. Obviously, there aren't easy answers to these types of problems. The trick really is to scare people away from schools when they consider doing something violent like this sort of in the same way that we deter people from robbing banks.

 

True. I wouldn't mind patrol of cops or whatnot; I think this is already done sometimes. But I also don't think that this would diminish the effect of also having gun control, and crazy people might still shoot the place up. Or maybe they'll just shoot other places up instead of schools, and then you've just moved the problem instead of fixing it. I also don't want police in every single public place I go to to make sure there isn't a shooting; it would be very costly and would be creepy.

 

Not only that, but this doesn't help the bigger problem of guns such as gang killings, plain ol' homicides, and suicides (which are the most common reason for gun deaths oddly enough). I personally think the biggest argument against gun control is that it could drive gangs to rule the gun circuit, causing more gang killings and the like.

[sweepstakes]

I don't doubt the lengths people will go to for survival. And historically that has been expressed primarily through hiding or persevering through horrible conditions like slavery or concentration camps.

 

As far as civilian firepower, they have automatic rifles and even vintage tanks but what about aircraft and heavy explosives, guided missiles, etc? I see what you're getting at and I think it would make a good story but it's just not realistic.

 

 

I can't help in these kinds of discussions but think of the fact that our primary frame of reference for the idea of armed defense by civilians is movies, video games, and Tom Clancy books, or (as mentioned before) pre-20th century history.

[SR4]

 

 

I don't trust the Republican party not to instill some sort of mega-fascist state at some point, and that's why I've always said, "if this happens, we would really wish that we hadn't let them take away our guns."

 

This is the country whose "liberal" party barely bats an eyelash before signing off on multi-billion dollar contracts for more fighter jets when we already have the planet's biggest military. If our military forces start attacking civilians on American soil, do you really think the weapons available to civilians will suffice to defend against them? No. You'd be fucked. Your guns would not save you. And anyway, at that point, most, if not all, of the soldiers would realize how fucked the situation would be and would refuse to act as soulless machines for killing innocent people. I have a little more faith in the people of the military than that.

 

 

 

I think you greatly underestimate the kind of firepower civilians have and also the lengths people will go to for survival. My concerns would also be for scenarios such as we were invaded and we need to resort to guerrilla warfare to take our country back. I take a better safe than sorry approach to things concerning armed citizens though. I would venture to guess that if we started restricting guns that armed crimes would go up as well.

 

 

 

the whole "rise up in case the govt becomes dictatorial and evil" argument has admittedly given me a lot of difficulty in processing....however I ultimately think that it is more bunk than realistically feasible.

 

For one, as most people mentioned, military technology makes civilians rebelling with medium firearms look like ants fighting a bear.

 

Second, armed rebellion by the direct citizenry is a bit of an invented fiction by more militant libertarians. There is always another motivating factor.

 

The Americans in the War of Independence had massive financial support from France towards the second half, providing money, armaments, and a navy against the British. Most of the Continental forces were led by people with former experience and armaments/connections from the British Army during colonial warfare and service. Second, colonists were forced to manufacture their own rather primitive ammunition, and support local gunsmiths simply because of their survivalist circumstances....this for the most part is close to a non-existent form of existence in modern US society.

 

Third, revolutions do not necessarily require violent rebellion to succeed....granted, this doesn't happen often, but take the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991....can you imagine what could have happened? Massive civil war, genocide, regional warfare based on longstanding ethnic tensions, etc. etc. Now, this pops up later on (South Ossetia being a big example), but it could have be absolutely massive in scope and scale....for some reason the ruling cadre of the Soviet Union at least in part acknowledged that it was time to fold or risk losing everything. SU troops also turned against their commanding officers (ie. Gorbachev, and later on the hard-liners that attempted the coup)

 

So in addition to that third point, we need to consider that the idea of an entrenched wealth elite might be true to some extent, it is never permanent, it can always change and collapse, and not necessarily and solely due to armed conflict from the disenfranchised public. I have plenty of criticisms with Occupy and other movements, but they have the right idea with mass demonstration in (relatively) non-violent protest.

 

If the conspiracy of a wealthy ruling Illuminati does turn out to be true, we are honestly completely and utterly fucked, regardless of how many assault rifles or grenade launchers we stockpile at home. See point No.1.

[SR4]

 

 

I can't help in these kinds of discussions but think of the fact that our primary frame of reference for the idea of armed defense by civilians is movies, video games, and Tom Clancy books, or (as mentioned before) pre-20th century history.

 

exactly. a lot of this "heroic farmboy-turned-soldier" rhetoric in modern day militia is largely an invented and/or outdated fiction.

[Guest Mirezzi]

Armed Teachers? What sort of fucking fantasy world do some people live in?

 

Or lemme guess, an Armed Private Security force patrolling schools? That's even more hilarious.

 

I guessed that you were either an idiot or had no children and now I realize it's likely to be both. The fetishistic attitude toward guns combined with the misconception that they're somehow "tools" is at the heart of why this will never be a meaningful or fruitful discussion in America. It's similar to the neoliberal notion that the way to address the latter day failures of Wall Street and banks is through more banks and more debt.

[SR4]

Armed Teachers? What sort of fucking fantasy world do some people live in?

 

Or lemme guess, an Armed Private Security force patrolling schools? That's even more hilarious.

