Resist Tyranny: The Power of a Tactical Retreat

Resisting tyranny isn’t an easy task. You may be alone and outnumbered by those who don’t believe that tyranny exists, or worse, don’t care. 

As we showed in our last blog, speaking out against tyranny and injustice is one method of resistance, but can sometimes result in severe consequences. 

If speaking against tyranny and unjust government action is ineffective or you are facing the tyranny of a mob mentality, perhaps the best thing you can do to resist it is to make a tactical retreat.

Pilgrims and the Church of England

King Henry VIII established the Church of England in 1534, but many people in England felt the new state religion maintained too many practices to the Roman Catholicism from which Henry switched. Not wanting to be constrained by the King’s new religion, and because it was illegal to belong to any other church, the Pilgrims fled England to the Dutch Netherlands.

While the Netherlands gave the Pilgrims the freedom to worship as they desired, their situation wasn’t without consequence. Work was difficult to find, parents feared their children would lose their English identity, older children were falling prey to the temptations of Dutch culture, and there were rumors of another war between the Dutch and the Spanish.

So the Pilgrims pulled up stakes again and made their way to the New World via the Mayflower. In the end, escaping the tyranny of King Henry and coming to America allowed them to both worship freely and live their lives on their terms.

Vietnamese exodus

The Vietnam War ended in April 1975 with the fall of Saigon. By 1978, the situation had deteriorated to the point where people started to leave the country. Former government and military officials had been put into re-education camps, city residents were “volunteered” to live in rural New Economic Zones where they had to try and grow crops in the jungle. In addition, the ethnically Chinese Hoa population was considered a security threat due to tensions between Hanoi and Beijing, culminating in China’s invasion of Vietnam in 1979. 

The prudent see danger and take refuge, but the simple keep going and suffer for it. -- Proverbs 27:12

Many richer Vietnamese were able to buy their exit permits to leave the country, but those that couldn’t chose to take their chances trying to cross at a border or flee across the sea. Over the course of the Vietnamese exodus between 1975 and 1997, approximately 1.6 million fled the country. Of those, nearly 44% were “boat people” who were willing to risk starvation, pirates, and drowning in order to escape the tyranny of Communism.

California dreaming

Moving to California has long been the dream of many Americans and immigrants. However increasing taxes and regulations, unaffordable housing, and a liberal stranglehold on state and local politics have caused the quality of life in the Golden State to deteriorate. Add the issues surrounding COVID and the pandemic, people are starting to leave in droves as former residents seek to leave the consequences of bad political decisions and seek freedom in states such as Nevada, Colorado, Texas, and Arizona.

Live to fight another day

Demosthenes, an Athenian orator and statesman, fled during the battle of Chaeronea, where the Macedonians killed 3,000 Athenians in the fight. He was subsequently censured for his desertion, but would retort to anyone calling him a coward with, “The man who runs away may fight again,” from which we get our modern version, “He who fights and runs away, lives to fight another day.”

When resisting tyranny, it may be more advantageous to tactically retreat. Do not mistake this for cowardly fleeing, as they’re not the same. Retreating is based on an intelligent assessment of the situation, alternative actions, and possible outcomes. Fleeing is an emotional response in reaction to a situation.

The Pilgrims left England because worshiping as they wished was illegal and had resulted in government punishment for their actions. Assessing that the situation wasn’t going to change, they chose to move to a country that allowed free worship. When they realized the new culture had a negative influence on their lives and understanding that wasn’t going to change, they decided to retreat to a location where there they could create their own culture and truly worship as they desired.

Retreat doesn’t have to last forever. If the circumstances allow, perhaps you can regroup and return one day. If not, that leaves the last method of resisting tyranny...defending against it...which we cover next week.