Posted on 08/12/2011 7:56:16 AM PDT by Travis McGee
Resistance to Tyranny begins with a chapter entitled “Why Armed Resistance?” Martino explains that international warfare was not the 20th Century’s greatest killer, but rather that official government tyranny holds that position of dishonor by a very wide margin. He then explores the link between gun control and state genocide, going through the historical cases of Turkey, the Soviet Union, Germany, China and other countries. Then, brick by brick, Martino builds the case for the morality of armed resistance to tyranny, postulating a “just insurgency doctrine” similar to the more familiar “just war” doctrine.
In the first five chapters Martino studies past rebellions and insurgencies from the American Revolution to the present day, to draw out and explore their timeless lessons. He also examines the government reactions to these insurgencies, starting with the crushing of dissent via state propaganda and the creation of enemy classes, use of economic leverage, deliberately nurturing crime waves for the purpose of installing police-state controls, through the full spectrum of violent repression by a gangster state. Martino’s analysis is consistently well thought out, lucid and downright fascinating in this overview of the eternal struggle between the forces of repression and freedom.
It would not be possible to examine the remaining contents of the book in any meaningful detail in a short review. In the interest of brevity, here is a partial listing of the remaining chapter titles, to give you an idea of the ground that is covered:
- Overt and Covert Resistance, - Personal Weapons, - Personal Equipment, - Survival Skills, - Camouflage and Concealment, - Boobytraps, - Weapons Caching, - Logistics, - Training, - Secure Base Camps, - Safe Houses, - Communications, - Encryption and Codes, - Ambushes, - Sniping, - Sabotage, - Raids, - Strategic Intelligence, - Tactical Intelligence, and - Counterintelligence.
The information is current; for example, taking into account the use of UAVs for covert population surveillance, internet data-mining, and other evolving technological frontiers.
This book is meant to be a primer, and not a collection of nuts-and-bolts tips to be employed in the field. For example, the chapter on boobytraps does not include details on how to build them, but rather lays out the general types of devices and the principles of their employment, as well as their pros and cons. For those who wish to study the subject matter in greater depth, at the end of each chapter there is a bibliography.
If Resistance to Tyranny is a primer for successful insurgency, then the entire reading list included would constitute a post-graduate education. The content that was mastered and then synthesized by Martino in order to produce this work is staggering. For that effort alone he deserves our hearty salute.
Here is just one of the hundreds of titles cited in the book, in this case with Martino’s comments following: “U.S. Army and Marine Corps Counterinsurgency Field Manual (U.S. Army Field Manual No. 3-24), University of Chicago Press. Undoubtedly the finest manual ever written on the subject. It will almost certainly be used by tyrannical governments faced with freedom-oriented resistance forces, as well as by democratic governments faced with communist or fascist insurgencies. Resistance forces should study it carefully, to prepare for government counter-operations. (Also available as a download at http://www.fas.org/irp/doddir/army/fm3-24.pdf ).”
That is just one of the countless nuggets and gems contained in Resistance to Tyranny.
Martino’s examination of likely government counterinsurgency tactics could be particularly helpful to those who may be at personal risk during a future time of official state repression. If cruel history is a guide, today’s patriotic and freedom-oriented opinion leaders will likely be considered tomorrow’s potential dissident leaders by a state gradually turned tyrant. Punishment for resisting tyranny may range from the loss of employment all the way to the gulags or worse.
Martino points out that the period while a nascent insurgency is attempting to emerge is particularly dangerous. He even cites historical examples of the establishment of bogus resistance organizations created for the covert purpose of identifying enemies of the state through false-flag recruitment. This is certainly something to consider in the internet era, with anonymous government-sponsored provocateurs busily typing away.
‘Keyboard commandos’, indeed.
If you believe in your heart that your homeland could never be dragged down into a dictatorship, Resistance to Tyranny will be of no interest to you.
But perhaps you are not so sanguine about your country’s future, and you observe your government in action with growing trepidation. If you would rather shape your own future and influence events in the ongoing struggle for human freedom, and not merely allow yourself to be buffeted by the storm winds of possible coming strife, you should not only read this book but study it. If and when the conditions are met for a “just insurgency,” books like this may be banned and will certainly not be as easily obtainable as they are today, during freedom’s long eclipse. (Of special note to those who prefer reading on electronic tablets: e-books may disappear into the ether with the same alacrity with which they appeared on your screen. Consider what is truly saved, and what is not. You might consider purchasing a dead-trees copy of this and similar titles.)
Resistance to Tyranny is an up-to-date study of insurgency methods, tactics and strategies. I recommend it most highly. If you believe that at this juncture it is critical to be a student of civil conflict throughout history, you should give Joseph Martino’s outstanding contribution to the cause of freedom a place of honor on your patriot’s bookshelf. While always hoping, of course, that the information it contains is never needed … except to entertain your unceasingly inquisitive mind on all matters of the gloriously messy and commonly unjust human condition.
Me, the poster of this thread and author of this review, or Martino, the author of the book?
I wish, but sadly not so. It is a (meager) living though.
