The Ghost During my generally misspent youth, when I contemplated embarking on a military career after high school (an ambition that was never realized), I often read any book on any military subject that I could get my hands on. Of particular interest to me were two authors, the historian Samuel Eliot Morison and the Australian novelist Ian Slater. The cantankerous Morison, who was a rear admiral and the official American naval historian of World War II, wrote a fifteen-volume set of books on Allied naval operations that were full of useful, if dry, statistics and figures on naval engagements, listing U-boats sunk, Japanese planes shot down and so forth. Ian Slater, on the other hand, wrote a series of fanciful pulp novels dubbed the “World War III” series, centering around the exploits of a fictional Patton-like American general named Douglas Freeman.
Slater’s World War III books were not exactly Nobel-quality literature. Each book followed an easily predictable formula: some adversary of the United States – at first the Soviets and North Koreans, then an independent Siberian republic, then the Chinese, and then terrorists – would always threaten America or America’s allies, leading to a military conflict. The enemies of freedom would always hold the advantage at first, routing American forces and making everyone in the White House despair until the brilliant General Freeman saved the day, with the help of a group of plucky aides and side characters. The books – which I eventually lost interest in and stopped reading as the 90’s came to a close – were of a moderate and predictable right wing bent.
Beginning in 1997, Ian Slater began publishing another concurrent series, also reveling in the exploits of Douglas Freeman. It was called the “USA vs. Militia” series, and it depicted the Second American Civil War, with various right wing militia groups rising up and attacking the United States government. The first few books – and I presume the ones that followed which I declined to read – had the same formulaic plots as the World War III books, with all seeming lost to the enemy until General Freeman saved the day for democracy and justice.
Thirteen years after the publication of the first “USA vs. Militia” volume we have seen a resurgence in the domestic militia movement, which had declined by the end of the 90’s and had seemed totally moribund during the Bush years. We have also seen the rise of an insurgent political movement – the Tea Party – and a chilling rise in political hate speech, as well as violence and threats of violence. With some right wing voices openly clamoring for civil war and revolution we all seem to be asking ourselves if the future conflict that Ian Slater so schlockily predicted is now in danger of becoming a reality. The purpose of this article is not to argue that civil war is a genuine risk (for that you can read my other posts here) but to ask the question of who would win in such a conflict. Would the government succeed in crushing the militias, or would the militia movement realize their dream of overthrowing the hated federals? What would happen to our country if such a war took place?
The Firepower Argument
Over the recent Easter holiday I had two separate conversations with two separate liberal friends about the prospect of civil war. Although both acknowledged the possibility of right wing violence, both of them had almost the same exact answer as to why the militias would not be a big problem for America. To paraphrase both of them: “If the militias tried to fight the government they would all get blown away so quickly it would be over.” In this respect their arguments were essentially the same as those of other people in the past that I have had this same conversation with. So awed are we with the military might of our country that even anti-war liberals seem to view it as the final and effective arbiter of a domestic dispute with the militias.
There is certainly no question that the Pentagon has more firepower at its disposal than any other military force on our planet. From cruise missiles to giant Abrams tanks, from nuclear weapons and aircraft carriers to GPS-guided artillery, the ability of the U.S. military to rain utter death and destruction on the heads of its enemies is not in doubt. But firepower can be a liability as well as an advantage. We liberals always scream that the indiscriminate use of our weapons in Iraq and Afghanistan has made us more enemies than it has killed. Even within the military there is an awareness that excessive civilian casualties undermine our causes in those wars.
Certainly it is true that, if the militias were stupid enough to rise up and fight in the open, they would be destroyed quickly. But what if they chose to resort to guerilla warfare instead? Worse, what if they turned out to be good at it? If firepower was everything in a guerilla conflict we would not have to still be slagging away at Afghanistan, and we would have fully pacified Iraq a long time before the recent, tenuous calm started to settle over the country. An old anecdote that’s circulated ever since the end of the Vietnam War tells the story of an aide to the Nixon Administration who, in 1969, fed the relevant data about the U.S. and North Vietnam’s military and industrial capabilities into a computer and asked when the United States would win. The computer is said to have responded that the United States won in 1964. The primitive machine could not factor in the complexities of politics and human behavior that contributed to the way the war was fought on both sides. Those who advance the “firepower argument” make a similar mistake by boiling a potential war down to a simple question of who could blow the other side away. While the federal government does and certainly always would have a firepower advantage over the militias, it seems fanciful to believe that such an advantage would guarantee victory by itself.
