To talk of armed resistance in the United States is like talking about fireworks and apple pie— the US government is not afraid to use violence whenever beneficial to its ends. So why is talking about arming the resistance to the US considered terrorism and spitting on the achievements of Martin Luther King Jr.? One might say I just answered my own question.

It’s definitely more complex than that. To open this discourse on non-violence and armed resistance I’m going to use the perspective of one of the greatest intellectuals alive— Noam Chomsky. I believe Chomsky’s stance on non-violence is representative of a significant portion of the United States populace. I will indicate where his historical example, the Civil Rights Movement, is mistaken; or rather I will cite the works of others to that effect. And then I’ll discuss what possibilities there are for armed resistance in circumstances where absolute force is woefully unbalanced. Or as Chomsky would put it, how armed resistance can be used tactically.

Noam Chomsky’s stance on violent resistance to the US is straightforward. In reference to resistance to the invasion of Vietnam he had this to say, “The argument that resistance to the war should remain strictly nonviolent seems to me overwhelming.” More broadly he believes the following, “As a tactic, violence is absurd. No one can compete with the Government in violence.” The impermeable violent power of the US is his primary reason for objecting to violent resistance, but he has a few others: violence will frighten and alienate some people who would otherwise help; it would act as justification of forceful repression and people will become better for resisting nonviolently.

It’s apparent that none of these reasons are objecting to violent resistance outright. They are practical reasons. Chomsky makes this explicit in another conversation, “if violence could be shown to lead to the overthrow of lasting suppression of human life that now obtains in vast parts of the world, that would be a justification for violence. But this has not been shown at all, in my view.”I’ll challenge the merits of these objections in turn.

For clarity, and a reference point, I’ll start by displaying the reconstructed history of the Civil Rights Movement. Chomsky uses the Civil Rights Movement as an example of successful non-violent resistance. However, the idea that the Civil Rights Movement was non-violent is a pervasive misconception.

The real Civil Rights Movement came to be through the grass roots organization of thousands of people, primarily poor black people. This organization depended heavily on armed resistance to state power, primarily the police. For further reading on the Civil rights Movement, AkinyeleUmoja in, We Will Shoot Back, Charles E. Cobb in, This Nonviolent Stuff’ll Get You Killed,and others document the history and efficacy of armed resistance in the Civil Rights Movement.

So instead of the Civil Rights Movement proving that nonviolence resistance works, it proves that armed resistance is an effective tactic, at least within a nonviolent strategy. This is the crux of the matter in this disagreement. The defendants of armed resistance can agree that the US government has monopolized power to such an extent that it is impossible to violently overthrow them and disagree with the idea that armed resistance has no usefulness against the US government. Armed resistance can be used in a limited way, possibly in the same way it was used in the Civil Rights Movement, to make resistance easier and more effective. I’m not going to give specifics, for now, but I hope that this properly dismisses the idea that armed resistance can be rejected out of hand by virtue of the US government's violent power.

So what of Chomsky’s secondary reasons? Chomsky says that armed resistance will alienate people considering joining the movement. That’s almost certainly true. What is also true is non-violent resistance will alienate people considering joining the movement. This much should be obvious. And, unlike the former, non-violent resistance doesn’t just alienate people by making people more reluctant to join. Non-violent organizations actively exclude people with ideas of armed resistance— for obvious reasons. So as long as some people reject violent resistance and others reject strict non-violence there will be no organization that doesn’t alienate someone.

Chomsky also says that armed resistance would act as a justification for forceful repression. Again, this is certainly true. Though how important of an objection is this? For any organization attempting to elicit radical/revolutionary change forceful oppression is already the status quo. On a grander scale, forceful oppression is already a significant part of the US system,although the US has an extremely effective and extensive propaganda system that allows it to use less forceful oppression. The US uses a lot of forceful repression before it’s citizens use armed resistance.

The last of Chomsky’s objections to non-violence is that non-violent resistance will make people better. I believe this is true, but with a qualification. In one way, people become better, by resisting oppression at all. The way they resist that oppression, non-violent or otherwise, can make them worse. There are all too many people who believe they are resisting the oppression of the US, whose dissident opinion is within acceptable opinion and gives the illusion of freedom and democracy. This is a serious problem that Chomsky goes to much greater lengths in investigating than me. Regardless of how convincing my arguments are, none of Chomsky’s secondary objections to armed resistance are actually objections. I believe they are better understood as legitimate concerns for the armed revolutionary— be wary of alienating your sisterhood, be wary of creating further justification for forceful repression and be wary of becoming what you so hate.

As a final note, I wonder: how is non-violencesupposed to bring about revolution? Do people think that the hegemon will simply give up their power when they realize what they’re up against? Or dopeople think that the hegemon will realize the error of their ways and come to support the people’s revolution? Chomsky seems skeptical of the latter. he says, “It is very difficult to retain a faith in the essential humanity of the… insensate victim of a lifetime of anti-Communist indoctrination… A society that is capable of producing concepts like “un-American” and “peacenik”— of turning “peace” into a dirty word— has advanced a long way towards immunizing the individual against any human appeal. American society has reached the stage of near total immersion in ideology.”

I doubt Chomsky thinks the hegemon will simply give up their power. So what will armed resistance do? I think it’s likely that a new hegemon will rise on the waves of non-violent resistance, one that can accommodate the revolutionaries while appeasing the powerful. This is the path of history. One group— the hegemon— is dominant and another, slightly less powerful group uses popular uprising to usurp power from the hegemon. Maybe this is all non-violent resistance can ever hope for.