Once a civilization starts down the road to destruction there’s not much that can be done. I wish that I could say that there would be a point where the true patriots would rise up and lead this country back to it roots but I don’t see that happening. Even here on FR most people are supporters of the police state that is rising up around us. The war on drug/terror/domestic violence/deadbeat dads/whatever have been used to justify horrible abuses of our constitutional rights and whenever the topics come up here you have a majority that thinks that’s just as it should be! Most conservatives are the same as most Liberals when it comes to cheering on the police and giving them ever more authority over our lives. Bit by bit we are becoming the CCCP but like the frog slowly boiled we won’t realize it until it is too late.
That plus the ability of the government to find out what you are planning would make it absurdly easy to break up any “terrorist” plot before you could get three guys to agree on the name of your organization. The Federal government has just become too strong to resist with small arms, it can’t be done and it’s foolish to even think that it can. Plus as I said you won’t have any State supporting you and neither will you have the general population with you (they’ll be too busy watching dancing with the stars to be bothered and even if they did think about for more than 2 seconds they would take the welfare state over what you’d be offering 99.9999% of the time).
The only true counter balance to the Federal governments power was long ago destroyed in the Civil War. Now states don’t even have their own armies (militia) but have a federalized army (the National Guard) that can be called on by the federal government to put down any state government uprising (just look at what happened during the 1960’s when Alabama tried to resist the federal courts orders, yep, it was the National Guard the Kennedy called out). So sorry but any hope of resisting the federal government ended around 1865.
Hey man, well, just don’t bust my image of you out cruising the high seas with buxom women as your crew.
Another great book that’s still applicable
Total Resistance:
You only outline one scenario. You haven’t accounted for the most likely scenarios, such as a financial collapse whereby the people are fed up and want to toss the fed out. You assume there is some plot to overthrow the US government by subversives, which is the least likely future and the most likely to fail.
“The Federal government has just become too strong to resist with small arms”
What does the federal government have but small arms themselves? You can’t count on the military to back the fed. The total number of armed officers, federal, State and local doesn’t even come close to 4 million and most don’t know the business end of their pistols. 15 million scoped deer rifles would make a mess of that force.
So, if I buy this book does this put me on some DHS list?
Oh, well I probably am anyway ;-)
If we start to curb our freedom-oriented reading based on fear of the govt, we’ve lost it already.
Only in my imagination. These days, all my thrills are vicarious.
Thanks for the fascinating ping.
An armed gang going after the Fed is the same as an armed gang going after the government and will get the same reaction. If things really do collapse you’re not going to have the resources to go after these guys anyway. You’ll be spending most of your time just trying to survive. Take a look at this were a guy that lived through the Argentina economic collapse give some practical advise.
I think we’ve all read Fer Fal’s writings. Good stuff, but Argentina was a far cry fom what this country will do if it goes down. We will take the rest of the world with us. Where is the fed going to get its resources if we have none? You act as though the fed is bigger than the whole of us. We are 200 million. The fed is 7 million employees, many that live among us. DC can be starved out fairly quickly. I don’t think anyone is going to give a single one of those employees a break if they find themselves at risk.
Like I said, if we really do collapse then we’ll all be more worried about where our next meal is coming from and most people would be willing to follow Satan himself if it meant that they could get a regular supply of food and water. At those times people don’t follow high minded concepts like the constitution but the rumbling in their belly. Advise you invest in a good bullet proof vest and CCW handgun, and lots of canned food.
Americans Buy a Close to 1 Million Guns in February 2011
In a SHTF scenario where there's a general crackdown on Constitutional Rights and an uprising by the populace, you forget the criminal/disenfranchised element that would also be taking advantage of the situtation as they are in London. Pre-occupied with those mobs, LEOs could little afford to do the bidding of would-be Tyrants in Mordor on the Potomac by opening up a new front against well-armed Patriots.
Doing so, en masse or even one Patriot at a time, would quickly decimate their ranks leaving it up to state level LEOs, again eventually decimated, and then to the Feds with no more local support resulting in even more local chaos. LEOs, even SWAT teams, are trained and equipped for mostly that: Law Enforcement and the possible suppression of an armed criminal or two, not the suppression of a well-armed general uprising. They also have families to protect and might be too pre-occupied with that to even show up for work.
With our own military having a tough go of it in smaller 3rd World countries like Iraq and Afghanistan, what makes you think the entire US could be easily suppressed??
"Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, Give me Liberty, or give me Death!"
You may decide the cause is hopeless, and kneel quietly with your eyes down.
Millions of others will not.
A quote by Sam Adams about chains comes to my mind.
You bet.
I’d just like to get as many copies of this book out in circulation while we are still free to purchase such items.
“Advise you invest in a good bullet proof vest and CCW handgun, and lots of canned food.
“
Most of us are WAY past that.
I agree. Argentina is only a model for certain aspects of what will surely happen here. Ours will be much worse, with factors included that don’t occur in Argentina, a basically homogenous European culturally Catholic country.
“Only in my imagination. These days, all my thrills are vicarious.”
You’re not dead yet. You’re not even old.
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