A thriving and unbeatable black market makes weapons available no matter what officials intend.

Read More: Europe’s Restrictive Gun Laws Disarm Victims, Not Terrorists

Between the attack recently thwarted by Americans who just happened to be visiting France, the Charlie Hebdo incident, and what really is a steady stream of events in Europe as a whole, the “gun free” Utopia of Europe is in fact, an outright lie. President Obama famously said, “…this type of mass violence does not happen in other advanced countries.” Politifact.com, not exactly an unbiased organization or one friendly to gun-rights, pointed out that statement was clearly false.

What is really interesting is that while most of the firearms we can own freely in the US are largely banned and seldom seen in Europe, several recent incidents in Europe have involved AK-47s or other variations of the Kalashnikov design. And by the way, none of them have been the pedestrian semi-auto versions we have here in the US. No, these were almost exclusively, fun-switch equipped, select-fire/full-auto versions that are exceedingly hard to come by in the United States. Yet they are surprisingly affordable and readily accessible in France, Germany, and the rest of the European Union where legal gun ownership is exceedingly rare and expensive if it is allowed at all.

-GM