Where Is The Militia?

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by Larry Pratt

During World War II, governors of east and west coast states called
up the citizen-militia to deal with the threat of invasion by the
Germans and Japanese.

Following 9/11, the governors did nothing and the federal government
created a new bureaucracy in Washington to coordinate federal police
agencies.

Everybody knows that Japan attacked Pearl Harbor, an act which was
followed by a congressional declaration of war in 1941. Many fewer
know that the Japanese made no plans to attack the American mainland
because of the militia, the armed populace.

Nationally renowned firearms trainer Massad Ayoob had a personal
conversation with a naval veteran. He reported (in Backwoods Home
Magazine earlier this year) that in the early 1960′s, Bob Menard
was part of joint maneuvers with the Japanese, many of whom were
World War II veterans. At dinner, one of the Japanese officers
explained why the Japanese did not invade:

The officer had replied that his country was well
aware that there was a high density of armed citizenry
in America, even state championships for private citizens
in the use of military rifles, and that the Japanese
were not fools to set foot in such quicksand.

The threat of Japanese attack was real enough at the time. The Japanese
did successfully occupy a couple of the Aleutian Islands in 1942, and it
cost 700 American lives to dislodge them.

Also in 1942, a Japanese sub fired shells at an oil refinery at Goleta,
California and later fired shells into the naval base at Fort Stevens,
Oregon.

In response, militia patrolled the west coast of the country during
those tense years.

In the east, a German submarine penetrated Long Island from a sub for
the purpose of blowing up bridges and water works. The saboteurs were
captured and executed. Civilian pilots and sailors patrolled the east
coast with their handguns and rifles at the ready.

Fifty years later, four gun-free zones flew right past the noses of the
professional police forces of the country. During the time the Muslim
mass murderers were preparing for 9/11, the FBI was investigating President
Clinton’s bete noire, the vast right wing conspiracy. They did not have
even a clue as to the real threat to America.

In spite of the national police force’s record of failure, even more
centralization of their power is being coordinated by Tom Ridge, the
director of Homeland Security.

The airplanes are still gun free, and we know from FAA inspectors that
they have been successful in slipping weapons through airport security
nearly fifty percent of the time. This is following the federalization
of airport security personnel.

The President and his subordinates have opposed even arming pilots.
(Would it have been a bad thing or a good thing if a passenger or two
had had a gun on the planes of 9/11?)

The Constitution provides for the militia. It gives the Congress power
to provision the militia and to select its officers.

Why are the citizen militia not being called up to guard bridges,
waterworks, nuclear plants, and airports? They have as much training
for this as the National Guard and other military units that have been
assigned for some of these duties — none. Other than Military Police,
the training of the military is to search and destroy — not exactly
the training needed for protecting nuclear power plants. Why was the
militia good enough for providing homeland security in the 1940′s,
but not in 2002?

We should not stretch our Clinton-decimated military further than it is
now. We should be calling up and training citizen militias.

Perhaps the idea of using “civilians” violates the unconstitutional notion
that security can only be provided by a centralized, professionalized police
force. The people cannot be trusted, in this view, to participate in providing
their own protection.

This notion of a centralized police fits comfortably with the growing
acceptance that only the federal government can provide for all of life’s
needs — education, old age, unemployment, health, etc.

The growing preemption of American life by the federal government has no
room for individual responsibility. Rather than encourage the militia,
politicians are busily looking for ways to disarm more and more Americans.

It is an unconstitutional view. Those that hold it should not be trusted to
hold public office.

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Larry Pratt is executive director of Gun Owners of America, a nonprofit
lobbying organization based in Virginia.