We don't need no stinkin Guns

[Terrance]

> 
> While I guess that the matter of exchange is the really promising
> trail... what happens when Indians adopt rifles? That is the
> question, much more than "who was the original owner".

No doubt, an useful tool. My kingdom for gun? The Indians needed to
master both the Gun and the Horse. Think Sioux. But the Horse and the
Gun were not known to the Indians in America, they were both brought in
by Europeans. The Gun & Horse transformed the Indian societies that
adopted them. But for the most part, it was too late. The Sioux held off
the Europeans for a long time, but these horseman were the exception. 

But consider the early conquests, the Spanish on horseback with swords.
How did an hundred Spaniards defeat 10,000 Indians. The Horse? Advanced
weaponry? In part, but the story, the one Pynchon tells again and again,
is not simply about technology (I notice that Doug is still mis-quoting
that passage from GR about technology). The Europeans, it's true, got to
America with advanced navigational skill and technology. They had horses
and advanced metal weapons. The Indians didn't. But the Spaniards took
advantage of the conflicts that were all too common on this great land.
They exploited the  existing wars and conflicts, the existing practices
of slavery and genocide. You don't need guns or horses to kill, consider
Rwanda or the SW African genocide Pynchon deals with in his novel V.
(the European killers save bullets by using barbed wire nooses). Of
course, the Gun & Horse can make the job easier. Also, it helps if you
can infect your enemy with smallpox or some other killer. What about
Money? And the way the Europeans organized their exploits? More
important than the gun. Language? Yup, a significant advantage for the
Europeans was the written word. GR takes this up at length. 

Certainly Pynchon wants the reader to think hard about the rifle. The
gun, the rocket, the launching device, so on ... that why we'll never
know all the answers the text raises. 

Now, must go buy more ballistics to celebrate America. 
And the rockets red glare
the bombs bursting in air
gave proof to the world
that our flag was still everywhere. 
Even on the Moon!