Surprise! Communist Chinese Support U.S. Gun Control

by Larry Pratt

And now — as they used to say on the old “Monty Python” TV show –
something completely different. The Information Office of Communist
China’s State Council has issued a report — U.S. Human Rights
Record 2000 — criticizing human rights in America.

That’s right. The country where Communism has killed an estimated
100 million people, the country whose leader Mao Tse-tung was once
listed in the Guinness Book Of Records as history’s greatest mass
murderer, is complaining about human rights in our country.

And — surprise! — one of the things the Red Chinese don’t like
about our country is that many of our citizens keep and bear arms.
In a section about the ways in which our freedoms are supposedly in
jeopardy, it is said: “The United States, the only country where
carrying a private weapon is a constitutional right, is a society
ridden with violence…. The excessive number of privately owned
guns has resulted in countless gun-related assaults, resulting in
tragedy for many innocent people.”

OK. So, what is there to say about this breath-taking hypocrisy on
the part of the Chinese Communists regarding human rights? Well, the
first thing is that, ironically — unlike the Liberal gun-grabbers
in our country — the Red Chinese at least acknowledge that private
America citizens do have a Constitutionally-protected right to keep
and bear arms.

But, of course, their report says nothing at all about the fact that
as many as 2,500,000 of us, annually, use guns in self-defense to
protect our lives, the lives of our family and friends, and our
property. Why was this information omitted? This report doesn’t say.
So, we contacted the Communist Chinese Embassy in Washington DC to
ask why, and other questions. Here’s the way our interview went with
Yuan Yuan Zhang, press spokesman for the Red Chinese government:

Q: Is there a constitutional right to keep and bear arms for
private citizens in your country?

A: Certainly not.

Q: Is it illegal in your country for private citizens to keep and
bear arms?

A: It is not — one has to get a permit to carry weapons. Of course
some people carry weapons because of their official duties such as
policemen or soldiers.

At this point, Zhang tells how four or five years ago in suburban
Peking some private people had guns to shoot pheasants and rabbits.
But, “later on the government asked them to surrender their weapons,
actually purchased back their weapons,” he says, laughing.
“Purchased back”?! Strange phraseology here since the government
never owned these guns.

Q: So, why were these guns confiscated by your government?

A: Well, sometimes you had a weapon in your closet and then someone
stole it and that may uhhhh, you know, cause some trouble….
Sometimes people just make their own rifles from makeshift shops
and turn out some kind of very primitive type of gun.

Q: And what happens if a person does this, if a person has a gun
but no government permit?

A: That’s a crime. That’s a big crime.

Q: Does a big crime mean a fine and jail?

A: Yes! It would be dealt with in accordance with the criminal
code.

Zhang explains that his government bans the private ownership of
guns to ensure “the social tranquility and safety and security of
the population.” This is why they “confiscate or buy-back” weapons
possessed by private persons.

Q: Why does your report make no mention of the fact that as many as
2,500,000 Americans use guns every year in self-defense?

A: I have a sense we are going to have a very long conversation. I
have to go. I have a lunch engagement in three minutes.

Q: Are you aware that millions of Americans use guns in
self-defense every year?

A: Yes. I am aware of that. I’ve been in this country for many
years. I know people use guns principally to defend themselves. But
even very decent citizens who have guns at home may sometimes find
that their weapons have been put to, you know, very wrong use –
good things in the wrong hands, you know.

Q: And sometimes people in the government who have guns put them to
wrong use, too. Did you know that?

A: (After long pause) Of course I know that. Sure.

But, Zhang adds: “We are not challenging the Constitutional right in
the U.S. We’re just presenting the basic facts. Yours is the only
country in the world that the Constitution allows its citizens to
carry guns.”

Q: But, why does your report leave out the basic fact that many,
many times more Americans use guns for good things, like
self-defense, than use guns for bad things?

A: [Our report] is not intended to be a very, very exhaustive study
of gun issues. It is just a short article trying to tell people the
human rights situation in the United States. It is not perfect. We
may be wrong about this gun-related matter. But we see this as one
of the areas in which we think the American peoples’ human rights
are in jeopardy because of this excessive ownership of guns.

Q: Are you aware that America won its freedom and independence
because, among other things, many of our private citizens had guns?
Do you know this?

A: Of course I know that. And you know Chairman Mao’s famous
quotation?

Q: Yes. He said that political power comes out of the barrel of a
gun.

A: We needed guns to fight back the Japanese invaders. We have 100
million men in our militias with guns.

Q: But, your point about Chairman Mao’s quotation is very
interesting. He said what he said when he was a private citizen and
not a member of the government, right?

A: Right.

Q: So, under your present laws, Chairman Mao would not have been
allowed to have guns!

A: I’m trying to figure out your point.

End of interview.

In their book Lethal Laws (Jews For The Preservation Of Firearms
Ownership, 1994) — which is about how “gun control” has been the
key to genocide in many countries throughout history — authors Jay
Simkin, Aaron Zelman and Alan M. Rice note that just as in Nazi
Germany “gun control” was the key to Mao Tse-tung’s genocide
especially during the so-called “Great Leap Forward” (1957-60). At
this time, “the government’s imposition of policies that promoted
massive rural starvation plainly depended on its monopoly of armed
force.”

Communist China’s first “gun control” law was enacted by the
Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress on October 22,
1957. Article 9 barred the unauthorized making, purchasing,
possession, repair, or use of firearms or ammunition “in
contravention of safety provisions.”

On September 2, 1983, the Second Meeting of the Standing Committee
of the Sixth National People’s Congress approved a law titled “On
Severely Punishing Criminals Who Gravely Endanger Public Security of
the Society.” This law stated:

(1) The following criminals who gravely endanger public security
of the society may be punished more heavily than the severest
punishment currently stipulated in the Criminal Law, and may be
punished by the death penalty.

And who might some of these “criminals” be who deserve death? Among
those listed in this law: “A person who illegally makes, trades,
transports, steals or purloins weapons, ammunition or explosives in
a particularly serious way or with serious consequences.”

But, of course, what really endangers the security and freedom of a
people is when the only ones who are legally allowed to keep and
bear arms are those who work for the State. This way lies true
tyranny. We must hope and pray this never happens in America.

— GOA —

[Larry Pratt is Executive Director of Gun Owners of America located
at 8001 Forbes Place, Springfield, VA 22151 and at
http://www.gunowners.org on the web.]