People keep talking about “Federalizing the National Guard” and now you’ve got other States pledging their NG to Texas in defiance of the Supreme Court (see image).
So is this what CW2 looks like?
P.S. I’m a Brit
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Highly unlikely this is what the civil war would be like. It’s not a state v state thing necessarily although that might be a small part of it. In the first civil war, the south unified and its people largely supported the war, except their slaves. It’s unlikely something like that will happen again. It’s not impossible but unlikely.
What is much more likely is rural v city. Even in red states, cities are blue and will often vote for blue policies. Rural areas are where things get dicey. They’ve been largely left behind by the surge in industry and general expansion of the capitalist economy we currently have (they’ve had a lot of businesses (including grocery stores) close because more people are leaving, and their rural towns are frequently having their hospitals close leaving large swaths of areas where the nearest hospital is an hour away). As such, they’ve got a grudge against the cities. What’s likely to happen is rural counties and their local governments trying to cut off their food supply, starving the cities to win the battle. There’s tons more possibilities, but this one I think is the one that’s got the highest likelihood.
Another possibility that is scary, but is highly dependent on the party of the people in power, is the government using their power to actually strike the cities, like in Syria where Assad bombed and used chemical weapons on his own people. Syria is actually a pretty good example of what more modern civil wars are like, or can be like. Governments v rebels and militias, and cities v rural (although there’s much less rural land in Syria).
If you’re interested, the podcast It Could Happen Here has a great first season where they go over possible disasters including a civil war and a pandemic (it was actually made in 2019 so before covid). It’s really helpful and can teach a lot, especially for an outsider from across the pond. It also does a lot better job giving an explanation and actual sources.
Hope this helps since it didn’t seem like you were getting a real answer.
The geographical separation of slave states by an actual border allowed the first Civil War to take place on a perfect stage for traditional warfare. North/South and the formal joining of the Confederacy by state governments kept it all straightforward.
It definitely won’t be that simple again.
I also recommend It Could Happen Here
I had to stop listening to ICHH it gave me way too much anxiety and was just too stressed back when i listened in 2020. I’ve since taken up to instead listen to BTB and cool people who did cool stuff off the same network. Monsters that are usually dead and people who kick ass make me feel better.
Another thing the world ought to know is that the folks who are identified by “red” and “right” in America are in the minority.
Significantly so.
However our voting system uses geography / land as a modifier so while there are less of them they occupy a larger land mass and have an outsized vote strength because of that.
When total votes in a state can be split 45-55 but the delegates go 90-10 there is a problem
Another fun thing about that is that most folks who identify “red” or “right” actually aren’t paying enough attention to know that. Go ask them, they think people like them make up 70% or more of the country. If they do try to activate their little civil war they are going to find themselves very quickly surrounded by folks who do not like them at all, as their expected 200-million strong army ends up actually only being 1.5 million people spread out over 30,000+ square miles. Watching the realization dawn on them might actually even be fun if it weren’t a herald of Troubles for America.
Another thing the world ought to know is that the folks who are identified by “red” and “right” in America are in the minority.
Significantly so.
This isn’t accurate. In 2020, 29% of voters identified as Republican, 33% as Democrat, and 34% as independent. There certainly were more Democrats, but only by a 5% margin.
Playing up exaggerated differences between the number of Democrats and Republicans and emphasizing the “we outnumber you” rhetoric is extremist and should be avoided. It makes you a part of the problem.
What is much more likely is rural v city.
Isn’t it even more likely trump disciples vs reasonable people?
This is oversimplifying the problem. Democrats from urban areas have failed for decades to adequately address the needs and concerns of rural voters. When one party ignores you (and often speaks of you with open contempt), it’s a no-brainer that you would be inclined to vote for the party that caters to your concerns. The Democrats handed rural voters to Trump on a golden platter.
My take on it is that the Republicans will do their best to drag this out until the election. No compromising or middle ground. Just make it out to be the crazy Democrats fault. This stuff gets to be very predictable after all these years.
the weird part is the predominantly conservative federal court sided with the presidential administration
I’d say that’s primarily because the conservative arguments have gotten so crazy/illegal that it’d be hard for almost any judge to agree with it. They ruled against Moore v. Harper and almost everything Trump tried to do with the election for example.
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No this is all Republican division. It’s their only playbook to rally their base. The take home message for everyone is VOTE, VOTE, VOTE. Before the election started up we had a nice quiet 2-1/2 years. This kind of shit only appeals to those that love the chaos that Trump will bring back.
It’s very tiresome. This also feels a lot more agro than interrogating a president about getting a BJ.
Why are your lunatics so energetic, crazy and numerous? They seem to be getting worse. Some BJ obsessions in the 90s. Then tea parties in the 00s. Now it’s full-blown inssurection with Texas wanting to secede.
