Could the Army be used to confiscate guns?

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Assuming this is a federal law, I don't think the Army is a law-enforcement agency.

Seems like the FBI or BATF would be more suited for this.
 
Back in the mid-90's, a survey was given to about 2000 active-duty marines, stationed at 29 Palms, that had served over-seas on UN peacekeeping missions.

Last question on the survey...
"The U.S. government declares a ban on the possession, sale transportation, and transfer of all non-sporting firearms. A thirty (30) day amnesty period is permitted for these firearms to be turned over to the local authorities. At the end of this period, a number of citizen groups refuse to turn over their firearms. Consider the following statement: I would fire upon U.S. citizens who refuse or resist confiscation of firearms banned by the U.S. government."
 
The Posse Comitatus act prohibits the U.S. Military (while in federal status) from engaging in civilian law enforcment. However, it is a statute and presumably could be repealed or modified to permit what you suggest.
 
With only 19%, though, you're looking at the whole military discipline system coming undone. It effectively means that there would be sufficient opposition as for it to not be practical. Additionally, and this is something many people may not know, a soldier has a duty and a right to refuse an unlawful order, and to defend and uphold the US Constitution. Given that this order would violate the US Constitution, it would be highly unlikely the military would enforce it. It is far more likely, though, that they start declaring that, for "emergency reasons", firearm possession in a given area is not allowed, and disarm the people one region at a time.
 
I think some states have passed laws that wouldn't allow this. In any event, we need to push to get our freedoms back when it comes to guns, but in general.

Glenn Beck has a show Friday night, WE SURROUND THEM (fox news at 5:00 eastern / 4:00 central) watch it. Government works for us.
 
Quiet said:
Back in the mid-90's, a survey was given to about 2000 active-duty marines, stationed at 29 Palms, that had served over-seas on UN peacekeeping missions.

Last question on the survey...
"The U.S. government declares a ban on the possession, sale transportation, and transfer of all non-sporting firearms. A thirty (30) day amnesty period is permitted for these firearms to be turned over to the local authorities. At the end of this period, a number of citizen groups refuse to turn over their firearms. Consider the following statement: I would fire upon U.S. citizens who refuse or resist confiscation of firearms banned by the U.S. government."

And that was given by another Marine that was working on his thesis and the response was not just no but "Hell No" in the overwhelming majority of answers....
Further federal law prohibits the use of American troops against US citizens.
 
I dont see how the government could ever have a solid enough reason to ever convince anyone that removal of our second ammendment would be o.k also I could see the armed forces as a whole refusing to violate our rights that so many have fought and died for.
 
Those surveys underestimate the ingenuity of an Army Private/Specialist for work-to-rule and goldbricking. "Yes, Sar'nt. We went house to house just like you said. Nope [grinning]; not a one. Guess they all got lost in that big fishing disaster they all talk about."
 
Are we talking about legislation that passed that does this with a certain class of guns? If so we could also assume it has survived court tests. Or, are we talking about some kind of coup in which the executive dictates this be done? In the latter case we are talking about another civil war with our armed forces dividing and fighting each other.
 
woof: "In the latter case we are talking about another civil war with our armed forces dividing and fighting each other."

Let's clear this up once and for all: The United States Army did not "divide" or "fight itself" in our 1861-1865 War Between the States. Some United States Army officers honorably or otherwise resigned their commissions and formed a new Confederate Army, and some United States Army enlisted men honorably or otherwise either quit or deserted, and joined the Confederate Army. Our soldiers most likely will not "fight each other" in any future American intrawar. More likely there will be a crisis of command, which will be resolved, possibly by force. The idea of individual American fighting commands fighting one another is so repugnant as to be almost inconceivable.
 
I suspect most (ie 70-80%) of people in uniform (Police, Fire dept, Army, Navy, Marines, Air Force, Coast Guard) have had one or two nightmares on what if ordered one day out of the blue to do some gross violation of the constitution like confiscate all guns, arrest a small city, bomb and strafe a bunch of peaceful protesters with aircraft, asked/ordered to be part of a coup; etc. stuff like in 1980's Soviet Union.

Their reply would be either a "Hell no. You are under arrest for ordering me to that." to a lying "Yes" (wink, wink) followed by mass defection to the side of the protesters since the "official" side has clearly gone to tyrannical evil and/or insane.

People easily forget soldiers and police are people too and would have friends and family among those they were ordered to arrest/murder, or would be reminded of them and that they serve the USA, not tyrants, hence a lot would say "Hell no. You're under arrest."

Go USA!
 
