Taliban is an interesting case, considering that (1) it's unpopular among many (maybe the majority of) Afghans, (2) it would have been better for almost everybody, even most Taliban recruits, if they fizzled out, and (3) you can trace its birth to foreign powers (US, Pakistan, maybe others) arming and training Afghans to fight their own geopolitical games.

Taken together, my take is that an armed and disenfranchised populace can be exploited by demagogues (and foreign powers) to destabilize the society, eventually overthrowing it, to the detriment of everyone in it.

Not exactly an argument for more guns in society.

I think these are two pretty different situations.

If civilian gun owners in the US tried to overthrow the US government, the US military would crush them in a heartbeat. Hell, with the level of militarization of many local police departments in the US, it might not even take the US military.

You can't really compare that to a reluctant, unpopular war fought in someone else's territory. The US was never going to commit the entirety of its military might to defeat the Taliban. And at any rate, it's probably more accurate to say that the Taliban defeated the poorly-trained, poorly-prepared (US's fault) Afghan Army, not the US military. I expect the US could have occupied Afghanistan indefinitely, holding back the Taliban, if we chose to.

" the US military would crush them in a heartbeat "

I think what we've seen in prior civil wars is that portions of the military will support both sides.

Just last year all the living former Secretaries of Defense penned a letter addressed to those serving in the military reminding them of their duty to the Constitution, not to any political figure. That these experts thought it necessary and pertinent to do this extraordinary act suggests that, yes, there's strong likelihood that significant portions of the military would factionalize into separate camps if civil unrest reached a certain pitch.

Then what are private firearms needed for? The local arsenal filled with assault rifles and rocket launchers is going to be a way better option...

Taking on the government isn't the reason most people own guns. There are other much more common reasons such as sport, hunting, self defense, etc. That said, if the armories are only stocked for roughly the population of the military, then there's little chance of arming a significant number of civilians that way. Not to mention the logistics would be a nightmare. The real usefulness of civilians owning weapons in that sort of scenario would be self dense, because the social/legal/etc structure would not be there to protect them. These are things we've seen to a limited degree in areas with violent rioting.

> If civilian gun owners in the US tried to overthrow the US government, the US military would crush them in a heartbeat. Hell, with the level of militarization of many local police departments in the US, it might not even take the US military.

The US military you know is not allowed, by law, to fight civilians. Only the national guard can, and that'll be quite hit and miss. The national guard is also under state control. The military would likely disolve and fight for both sides of civil conflict.

> If civilian gun owners in the US tried to overthrow the US government, the US military would crush them in a heartbeat.

This is such a reductionist argument. Many of those civilians used to be those military, and many of those military would no longer be military if this situation arose.

good point, but i'm speaking from a US-centric point of view. and so is this article. so i don't think the your taliban argument is a strong counterpoint to my claim.

The Taliban was fighting against the US though, with all their high-tech drones and such, which are usually cited as the reason that guns are futile against the state.

i don’t know enough about the military strategy that allowed the taliban to seize control, so i can’t argue with you there. but i do want to point out how your argument could be interpreted as advocating for guns so a tyrannical regime like the taliban can take over a government.

That is fair and I agree with the assessment!

My argument is advocating for guns so that a population can determine its own fate, and not be subject to either domestic or foreign top-down control against its own will.