Now that all the crazies have joined their “god army” and trundled down to the border would it be a good time to nuke them? Just wipe out all the lunatics in one go. Problem solved.
Why are your lunatics so energetic, crazy and numerous?
Simple, Russian and Chinese bots on social media designed to foment division, anger, and the destruction of western democracy. It’s the exact same thing that led to Brexit and the election of Trump. And it will get worse until we get a handle on blocking bad actors on social media.
It’s not Republican division. A lot of Americans are disgusted with the open border and the gross inaction of our government.
lol. Every additional illegal immigrant makes Texas SAFER. https://www.pnas.org/doi/full/10.1073/pnas.2014704117
Why?
It’s not a totally unreasonable impression, but no, this will not turn into a second civil war. The Guard units of each state can be called up for federal duty. The National Guard is part of the US Department of Defense and thus ultimately answers to the DoD and the US president as commander in chief. The US military has multiple components, including regular services (eg the full time Army), reserve components (eg US Army Reserve) and National Guard components. The latter two are part-time military with one weekend per month training duty plus an annual training. Guards members and Reservists hold regular full time jobs.
The Guard units are deployable by the governors of their respective states, and so can be used in emergency situations like natural disasters. They have also been deployed against what have been perceived as riots that threaten lives and properties of the individual states.
However, they are subject to activation by order of the US president and they fall under the national command authority. Guard personnel take the same oath to the constitution as other military personnel, and cannot legally refuse federal activation. Guards personnel would be subject to courts martial and face potentially extreme penalties including being discharged from service under criminal conditions, being stripped of rank and benefits, and jail time in federal prison. This would be what we call a career limiting rule.
So, if push comes to shove, Biden can activate the NG and order them to stand down or to implement policies to maintain order. Thinking the NG units and in particular their commanders would disobey a presidential order because they just love their state governor and hate the president so much is getting into Turner Diaries levels of right wing apocalyptic fantasy.
All of which misses a critical point:
The forming of the Confederacy wasn’t “legal” either.
We can handwave away concerns about mounting threats of violence by citing regulation and law, but none of that actually addresses the underlying issue that if these people want to start shit, they will find an avenue.
And let’s also not sit here, in 2024, and assume the institutions, norms, checks, and intended safeguards in our system will always work when they need to. We’ve seen far, far too many breakdowns and failures in our system over the last decade to believe otherwise.
That’s what frustrates me so much about the framing of the situation we’re in right now: most people - and the vast majority of major media organizations - are fully intent on presenting this as “normal”, but it’s very fucking clearly not. It’s assumed by so many that the rules will simply be followed… and then they turn around and cover Trump, whose whole bit is to not follow the rules because he doesn’t feel like it and wants to stay in power forever. It’s like being unconcerned about standing 3 feet away from an uncaged, unleashed siberian tiger because someone once told you at one point that it had been “trained”.
You have to understand that the US military today is a very different organization than it was in the 1860s. I know - I served and majored in military history for my first undergraduate degree, and studied the civil war in particular. I also come from a military family with a father, grandfather, and uncle who served as officers until retirement age.
Far right domestic terrorism is a real and developing threat coming from both former military personnel and from civilians. The election of a far right government that shreds the constitution is also a major threat to American democracy. But if the shit does come down, it’s not going to be because some Guardsmen decide that they’d follow DeSantis over Biden.
Military justice is no joke. Falling on the wrong side of it can end people. The military is also very integrated and has political as well as ethnic diversity. I’m not saying you couldn’t find an Army colonel who wouldn’t want to engage in an armed rebellion, but the country today is very, very different than it was mid-19th century, and so is the military.
Please do note that I do see the rise of American fascism as a real threat. It’s just not going to manifest because state Guard orgs decide to disobey orders.
Thank you for sharing this insight! It’s frustrating to hear everyone everywhere speculate about how easily the active military would turn, not considering…well, everything you wrote.
Yeah, ex-military of course is part of the brainwashed; nowhere else in the civilian world (outside of mercenary work) is warfare conducting knowledge of direct use.
Add that our Government has not always done even the bare minimum for our vets, and you got a recipe for the radicalization of the “disenfranchised warriors” (quotation because I don’t consider oathbreakers worthy of any title).
They’re gonna fall and listen to the honeyed words of Fascism in a different, harder way than your average civilian. That’s a call to something they amongst the rest of their group are genuinely and tangibly valuable for–until they aren’t.
Please do note that I do see the rise of American fascism as a real threat. It’s just not going to manifest because state Guard orgs decide to disobey orders.
