I mention his origins because at the same time, scandals were washing around the feet of the Liberals, and especially Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, over his embarassing links to the Chinese Communist Party and the CCP’s illegal activities in Canada. Since Trudeau has, like his late, unlamented father Pierre, often expressed his admiration for the Red Chinese and their regime, it makes one wonder.
Mikhail Khodorkovsky is in an excellent position to comment on Russia’s future, having fallen foul of Vladimir Putin, lost his considerable fortune, and ended up in Gulag 2.0, as we can characterize the rejuvenated Russian network of labor camps. In 20 years, it has descended to serious police-state status. I don’t know the state of private gun ownership in Russia; I do know that oligarchs like Khodorkovsy kept Purdey and Holland & Holland thriving for a decade. H&H even had a gunshop in Moscow.
The Russian criminal class certainly does not lack for guns, mostly military, but I rather doubt they would be on the front lines of a democratic revolt.
But armed revolutions are not carried out with Purdey game guns and Holland double rifles. It requires a citizenry not unlike the one that exists in the United States, with its Second Amendment, and which is still hanging on in Canada. Anyway, guns come second; what comes first is the concerted will to act.
Those who argue that the Second Amendment is an anachronism, and that such conditions don’t exist today and never will again, should also consider this: With an armed populace, potential despots think twice before acting; with a population that is helpless, they have free reign.
Gray’s shooting editor Terry Wieland was a journalist in Canada during Pierre Trudeau’s time as prime minister and saw him at work first-hand. As well, one of Wieland’s oldest friends wrote a book about Trudeau’s Bolshevik leanings in the mid-1970s. He’s hanging on to every gun he’s got.