 

I guessed that you were either an idiot or had no children and now I realize it's likely to be both. The fetishistic attitude toward guns combined with the misconception that they're somehow "tools" is at the heart of why this will never be a meaningful or fruitful discussion in America. It's similar to the neoliberal notion that the way to address the latter day failures of Wall Street and banks is through more banks and more debt.

 

 

is this in response to that exec. director's ludicrous quote?

 

nm i see its in response to Adieu.

[Guest Mirezzi]

 

Armed Teachers? What sort of fucking fantasy world do some people live in?

 

Or lemme guess, an Armed Private Security force patrolling schools? That's even more hilarious.

 

I guessed that you were either an idiot or had no children and now I realize it's likely to be both. The fetishistic attitude toward guns combined with the misconception that they're somehow "tools" is at the heart of why this will never be a meaningful or fruitful discussion in America. It's similar to the neoliberal notion that the way to address the latter day failures of Wall Street and banks is through more banks and more debt.

 

 

is this in response to that exec. director's ludicrous quote?

 

nm i see its in response to Adieu.

 

 

No, sorry. It was in response to AdieuErsatzEnnui.

[SR4]

yeah I didnt even see his suggestion until now....which I even think statistics would show it would greatly increase the risk of a school shooting, either from a stolen firearm or an overreaction/misfire from an officer.

 

edit: I dont have any statistics, so I might be full of shit, just going on a hunch here.

[Hoodie]

police officers already patrol schools. at least, where i'm from, we always had one officer on campus in middle and high school.

 

edit: not that it even helps. i figure if someone wants to commit suicide and kill a bunch of people, they're not gonna change their mind if there are armed people in the way.

[vamos scorcho]

I think you overestimate the kind of firepower civilians have, lol. We certainly don't have drones to strike our government with.

 

 

I disagree. If this was true, the war in Iraq + Afghan would have ended a lot sooner.

[vamos scorcho]

I would find it funny, how people seem so mystified ("I just can't imagine how people could be so horrible") if it wasn't so frustrating.

 

I mean, really? You can't imagine? Are you walking through life half asleep? Have you ever stepped in when someone was being bullied? Have you ever laughed at the weak?

 

This behavior is the standard. It's just a more extreme version.

 

One of the primary methods of discussion is to say: "If you (this and this thing that I disagree with) then you are responsible for the deaths of these children" Frankly, I am glad to see this kind of argumentation. It shows that we're finally waking up to the fact that everything is interconnected. So, so, so interconnected. The way I speak to my father in the morning is connected to the way I shop, the way I raise my kids, the way I look at politics. Everything is connected.

 

The way I think about guns is connected to the way I treat people.

 

 

 

This is HUGELY problematic but I have to let in a bit of optimism, a very, very serious bit of optimism. On Reddit, and elsewhere, my own Dad, a notoriously narrow minded Democrat... I've seen something new: the widespread realization that all our practices are intimately connected, and that we need a new way of thinking and talking and doing that can fit to our current situation.

 

We need a way of thinking the interconnection between the objective and the subjective. And I do feel that we have taken the first steps toward this.

 

 

 

 

 

"Do not politicize my child's death."

Our hearts are with you. We are going to make sure this never happens again. It is the duty of each and every living person to see the interconection between our daily actions and ways of thinking and treating one another, and the very political life. The "news" and "media" must be turned off and hut out. This is perhaps the one objective statement I can make. It is the responsibility and duty of all good men and women to turn off their cable news, permanently, to find news in a more secure setting, a setting of real people, who are there. As far as I'm concerned, the news media is not "information" or "fact," we need to realize this. Just because it's easy to turn on the news, and find "facts" does not mean anything. The reason it means nothing is that the "facts" are in fact tainted, and thus reversed by the subjectivity of news programming. So there is no difference between your getting news from NBC and Reddit word of mouth. NBC has no authority or relevancy.

 

 

I would recommend all news come from something like NPR. I think we need to spread awareness of the fact that cable news needs to be completely, 100% discarded.

[LimpyLoo]

"This behaviour" is not the norm. It doesn't happen in a vacuum. It requires emotional trauma, mental illness or a radical belief system.

[vamos scorcho]

"This behaviour" is not the norm. It doesn't happen in a vacuum. It requires emotional trauma, mental illness or a radical belief system.

 

I'm just noting the tendency for "average" people to gang up and lose sense of self. The "average" person commits genocide depending on circumstance.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Even still, I feel like I have to take back everything I've said. I feel guilty, because nothing I've written is any closer to the truth than a dog taking a shit in the grass. I have to apologize, because I'm entirely wrong.

 

The news isn't bad, first off. I can't pinpoint aspects, all I know is that everything I've written in this thread is irresponsible and stupid, and I'm sorry. I don't know what's going on any better than anyone else.

 

The most I can say, with any accuracy, is that I'm really sorry that another shooting has happened, and that it hurts knowing that the lives of many children have been taken or damaged. The most I can really say, as an ethical thought, is that love is a good thing.

[luke viia]

 

I think you overestimate the kind of firepower civilians have, lol. We certainly don't have drones to strike our government with.

 

 

I disagree. If this was true, the war in Iraq + Afghan would have ended a lot sooner.

 

 

I don't remember civilians winning those wars, but ok, point taken