Same, and I do still worry for the death tolls. That “theirs” (the civilians, who can be said to not know better) would be orders of magnitude higher than any on the military’s side doesn’t mean I’d like to see deaths on either side.
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Robert E Lee famously didn’t want to fight the North but didn’t think of himself as a traitor for doing so, because his loyalty was to his state first, to the US second. And that was a common mindset at the time.
I think it’s possible that there will be resentment, but those with rank would be risking everything for zero gain. It would be determined by the people who wear the birds and the stars, and although there have certainly been high ranking officers who have engaged in conduct we might consider treasonous, it’s simply not going to be a common enough occurrence.
A Handmaid’s Tale scenario, where the US goes down the path of a Christian theocracy, is a possibility that concerns me,
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You also have to factor in the fact that the military today is not a bunch of guys with rifles. It is carrier battle groups, fighter jets, sophisticated artillery systems, and other platforms that require massive supply chains to deploy and maintain. That’s just what modern warfare is. US aircraft carriers alone are crewed by 5000+ people.
Raytheon, Northrop, and Lockheed are not going to side with Ohio against the US government. The question is about civil war, not about a single military unit going rogue until the members are arrested or killed. Keeping planes in the air and tanks running requires a lot more than Ohio can do. The Feds spend about a trillion dollars per year on the military, and some Confederate missile battery is going to be in trouble once they run low on things to shoot and when their vehicles start to break down.
I’m not a fan of the military industrial complex, to say the least, but it’s an absolutely necessary part of warfare today.
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They have also been deployed against what have been perceived as riots that threaten lives and properties of the individual states.
Yeah, like when they got called up against random citizens in Minneapolis…
Seems to be a distinct possibility. Posturing prior to the election, rattling sabers, they’re spoiling for a full-on shootin’ war contingent on losing the election, in my opinion.
edit: I dare say, it might even be strategically advantageous for them to intentionally try lose, claim it was rigged, and use that to go live with the 4th riech.
I think the tactical nukes will slow their ambitions for another hundred or so years. We can’t take these posturing fools seriously.
We can’t take these posturing fools seriously
Have you just not been paying attention for the last…decade?
Yes, we absolutely should.
No one is using a tactical nuke on US soil. We have enough conventional bombs to destroy ourselves anyway.
And yet, we must. Assume your enemy will lose, but prepare for them to win.
It’s not a new civil war reason. It’s the same one as last time just packaged up a little different.
Racism
It’s not even a new civil war. The last civil war only ended technically. In reality it went cold and has still been being waged all this time. It turned from a war of the rural South against the industrialised north. To a war on the industrialized from the rural.
No, it’s theatrics
An election is upcoming
Its a meaningful and new escalation. This dismissive attitude is exactly why there will be a war. These governors should be removed and charged with sedition.
At the same time, if we can get the 14th figured out the “pledging troops in opposition to the federal government” seems like the things insurrectionists do.
Just like every year
This is exactly why DeSantis wants to revive the Florida State Guard.
Biden should ignore Abbott right until the point he signs an order to interfere with Federal agents on duty. Then it’s a conspiracy & the Insurrection Act can be brought into play to clean house.
Oh goody goody gooooody!!! 🍿
Certainly would be exciting as an Australian
I found your wife! --> 🦘
I found ya mum -> 🐄
Seen from the outside and ignoring all the innocent people suffering, I would love one thing about the USA splitting up, it would be the perfect example of how shitty things can get when people don’t realize they live in locations that depend on the goodwill of more progressive locations. Split the USA like on OP’s map and just watch as the red part devolves into a third world country.
It would be rad for me too. I don’t wish harm to Americans of course, but I think it’s about time they start throwing hands instead of whining on the internet 24/7 about how much they hate eachother.
It all seems quite a bit overblown to me. There’s legal precedent for the President to take over a state’s national guard and use federal troops to enforce a court order (see Brown v Board of Education):
“In September 1957, Arkansas governor Orval Faubus called out the Arkansas Army National Guard to block the entry of nine black students, later known as the “Little Rock Nine”, after the desegregation of Little Rock Central High School. President Dwight D. Eisenhower responded by asserting federal control over the Arkansas National Guard and deploying troops from the U.S. Army’s 101st Airborne Division stationed at Fort Campbell to ensure the black students could safely register for and attend classes. […]” (Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brown_v._Board_of_Education)
The current wording of the Insurrection Act provision (which has been amended a few times since initial adoption), according to Wikipedia:
"Whenever the President considers that unlawful obstructions, combinations, or assemblages, or rebellion against the authority of the United States, make it impracticable to enforce the laws of the United States in any State by the ordinary course of judicial proceedings, he may call into Federal service such of the militia of any State, and use such of the armed forces, as he considers necessary to enforce those laws or to suppress the rebellion."Just my $.02 but I’d guess either the feds back down or Texas does. Hopefully nobody gets trigger happy.
