To be fair to myself and you, I grew up in rural america around with guns everywhere. Took hunter safety, whole shebang, never really got around to buying myself or using automatic weapons.
I see your point on the American revolution, but please, let's not forget times have changed. the US population were on home ground with rifled barrels, easier to aim and using geurilla tactics against an old british standing line firing system (also their rifles weren't always rifled ;) ).
The chance that a population of civilians with weapons goes to hide in a bunker with or without unarmed people is higher than it is with military troops, and what happens when Russian intel says there are enemy combatants hiding in a bunker vs a bunch of civilians hiding in a bunker...chances go up that they will receive a bunker buster knock and talk more than if there were unarmed people there.
The Ukrainians aren't some ragtag group. Literally thousands of antitank weapons have been supplied to them.
The Ukrainian military, and even their air force, are still coordinated and operational.
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This means that rifle militia aren't there to kill a tank. They are there to force the tank commander inside with small arms fire. Tanks are famously difficult to see out of.
Once in there, the tank is a sitting duck to a Javelin or Panzerfaust will kill the tank reliably.
This isn't 100 poorly trained militia vs tank.
The situation is closer to 100 poorly trained militia + 5 professional soldiers armed with NATO top of the line antitank missiles vs tank.
Having grown up around guns, you should know that modern semi and fully automatic rifles are 100x more n00b friendly than an 18th century muzzle loader.
If pseudonymous self-professed US veterans of Afghanistan/Iraq wars commenting online are to be trusted, balloons full of paint are among the most effective anti-tank weapons in urban fighting.
That works but a Molotov cocktail on the engine air intake is also pretty good and easy too. The goal is to get the crew out of the tank. Usually you have a LOT of infantry around tanks to provide security
Was it not Stalin who said "quantity has a quality all its own?"
There are hundreds of thousands of Russian troops, but tens of millions of Ukranians capable of using rifles semi-effectively. And they are literally everywhere in the country.
I see your point on the American revolution, but please, let's not forget times have changed. the US population were on home ground with rifled barrels, easier to aim and using geurilla tactics against an old british standing line firing system (also their rifles weren't always rifled ;) ).
The chance that a population of civilians with weapons goes to hide in a bunker with or without unarmed people is higher than it is with military troops, and what happens when Russian intel says there are enemy combatants hiding in a bunker vs a bunch of civilians hiding in a bunker...chances go up that they will receive a bunker buster knock and talk more than if there were unarmed people there.
this isn't 1776.