I dont think the Marine or Soldier will carry through a order to fire on thier families, friends and the people in thier towns and cities because these people exercise the rights of 2A. Just as those Solders and Marines do when they are at home and not on Duty.

We would probably see that as a unlawful order and I think it will make our Government as Elected responsible in the end for attempting such a act.

I dont mind Harboring Soldiers and Marines in time of war at home which provisions allow for, but I must treat those who invade or unlawfully try to seize or take by force arms or anything from the home as unlawful acts.

Freedom hanging by a thread indeed. It will not be the first time we go through this.
 
Never say it won't an can't happen...times change..They said Prayer could never be takin out of school...they said abortion could never be legal...the other day Glenn Beck said there are now 15 % of Americans have no faith in God, twice as much from 1990....

" Men must be governed by God or
they will be ruled by tyrants."
William Penn
 
This is a more difficult question than some might guess. The primary responsibility of the soldier is to support and defend the Constitution of the United States. What you and I see as an infringement on constitutional rights could be effectively portrayed as a necessary exercise of executive and legislative power in the face of a national emergency.

The WW II interment of Americans of Japanese ancestry was, in fact, determined by the Supreme Court to pass constitutional muster, but I think it's fair to say that current legal thinking calls those decisions into serious doubt. Legislation, followed by a Supreme Court decision upholding gun confiscation, would place the military in a real quandary.

The assault on freedom is unrelenting, and we need to fight it in every form, whether it originates from liberals or conservatives.
 
I have actually discussed this with a couple of my commanders. They can't see it ever getting as far as them, it would have to go past posse commitatus, court challenges of the order being in direct conflict with the Bill of Rights, expensive, ineffective, and yet another layer of national guard troops being federalized to carry out an order in conflict with state law.

And yes, we also discussed that we all swore an oath to defend the Constitution, and that all orders must legal, ethical, and moral to be legitimate, and that order would be none of those.
 
One only needs to look at the comments of soldiers put on the ground in the Katrina aftermath.

They were willing to shoot Americans, setup cehckpoints to confiscate weapons, and go block by block for a greater good.
Many of them were unhappy about it, but convinced themselves it was for the best, and certainly better than being a bad soldier and illegaly refusing to follow an order.

Last year a portion of the military was set aside just for domestic use. Primarily disaster support, whatever that disaster may be (including civil unrest.)
They were put under the command of United States Northern Command. Or NorthCom.
Northcom is entirely for domestic use, setup after 9/11 to respond to and control domestic situations.
In October 2008 they were given an Infantry division. The 3rd Infantry, First Brigade Combat Team.


Multiple detention facilities have been constructed across the United States under various government contracts. One such contract went to KBR. KBR is the former subsidiary of Halliburton, the company Dick Cheney was CEO of from 1995-2000.
A $385 million contract from the Department of Homeland Security to provide "temporary detention and processing capabilities."
That was just the initial contract and figure. Much more has been spent.

Numerous private "for profit" prisons have also been being built in recent years, ready to take prisoners from any source.
Private for profit prisons make more money the more people they have locked up. There is no incentive to reduce the prisoner population (like in state and federal prisons), and great incentive to increase it.


Since 9/11 there has been widespread domestic spying most people are not aware of because most lawsuits brought to court on it have been dismissed under "sovereign immunity".
At the same time the purchase of vhast data storage facilities in multiple states has been happening. With the Federal Government doing the purchasing.

Some such lawsuits were brought by the EFF or Electronic Frontier Foundation, and the ACLU.
It came to light super computers were being installed in most of the big communication giants, to monitor all electronic data.
Of course that amount of information is greater than any human being can review, so various software methods are used to red flag things for further review. Unless they have a need to review a specific source or person.
Most of the data can be stored for a length of time.
This data is not just internet traffic, but things like cell phone information. They can tell anywhere a phone has gone for the previous several months. Any Cell phone on the move is constantly getting reception from new cells, and record of where it is pinged is kept. You see this in many investigations today to review where a person was known to have been.

NarusInsight was the name of the system being installed in the major hubs of telecommunication giants like Verizon, AT&T, etc etc etc
Those companies acknowledged it, but said essentialy they could not discuss such things if they were going on because they would be a matter of national security. And more than implied they were under federal law not to discuss those things because they were going on.
A former AT&T employee who helped set one up even blew the whistle. Rooms requiring a security clearance were having all information sources routed through them.
http://www.eff.org/issues/nsa-spying
This was conducted by the NSA.
The head of the NSA during the time most of this was thought up and put into motion was Michael Hayden, appointed as head of the CIA under Obama.

