Give Us More Guns

'It will terrify you but it's a story you must know.' - Mandy Wiener It was one of the most brutal criminal acts of the post-apartheid era, and its consequences were devastating. Thousands of people died between 2011 and 2019 as a result of one senior police officer's criminal decision to sell a huge cache of guns. Colonel Christiaan Prinsloo, former head of the Gauteng firearm license division, and his network of cronies sold guns decommissioned by the SAPS to South Africa's gang lords. The sale of these weapons led to a killing spree of unprecedented proportions. Based on interviews with police and the criminal underworld, this book tells the story of this callous crime for the first time. Shaw explores how the illegally sold guns got into the hands of South Africa's crime bosses. The book describes the bloodbath that ensued and uncovers accounts of rampant corruption within the police and in the gun-licensing system, probing the government failure that has been instrumental in arming the country's gangsters.

'With remarkable courage, insight and access, Mark Shaw takes the reader into the darkest corners of South Africa's ganglands.' – Mandy Wiener The assassination of police investigator Charl Kinnear in Cape Town in 2020 was yet one more in a spate of murders related to the so-called 'guns to gangs' saga, in which state weapons are sold to South Africa's criminal underworld. It began in 2007 when Colonel Christiaan Prinsloo and his cronies began selling thousands of decommissioned police weapons to gang lords. Prinsloo's motive: to fund his son's university fees. The sale of weapons to criminals, which the police service has tried to downplay, has resulted in a killing spree of unprecedented proportions. Cape Town is now one of the most violent places on earth, and in 2019 the army was called in to patrol gang-infested areas. Give us more Guns, based on hundreds of interviews with police, experts and the gangsters themselves, tells the story of this callous crime for the first time. Mark Shaw explores how the guns get into the hands of South Africa's crime bosses and describes the bloodshed that ensues. He also uncovers accounts of rampant corruption within the police and in the state's gun-licensing system, probing the government failure that has been instrumental in arming the country's gangsters.

Does allowing people to own or carry guns deter violent crime? Or does it simply cause more citizens to harm each other? Directly challenging common perceptions about gun control, legal scholar John Lott presents the most rigorously comprehensive data analysis ever done on crime statistics and right-to-carry laws. This timely and provocative work comes to the startling conclusion: more guns mean less crime. In this paperback edition, Lott has expanded the research through 1996, incorporating new data available from states that passed right-to-carry and other gun laws since the book's publication as well as new city-level statistics. "Lott's pro-gun argument has to be examined on the merits, and its chief merit is lots of data. . . . If you still disagree with Lott, at least you will know what will be required to rebut a case that looks pretty near bulletproof."Peter Coy, Business Week "By providing strong empirical evidence that yet another liberal policy is a cause of the very evil it purports to cure, he has permanently changed the terms of debate on gun control. . . . Lott's book could hardly be more timely. . . . A model of the meticulous application of economics and statistics to law and policy."John O. McGinnis, National Review "His empirical analysis sets a standard that will be difficult to match. . . . This has got to be the most extensive empirical study of crime deterrence that has been done to date." Public Choice "For anyone with an open mind on either side of this subject this book will provide a thorough grounding. It is also likely to be the standard reference on the subject for years to come."Stan Liebowitz, Dallas Morning News "A compelling book with enough hard evidence that even politicians may have to stop and pay attention. More Guns, Less Crimeis an exhaustive analysis of the effect of gun possession on crime rates."James Bovard, Wall Street Journal "John Lott documents how far 'politically correct' vested interests are willing to go to denigrate anyone who dares disagree with them. Lott has done us all a service by his thorough, thoughtful, scholarly approach to a highly controversial issue."Milton Friedman

A "riveting," "relentlessly engrossing," and "brilliantly researched" investigation of the life of the gun -- its manufacture, its sale, and its impact -- and of our world's hugely complex relationship with firearms. In some places of the world, getting a gun is easier than getting a glass of water. In some parts of the world, an individual is allowed to carry concealed firearms into schools. In some parts of the world, there are more guns than people to shoot them. There are almost 1 billion guns across the globe today, a shocking number that is higher than ever before in history. Each year, 12 billion bullets are produced -- almost two bullets for every person on the planet. And over 300,000 people are shot dead over an average year worldwide. In The Way of the Gun award-winning investigative journalist Iain Overton takes readers on a shocking and eye-opening journey to over 25 cities all across the globe, from Cape Town to Tokyo, from San Pedro Sula to Phnom Penh, along the way encountering people from all walks of life affected by guns: Zionist anti-terror gun trainers; El Salvadoran gangland killers; porn starlets who appear as snipers in triple-X films; and South African doctors soaked in the blood of gunshot victims -- unearthing some hard truths about the terrible realities of war and gun crime. Harrowing and sobering, this riveting expose on the long-reaching and mostly unknown life of a gun is an essential and important book in today's world.

James Atwood contends that the thirty thousand gun deaths America suffers every year cannot be understood apart from our national myth that God has appointed America as "the trustee of the civilization of the world" and even "Christ's light to the nations." Because these purposes are noble, and we are supposedly a good and trustworthy people, violence is sometimes "required" and gives license to individuals to carry open or concealed weapons, which "save lives" and can even be "redemptive." Atwood, an avid hunter, cautions that an absolute trust in guns and violence morphs easily into idolatry. Having spent thirty-six years as a Presbyterian pastor fighting against the easy access to firearms, one of which took the life of a friend, he uses his unique experience and his biblical and theological understanding to graphically portray the impact guns have on our society. He documents how Americans have been deceived into believing that the tools of violence, whether they take the form of advanced military technology or a handgun in the bedside stand, will provide security. He closes with a wake-up call to the faith community, which he says is America's best hope to unmask the extremism of the Gun Empire.

An encyclopedic look at firearms.

The Epic Western by the Author of Vengeance Gun The hunter becomes the hunted... The Civil War is over. The American West is on the mend, but turmoil still brews south of the border. And one man 's search for peace finds him the subject of a Mexican manhunt. Matthew Price is weary of the trail, lies tired He’s tired of living by the gun—tired of finding trouble everywhere he rides. So when he recognizes the face plastered on a public execution notice in a tiny Mexican village, He's tempted to turn His back and hightail it out of town. But the man pictured is Gray Wolf, the Apache to whom he owes his life. Matt knows it's time for him to return the favor. Breaking Gray Wolf out of jail is the easy part. Soon Matt discovers that by setting free his compadre’s cellmate, he has also released the federales’ greatest threat: fierce resistance leader Cesar Zapata de León. Running with the revolutionary means that this time Matt has more than a bounty at stake. Now the price is on his head.