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hga · 2013-05-03 · Original thread
From memory (read http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Tannenbaum for a start, http://www.amazon.com/Target-Switzerland-Swiss-Armed-Neutral... and http://www.amazon.com/SWISS-NAZIS-Alpine-Republic-Survived/d... for details), the General Staff figured taking Switzerland would break 80 divisions, a cost the Nazis simply couldn't afford.

Are the Swiss of French and Italian stock preponderantly "blond-haired blue-eyed"? If not, that argument tends to fail, although I suppose the Nazis did prefer killing Slavs et. al. in the east to Western Europeans. (ADDED: see the above Wikipedia link for how Hitler viewed the German Swiss who preferred their French, Italian and Romansh citizens over the greater German volk.)

"It's to the point where the word "militia" is associated with racists and kooks."

That has a lot more to do with demagogic politicians, including one in particular who had a dicey re-election coming up, than anything real. Amplified of course by a media who see all gun owners as the Other.

"Not "well-regulated" at all."

It's a nice ideal, perhaps, certainly a necessity if you live in a bad neighborhood like the Swiss, but history, going right back to our revolutionary war, tells us it's profoundly not in the American character, with exceptions here and there.

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