I agree, armed intervention was required to destroy these fascist regimes. And NATO certainly is necessary to maintain that freedom, though it's a collaborative effort provided by all members (though not equally). Nevertheless, there's no proof, or even way to prove, that so many guns in circulation would have made a difference.

Meanwhile, in the U.S., the huge number of guns per capita has not ensured freedom at all. The vast majority support universal health care, prison reform, gun control, electoral reform, and more. Yet nothing ever changes due to an entrenched system of incumbency and bought-and-paid for representatives.

Meanwhile, incarceration rates, incumbency, institutionalized corruption, bigotry, race-related killings, poverty, the gap between the rich and poor - it continues to run rampant.

All that the guns have brought are record high rates of violent crime, suicides, mass shootings, and a population that lives in fear.