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defer is literally just an explicit RAII in this example. That is, it's just unnecessary boiler plate to wrap the newResource handle into a struct in this context.

In addition, RAII has it's own complexities that need to be dealt with now, i.e. move semantics, which obviously C does not have nor will it likely ever.

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> RAII has it's own complexities that need to be dealt with now, i.e. move semantics, which obviously C does not have nor will it likely ever.

In the example above, the question of "do I put defer before or after the `if err != nil` check" is deferred to the programmer. RAII forces you to handle the complexity, defer lets you shoot yourself in the foot.

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