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Further implications
In 1996, after the Port Arthur massacre, Australia successfully put in place legislation restricting and regulating Australians' gun access and prohibiting certain classes of firearm. Measures of this scope are unlikely to ever be implemented in the United States.
Australia's laws succeeded in casting gun ownership as a privilege for which Australians had to demonstrate both competence and a need. In the United States gun ownership is seen as a right, one to which the population appears to have a particularly strong attachment, so that it is defended with far greater vigour than many of the other rights enshrined within the United States Constitution.
The right to possess firearms and the desire to protect the country against terrorism come together in different ways depending on individual beliefs. On the one hand, whenever a gun outrage occurs within the United States (whether involving formal terrorism or not) those supporting universal gun ownership pose this as a solution, not as part of the problem.
The argument is usually put that if only all or some of those at the scene of the gun attack had been appropriately armed, they would have been able to defend themselves against their assailant. (The fact that the country has substantially unfettered access to guns and yet armed individuals do not succeed in defending themselves in this way has yet to undermine this argument.)
The situation is further complicated by what appears to be an historical belief in the right to armed civil disobedience as a defence against oppression. The Second Amendment appears to give expression to a desire to enable people to defend themselves against the tyranny of a centralised government. The country's political ideology grew out of small-scale communal government centring on church and town councils and in opposition to what came to be seen as subjugation by England. When the country federated there remained a powerful residual suspicion of strong central government which was seen as a threat to individuals' freedom.
The extreme lunatic fringe of such attitudes has prompted a series of domestic terrorist attacks within the United States which well predate those perpetrated or inspired by Muslim extremists. The best-known and most deadly domestic terrorist attack was the Oklahoma City bombing which occurred in April, 1995, and resulted in the deaths of 168 people. It is also possible to see the assassination or attempted assassination of many United States political leaders as a related form of action.
What complicates the situation so tragically is that one of the preconditions for mass killing and the supposed partial solution to mass killing are seen by many Americans as one and the same thing - the right to bear arms.
There has been an attempt to break this impasse since September 11, 2001, and the emergence of a popularly recognised external terrorist danger. A range of anti-terrorist laws, which have restricted the civil liberties of some within the United States (such as the removal of travel rights from those on the no-fly list) have raised the possibility that at least this category of threat might be reduced if potential terrorists were denied legal access to guns. Some conservative-leaning politicians, such as the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, Donald Trump, have given qualified support to such measures. However, these restrictions also seem unlikely to be successful.
When the threat could be seen as purely external and those to whom guns were being denied were categorised as non-American, such restrictions may have had some chance of success. However, the terrorist watch list includes a minority of United States nationals and the criteria for inclusion has been condemned as too vague. Therefore, denying guns to those on the list can be seen as a threat to the gun ownership rights of the ordinary, potentially-innocent, United States citizen.
It is an indication of how bitter the battle is, that those in favour of stricter gun laws and those opposed have chosen this tiny area over which to dispute. From the point of view of those who wish to prevent gun-related deaths by restricting gun access, the gains to be made are likely to be small. A total of 256 Americans were killed in firearm-related terrorist incidents between 1970 and 2014 (excluding the year 1993), according to the Global Terrorism Database. That is less than six firearm-related terrorist-caused deaths a year. This is a very small number compared to the approximately 30,000 gun-related deaths of all types that currently occur within the United States annually. Equally, denying access to guns to those on the no-fly list (rumoured to be some 47,000 people) would affect very few people. Those who want gun reform appear to be trying to make a gain wherever they can. Those opposed seem determined to hold on to their substantial control of the politics and the law, even though very few people would be affected by the change they are contesting.