Candidate Carson v. the Truth-o-meter

Carson v. the Truth-o-meter: 

“…Carson said that under the Nazis, ‘German citizens were disarmed by their government in the late 1930s,’ which allowed the Nazis to ‘carry out their evil intentions with relatively little resistance.’ This is a misreading of history on two levels. First, German citizens as a whole were not disarmed by the Nazis. Jews and other supposed enemies of the state were subject to having their weapons seized. But for most German citizens, the Nazi period was one in which gun regulations were loosened, not tightened. Second, a lack of guns was not the issue. If the majority of Germans had wanted to use these guns to fight the Nazis, they could have. But they didn’t. Carson ignores that the Nazis enjoyed significant popular support, or at least, broad acquiescence. We rate this claim False.”

Carson & Truth-o-meter v Barry: 

I think Carson has a point, in that an armed citizenry is less likely to be subjugated than an unarmed one. Consider what would have happened, or not happened, if King George III’s ministers in the 13 colonies had confiscated every firearm in those colonies in about 1770. But I think both Carson and the Truth-o-meter are off target.

The Nazi assault on the civil rights of Jews in Germany was so massive, legalistic, and gradual that their gun ownership was not much of a factor either way. Being only about 1% of the German population, German Jews had no political clout, were easy to victimize.

Most of the Jews murdered were rounded up in Poland, Russia, Austria, France, Italy, and other areas controlled by the German army. The infamous camps were mostly in Poland and Austria. So the question of how gun laws relate to the murder of European Jews would have to take into account more than just how the Jews were treated under the gun laws of Nazi Germany.

Once the Nazi “Final Solution” got rolling, in 1939-41, it would have been a little silly to suggest that even well-armed and combat-inclined Jews of that time would have been able to organize and defend themselves against a German army that nearly defeated the best armies of Britain, France, Russia, and the United States combined.

A real examination of the question of gun laws and the treatment of Jews (and others) by the Nazis would need to take in account the 1930s gun laws of Poland, Austria, France, Italy, and, most of all, of the USSR, because that was where most of the arresting and murdering of the Jews actually took place.

Source (at Politifact): 

http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2015/oct/26/ben-carson/fact-checking-ben-carson-nazi-guns/