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+https://nakamotoinstitute.org/static/docs/from-crossbows-to-cryptography.pdf
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+From Crossbows To Cryptography:
+Techno-Thwarting The State
+Chuck Hammill
+weaponsrus@earthlink.net
+Future of Freedom Conference, November 1987
+Public Domain: Duplicate and Distribute Freely
+You know, technology—and particularly computer technology—has
+often gotten a bad rap in Libertarian circles.  We tend to think of Or-
+well’s 1984, or Terry Gilliam’s Brazil, or the proximity detectors keep-
+ing East Berlin’s slave/citizens on their own side of the border, or the
+sophisticated bugging devices Nixon used to harass those on his “ene-
+mies list.” Or, we recognize that for the price of a ticket on the Concorde
+we can fly at twice the speed of sound, but only if we first walk through
+a magnetometer run by a government policeman, and permit him to
+paw through our belongings if it beeps.
+But  I  think  that  mind-set  is  a  mistake.   Before  there  were  cat-
+tle prods, governments tortured their prisoners with clubs and rubber
+hoses.  Before there were lasers for eavesdropping, governments used
+binoculars and lip-readers.   Though government certainly uses tech-
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+Hammill
+From Crossbows To Cryptography
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+nology to oppress, the evil lies not in the tools but in the wielder of the
+tools.
+In fact,  technology represents one of the most promising avenues
+available  for  re-capturing  our  freedoms  from  those  who  have  stolen
+them.  By its very nature, it favors the bright (who can put it to use)
+over the dull (who cannot).  It favors the adaptable (who are quick to
+see the merit of the new) over the sluggish (who cling to time-tested
+ways).  And what two better words are there to describe government
+bureaucracy than “dull” and “sluggish”?
+One of the clearest, classic triumphs of technology over tyranny I
+see is the invention of the man-portable crossbow. With it, an untrained
+peasant could now reliably and lethally engage a target out to fifty me-
+ters – even if that target were a mounted, chain-mailed knight. Unlike
+the longbow, which, admittedly was more powerful, and could get off
+more  shots  per  unit  time,  the  crossbow  required  no  formal  training
+to utilize.  Whereas the longbow required elaborate visual, tactile and
+kinesthetic coordination to achieve any degree of accuracy, the wielder
+of a crossbow could simply put the weapon to his shoulder, sight along
+the arrow itself, and be reasonably assured of hitting his target.
+Moreover, since just about the only mounted knights likely to visit
+your average peasant would be government soldiers and tax collectors,
+the utility of the device was plain: With it, the common rabble could de-
+fend themselves not only against one another, but against their govern-
+Public Domain: Duplicate and Distribute Freely
+Hammill
+From Crossbows To Cryptography
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+mental masters.  It was the medieval equivalent of the armor-piercing
+bullet, and, consequently, kings and priests (the medieval equivalent
+of a Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Crossbows) threatened death and
+excommunication, respectively, for its unlawful possession.
+Looking at later developments, we see how technology like the firearm—
+particularly the repeating rifle and the handgun, later followed by the
+Gatling gun and more advanced machine guns – radically altered the
+balance of interpersonal and inter-group power.   Not without reason
+was the Colt .45 called “the equalizer.”  A frail dance-hall hostess with
+one in her possession was now fully able to protect herself against the
+brawniest roughneck in any saloon. Advertisements for the period also
+reflect the merchandising of the repeating cartridge rifle by declaring
+that “a man on horseback, armed with one of these rifles, simply cannot
+be captured.”  And, as long as his captors were relying upon flintlocks
+or single-shot rifles, the quote is doubtless a true one.
+Updating  now  to  the  present,  the  public-key  cipher  (with  a  per-
+sonal computer to run it) represents an equivalent quantum leap—in
+a  defensive  weapon.   Not  only  can  such  a  technique  be  used  to  pro-
+tect sensitive data in one’s own possession, but it can also permit two
+strangers to exchange information over an insecure communications
+channel—a wiretapped phone line, for example, or skywriting, for that
+matter)—without ever having previously met to exchange cipher keys.
+With a thousand-dollar computer, you can create a cipher that a multi-
+Public Domain: Duplicate and Distribute Freely
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