The "want to be" gun confiscators would have a daunting job ahead of them

[montana]

That may be the point that you deem important, but the original question was about whether a population armed with rifles and pistols posed enough of a threat to deter a government from tyrannical actions. The Afghan/Soviet experience shows it is not.

For that matter, even the Founding Fathers' experience demonstrates that a population so armed is insufficient to deter tyranny. Colonial Americans were also well armed, and even had organized militias, but that still failed to deter tyrannical behavior by the British.

The concept is a fiction. History proves that.

You are not wrong about preventing all tyrannical behavior, but being armed is better than being un-armed. Muggers, rapist, thugs of all kind rarely target big, well armed individuals who can fight back. The risk would be too high for the gain. Predators always target the weakest and most vulnerable. Governments are no different. Why do you think the democide, "which occurred in the last century" began with gun confiscation? With privately held arms there is hope, without arms, people are at the total mercy of the few with the guns. If you have been paying attention to the last two mass shootings, shot guns and a revolver were used by the criminal killers but we haven't been hearing the rhetoric to ban shotguns and revolvers like we did with the AR-15. This is because the AR-15 type rifle is more vulnerable to eradication compared to the others at this time because of the ignorance of the AR-15 with the non shooting masses. If AR type rifles are banned then it will be handguns, then shot guns and so forth. The anti's always do it piecemeal until the 2nd Amend. is completely neutered. Forcing people to depend on a governmental system makes them totally vulnerable to that same system. This is why I agree %100 with this statement:
"When governments fear the people, there is liberty. When the people fear the government, there is tyranny. The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government." Owning antiquated arms with draconian regulations does not deter government aggression.