Thomas Countryman, a US assistant secretary of state, made it clear in April 2012 that the treaty is not aimed at governments. Least of all, ours. “We do not want something that would make legitimate international arms trade more cumbersome than the hurdles United States exporters already face.”9
Those who die at the hands of such legitimate arms sales will doubtless be comforted.
GUN REGULATIONS ON THE WAY
The Treaty includes, according to the Independent Sentinel, “the creation of a new UN agency to regulate international weapon sales, and require countries that host firearms manufacturers to set up a compensation fund for victims of gun violence worldwide.”10
Gun control opponents, writing in the Independent Sentinel, predict that,
disguised as… a treaty to fight against “terrorism,” “insurgency,” and “international crime syndicates,” the treaty would undoubtedly:
1. Enact tougher licensing requirements, making law-abiding Americans cut through even more bureaucratic red tape just to own a firearm legally;
2. Confiscate and destroy all “unauthorized” civilian firearms (all firearms owned by the government are excluded, of course);
3. Ban the trade, sale and private ownership of all semi-automatic weapons;
4. Create an international gun registry, setting the stage for full-scale gun confiscation.11
While the treaty will doubtless be filled with reassuring disclaimers, former US ambassador to the UN John Bolton has seen this kind of thing before. “After the treaty is approved and it comes into force, you will find out that it has this implication or that implication and it requires the Congress to adopt some measure that restricts ownership of firearms,” he warns. “The [Obama] administration knows it cannot obtain this kind of legislation purely in a domestic context…. They will use an international agreement as an excuse to get domestically what they couldn’t otherwise.”12
Tom Mason, who represented the World Forum on the Future of Sports Shooting at the UN conference, said, “The treaty is a significant threat to gun owners. I think the biggest threat may be the body that would administer the treaty.”13
The ATT sets up an Implementation Support Unit to administer its provisions. Defenders of the treaty counter that it will clearly recognize the right of individual and national self-defense and say that it will be administered by the individual nations themselves, not by the UN.
But the draft treaty provides that “parties [to the ATT] shall take all necessary measures to control brokering activities taking place within its territories… to prevent the diversion of exported arms into the illicit market or to unintended end users.”14
Opponents of the treaty warn that the Implementation Support United established by the ATT will increase its own powers to make sure that nations who sign the treaty “take all necessary measures” to enforce its ban on arms trafficking. They point out that UN treaties are subject to the kind of mission creep that Ambassador Bolton warns about.
One hundred and thirty members of Congress—organized by Pennsylvania Republican congressman Mike Kelly—wrote to President Obama on July 1, 2012, to express their opposition and concern about the ATT. “The UN’s actions to date indicate that the ATT is likely to pose significant threats to our national security, foreign policy, and economic interests as well as our constitutional rights,” reads the letter. “The US must establish firm red lines for the ATT and state unequivocally that it will oppose the ATT if it infringes on our rights or threatens our ability to defend our interests.”15 The congressmen demanded that the treaty exclude small arms and ammunition and recognize the right of individual self-defense.
The National Rifle Association attacked the treaty. “Any international Arms Trade Treaty (ATT) that in any way, shape or form affects the constitutional rights of American gun owners is unacceptable,”16 Chris Cox, executive director of the NRA’s Institute for Legislative Action, said in a statement. “International organizations and foreign governments do not have the right to restrict the fundamental freedoms handed down to us from our Founding Fathers.”
NRA President Wayne LaPierre testified before the U.N. that “on behalf of all NRA members and American gun owners, we are here to announce that we will not tolerate any attack—from any entity or organization whatsoever—on our Constitution or on the fundamental, individual right to keep and bear arms.”17
Ted R. Bromund, senior research fellow in the Margaret Thatcher Center for Freedom, at the Heritage Foundation, warns that the ATT is what he calls an “aspirational” treaty, meaning that it sets goals and is less specific about how to achieve them.
He warns that “Americans should realize that many of the risks to US sovereignty posed by the ATT and other aspirational treaties cannot be fully addressed by legislative action, because these risks are inherent in any effort to negotiate vague, aspirational, and universal treaties in a world full of dictatorial states. The best defense against encroachments on US sovereignty—including the ability to conduct foreign policy—rests with oversight by elected officials and the vigilance of American citizens.”18
The combination of the aspirations of the treaty signatories to curtail small arms throughout the world and the enforcement mechanisms built into the document spell bad news for our Second Amendment freedoms if we ratify the ATT.
HILLARY’S SECRET STRATEGY FOR IMPOSING GUN CONTROLS
NRA president Wayne LaPierre announced in July 2012 that his organization had secured the commitment of fifty-eight US Senators to oppose ratification of the Arms Trade Treaty if it contains any regulation of civilian firearms—far more than the thirty-four required to block Senate ratification. And, on July 26, 2012, fifty-one Senators said they would vote against ratification in its current form. Obama, knowing that if Hillary signed the treaty, as she had pledged to do on July 27, the day after the senatorial letter, the gun issue would become front and center in the presidential race. So the administration pulled back in a tactical retreat and the signing scheduled for that day was canceled. End of story? No way!
Here’s what the play is: The United Nations General Assembly will likely approve the treaty by a two-thirds vote before election day in the US. Then the requisite sixty-five nations will sign and ratify the treaty. That sets its provisions in stone. Obama and Hillary will keep silent until after the election. Then they will sign the treaty—and Harry Reid, the Senate Majority Leader, will probably never bring it up for a vote. Knowing he would lose any ratification vote, Reid will just let the treaty take effect under the Vienna Convention—without any approval by the Senate. If President Obama is reelected, he will, of course, refuse to renounce the treaty and it will take effect without a vote of our elected representatives.
The only way to stop the treaty is to defeat Obama and/or elect a Republican Senate.
REPEAL THE REAGAN DOCTRINE
Bromund points out that the ATT is likely to mean one thing to the world’s democracies but something quite different for its tyrannical dictators. He points out that many of the nations that will sign the ATT are “dictatorships. Thus, the treaty will on the one hand recognize that states such as Syria have the right to buy and sell arms and on the other hand require them to establish effective systems of import and export control that, like the current US system, consider the human rights consequences of arms transfers.”