The reference to Little Rock Nine suddenly made me realize that Forest Gump was 38 at the time of Forest Gump.
I’m 38 now. As tired as I am of Hollywood reimagining films from the nineties, I would appreciate a Forest Gump born in the 80s. The whole concept could really be repeated every 30 years or so.
Brother, your idea is commendable, but the weave of history will be incinerated if you give all of that malign power to the Bubba Gump Shrimp Company.
The aftermath of racial desegregation court victories are some of the most interesting things in recent US history. A law would be struck down and sort of left like that… and people would take it upon themselves to organize and challenge the new law, often in the face of violent opposition. Freedom Riders taking busses down to the south to challenge desegregation of public transit being met with mobs and put in jail.
inb4 Brown v Board was wrongly decided.
I want to say one of Trump’s candidates for a judgeship hinted at that.
No.
Thank you for your indepth and insightful analysis. 👍
This will all blow over once Trump fucks off to private dementia care to escape prosecution.
AKA Epstein’s Loli Island
I can’t imagine it disappeared with him, I wonder who’s running it now.
Donald Trump, of course!
Gotta grab 'em by their pussies!
That’s disgusting even in context
Exactly!
Trump is beating Biden in the polls and bookies have him as the favroite to win.
Unless some states that matter kick him off the ballot the US is headed for 2nd Trump presidency.
God help the entire world.
The US is the next empire to fall. I am a US citizen and i am taking steps to GTFO if needed. I have an e-residency and ID card from another nation and am working up to the investment for full citizenship.
I mean, the issue is that most of the rest of the so called free World (and in my opinion correctly so), especially Europe, depends on the US for defence, specially weapon production. Despite France constantly whining about it, insisting on strategic autonomy, as far as I am aware, when it comes to ammo production and air power, we very much depend on the US for production and designs (the design when it comes to aircraft)
If the American empire falls, it’s not going to reduce weapons production or arms sales. Decline into fascism requires more guns and bullets, as they get turned against domestic targets, while guns and oil are among the US’s best sources of external currency.
The United States military should scale way back, but the European military would have to increase because of what you mentioned with designs for specialty weapons.
We have reasonable designs for almost all weapon categories, except maybe for airplanes, with the latest being the Eurofighter which is by now a bit dated. Regarding Tanks, the German Leopard is as far as I am aware a fine piece of engineering as well as the belgian FN-SCAR. However we lack the ammo capabilities (especially when it comes to artillery shells) to ever have hope of winning a protracted war (or simply keeping Ukraine alive). (also, quick side note, France also spends a great deal of money maintaining their own nuclear arsenal and weapons delivery system, which kinda makes the UK seem a bit puny with their dependence of the US for weapon delivery)
Please explain the e-residency and id card thing. I’m in the red area and really really don’t want to be.
Oh, then the place I am looking at would definitely not work for you. I don’t think… Ever heard of Liberland?
A country run on a blockchain. Fucking yikes. I think a “ship of fools” is putting it generously.
Oh. Yeah. That’s gonna be a no from me dawg. Thank you for the reply though.
Just FYI, Estonia is a real country and also viable.
But I think I’d much rather stay on the 5th column.
I don’t see how the national guard isn’t already federal, it’s the national guard, not the state guard. They get called up just like regular military for wars.
Cut off their money, court martial them, dishonorable discharge, take away their guns and vehicles. These belong to the military, not Texas.
National Guard listens to the state by default, as each state has its own National Guard. However, the federal government can intervene at any time and give them new orders.
I guess they’re just choosing not to do anything? IDK.
The national guard is part of the military, so funded and supported by the feds. Unlike normal army units though, each state or territory has its own national guard unit under the command of the governor. The intention is to give each state the power to quickly respond to emergency situations without needing federal approval. They’re the successors to the old state militias, but have much stronger federal ties now.
Unlike normal army units though, each state or territory has its own national guard unit under the command of the governor.
What’s the chain of command?
Does it stop at the Governor, or does it go from the Governor to the President?
Do they swear an allegiance to the state Constitution, or to the Federal Constitution?
They swear allegiance to the federal constitution, the governor, and the president. With the president being CIC and having power over the governor and the constitution having power overall. So in theory, the governor cannot give you orders that defy the president, and not even the president can give force you to comply with an unlawful order. It would take some serious stones to defy orders though
That same separation is what prevented Trump from sending in the national guard to Detroit and Oregon just because he disagreed with the protests there.
The intent to give the peoples of the state further say in the use of force in the state.
Weak king, so the local lords smell the opportunity to gain power, tale as old as time.
