European populists champion self-defense rights as terrorists arm themselves illegally

“You can find Kalashnikovs for sale near the train station in Brussels,” a European Union official told the Washington Post last year. “They’re available even to very average criminals.”

Likewise, “[t]he French black market for weapons has been inundated with eastern European war artillery and arms,” Philippe Capon, the head of the country’s UNSA police union told Bloomberg. “They are everywhere in France.”

Everywhere indeed. “While the exact number is not known, estimates run to 10 to 20 million illegal weapons in circulation in France’s population of 65 million,” adds the Christian Science Monitor (a number that squares with Small Arms Survey estimates).

The darknet through which David Ali Sonboly armed himself for the Munich rampage referenced by Petry has simply added a level of technological sophistication to a long-thriving weapons black market—an easier way to shop the ever-shifting inventory.