We face a peculiar dynamic in terms of weapons registration in my AO, which need not be that hard to resolve, but it is. Locals have weapons for sure, to include the ubiquitous AK-47 or variant, and some of the bigger players are known to control many weapons at once. The problem has arisen, however, that they are afraid to keep these weapons around for fear of being connected to the insurgency and a weapons facilitator, so in at least one case the weapons are reported to be buried. What is truly odd is the fact that these same villagers complain about being strong-armed and intimidated by the Taliban, yet have never reported a single instance where they used weapons to defend themselves. To some degree, they are caught between the proverbial rock and hard place of openly carrying an AK and risking getting fired upon by coalition forces, or being attacked by the Taliban for appearing to be actively defending themselves and putting up resistance. We assess that the average man who wants to register his weapon with GIRoA is even too afraid to take it to the DC in order to have its serial number recorded and logged into a district registry.

The bottom line is that the locals do not seem to have weapons on them at the right time to defeat the insurgents’ actions. Giving them a weapons registration card doesn’t necessarily mean they are suddenly start carrying an AK-47 in a cross-body fashion while they farm their fields or tend to the goats. I think a win for everyone down here lies in the more widespread use of pistols. For starters, they are short range, conversational distance affairs, with lower risk of collateral damage. They are also easier to conceal. If a patrol or vehicle checkpoint comes across a local with one on him, he need do nothing more than what conceal carry permit holders do in the US, assuming he has registered his weapon with the district government. Retrieve the ID card surreptitiously and present it for review. The coalition forces involved need to have the savvy to not retrieve the weapon and brandish in front of every onlooker, but a cursory inspection on the card and the individual is all that is required.

This all requires an almost herculean effort to combine information operations messages, engagement with district officials, security forces mentoring approaches, patrolling strategies, biometrics collection efforts, and litany of other synchronized tasks in order to be accomplished, but it can be done with the appropriate amount of effort and sense of “give a you-know-what.”

Now, in the current environment, concerns abound about central government control and authority, and masses of armed civilians moving about the districts under arms and potentially massing on their own to take action outside the scope of normal law and order, or outside the scope of the security apparatus. This worries many people for certain, from the President himself, down to think-tankers who spend a lot of time analyzing the influence of small arms in failed or failing states, and instability. There is good reason for concern, but it need not result in hand-wringing. In fact, in those areas that are under-governed, an armed society can shape itself into a polite and civil society, and resist the influence of those knuckleheads who would seek to take over a village via their own inkblot strategy. Right now, learned helplessness is keeping these people on their knees, and it doesn’t need to be that way