Thier lawyers told them it was legal, so since under Soveriegn immunity nobody could challenge them, it was "legal". Great how that self review works?

between October 23, 2001, and October 6, 2008, resting on legal analysis that they now admit was "doubtful," the OLC took the unqualified position that the Fourth Amendment did not apply to domestic wiretapping conducted by a military entity
http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2009/03/bush-administration-asserted-fourth-amendment-did-


There is much much more, and hundreds of citations and links to verify everything here.
It sounds like something some wierdo with a tin foil hat would have dreamed up back in the 90's, but it has been reality in the 2000's.

Everyone is tracked, most information is recorded. The only limitation is the ability to review it because it is such massive amounts of information.
As data storage capabilities increase however, more and more of the data can be stored for longer periods of time, just in case something is later red flagged.


Military personal are also learning a lot in places like Iraq in how to control a population even with elements of the population willing to resist (and they have RPGs.)
There is no question the army could be used for confiscation, and different sources of intelligence could make operations very successful. The only question is will they be. Probably not, hopefully not.
 
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And it would also be a serious infringement on states' rights. Let's not forget that even though we are a union that states still carry quite a bit of autonomy, and the federal government ordering federal soldiers to go state to state to disarm the populous would be an act of imperialism IMO, and would be seen as a direct attack on the rights of the individual states.

In Texas especially, I can't imagine that going over too well.
 
What was the name of the movie, the 4th die hard movie.. super computers that record all info.

Technology is there. Besides, I was just able to pull up a cached copy of my website that was fairly obscure from 5 years ago. =P
 
super computers that record all info.

Technology is there. Besides, I was just able to pull up a cached copy of my website that was fairly obscure from 5 years ago. =P
Funny because it was the type of tin foil hat thing people imagined in the 90's.
Even movies like Enemy of the State tapping into that imagination.
It is funny seeing a movie like Enemy of the State today, where they plant bugs on someone. In reality they would just track the cell phone or the car's GPS service today. No need to phyisicaly plant anything.
They can even listen to anything a cell phone can hear, even where it is not being used, and have been able to since the 90's.
It was used to listen to several mob figures and many other people before them and the FBI tried to keep it a secret relying on other evidence until it was necessary to finaly disclose it:
The technique is called a "roving bug"
http://news.cnet.com/2100-1029_3-6140191.html


Today it is being done.
Not only internet information, but everywhere you travelled with a cell phone every day will still be known months or years afterwards.
Private email, and many other records will still be in data storage long after you have deleted them, or even closed that account.

The only limitation is organization and the ability to review the vhast amounts of information, and the amount of data storage available, which increases every year as technology improves.
They also get better at organization all the time.
Human review will still be a limiting factor, so most review is software review, prioritzing certain flagged data for human review.
They can only employ so many thousands of humans to review the endless data, so they have to prioritize.

So random fishing has a limitation. Each employee can only review so many people per day, and they can only have so many thousands of employees. If however they take an interest in any individual that limitation means nothing.
 
Just to add on to this... If they say that all technology we have now was developed by government and military 15 years ago.... and now look at it this way, anything online is stored somewhere continents away, we catch white color crime based on an email someone sent years ago..... think of all the good stuff the private sector and government is working on right now. =)
 
I also think the idea of Americans fighting each other in what could only be called another civil war is repugnant. But I fear we are in trouble when we convince ourselves it can't happen here just because it is repugnant. The most repugnant potentialities are the ones we should be most prepared for.
 
there is no reason for the US military to confiscate weapons.. this would be far to dangerous for everyone involved.. all that would be done is removal of ammunition and reloading supplies the shelves and then, guns become paper-weights...
 
I observed Katrina via radar because it was probably necessary to get out of our area depending on it's path.

After the storm passed, I read one account of two soldiers holding a looter at gunpoint under a sitaution where the looter was not allowed outside at that time of day.

I dont mind that NorthCom has a few tens of thousands of Troops for Domestic use, but in face of storms like Katrina and other natural disasters, we most certainly dont want to be around for a month or two after such events because of what we see happening to NOLA after Katrina.

We had a tornado come through our area about a decade ago. The Gaurd was deployed blocking intersections to the controlled zone and we present ID proving that we live in the area before allowed passage. Usually there were no problems during those three days.

It was a difficult time for everyone because so many had loss. It is my belief that the Police Department in our area interfaced with and coordinated extremly closely with that of the Military which was ok.

But should something like that happen again, we dont intend to stick around. We will have go bags set up and gone in a few minutes time for a short vacation somewhere.
 
no they wont take them all at once,just assault weapons first,then the next and the next and so on..
 
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