Federal Advantages
Of course, the government of the United States has other advantages that it would bring to a war with the militias. Unlike in Iraq and Afghanistan, American soldiers fighting a guerilla war against militia insurgents would speak the same language as the local population, understand its culture and generally be of the same religious persuasion. In addition, the federal government has significant intelligence gathering capabilities (and not just military intelligence capabilities, either; the FBI is excellent at this as well) and talented personnel who could infiltrate militia groups. The federal government also has the ability to hire the mercenaries of companies like Xe Services – formerly Blackwater, of course – if they need additional manpower. Also, it is unlikely that the militias would find any major state sponsors for their insurgency. Too many other countries are either allied with the United States, dependent upon American support or owed too much money by us for them to support the overthrow of the American government. Even if an Iran or a North Korea wanted to sponsor the insurgents, would the insurgents really take help from a hated Marxist and a despised Islamic regime? I could be wrong, but I doubt they would if they had any other means of supporting themselves.
Militia Advantages
With the asymmetrical nature of guerilla warfare, the militias would not be without advantages too. Chief among these is the fact that they would likely be decentralized, autonomous military forces. As we’ve seen with the Tea Party and its attendant militias up to now, there is nobody really in charge at the top. There are national figures like Sarah Palin who command the respect of the movement, and there are noticeable Republican attempts to co-opt the movement, but so far there is no formal national leadership. The groups are free to set their own course. If this pattern was to continue in a war it would be hard for the militias to coordinate a cohesive national strategy, but it would also be difficult for the federal government, which would have to dismantle or defeat each individual group.
It is also worth remembering that the lack of religious, cultural and linguistic difference between military and militia cuts both ways. Just as the government could infiltrate the militias, so too could the militias infiltrate law enforcement and the military. In a sense they already have, as we have seen the rise of the Oath Keepers, an organization of current and former police officers and military members, which has ties to the militia and Tea Party movements. Although the Oath Keepers claim that their mission is primarily to defend the republic and to not obey any order which violates the Constitution, there is a darker side to some in their movement. For instance, an Oath Keeper and former Marine named Justin Dyer was arrested this past January on a sex charge. When police searched his home they found an M-203 grenade launcher that he had apparently stolen from the military.
The number of militia agents or sympathizers within law enforcement and the military is probably rather small, but their ability to cause trouble in the event of a war with the militias should be taken seriously. They could provide the insurgents with sensitive diagrams, blueprints and operational details (or leak them to the media or onto the Internet), and even provide them with stolen federal weapons. They could also commit acts of sabotage or terrorism. If veterans of the Iraq and Afghan wars found their way into the militias in large numbers it could put the military at a tactical disadvantage, as those militia fighters would already know what the military’s counterinsurgency weaknesses were.
Another possible militia advantage is the American military itself, with that chain of overseas bases stretching from Europe to the Middle East, from Asia to Latin America and beyond. Although the exact number of overseas bases can be disputed (independent analysts put it at a far higher number than official military figures), there is no question that a significant chunk of America’s ground, naval and air forces are currently deployed overseas. In Japan alone there are still over 30,000 U.S. military personnel. And trying to withdraw all of those troops to combat a domestic insurgency would be a major logistical feat, one that would probably be subject to countless delays and problems. No doubt some combat units could be sent home on short notice, but others, particularly armored units with lots of heavy equipment, would take much longer.
The American Empire
Even if those hundreds of thousands of overseas American troops could be brought home quickly, would Washington and the foreign policy establishment really dismantle this foreign empire of ours and let all our puppet and client states go their own ways? Speaking honestly, I have grave doubts about the willingness of America’s elites to surrender the imperial project, even in the face of a domestic insurgency. Keep in mind that from Congress to the Pentagon, from K Street to the White House, Washington is full of elites who have devoted their entire careers, even their entire lives, to the fact that America has this vast overseas empire. Nobody wants to just give up on their life’s work and there are powerful, established political interests who have major financial stakes in the maintenance of America’s imperial project.
We must also remember that any new American civil war is most likely to start in the Midwest or the former Confederacy, and it’s likely to start off as a small, local conflict. During the opening phases of such a war – before it is really even apparent that it is a war – the militias would likely be confronted first by state and federal law enforcement personnel, along with the National Guard. The heart of the insurgency would be small enough and far enough away enough from Washington that it would not seem like an imminent threat to the survival of the government. Even if the problem grew, there would still be federal military units based domestically who could be mobilized. Only if the insurgency managed to survive that initial confrontation and massively spread its operational reach and increase its number of fighters would we be looking at a situation where the mass withdrawal of federal troops from overseas would look like a necessary step.
The U.S. government loves having its cake and eating it too. America’s prestige and power, much of inherited from a previous generation, has allowed America’s political leaders to embark on massive social, economic and imperial projects while simultaneously dodging the difficult decisions required to make those projects work. This behavior is now so ingrained in our leaders that it has become pathological. Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush increased federal spending while simultaneously cutting taxes, and Bush launched a second war in Iraq even though he was warned the U.S. military didn’t have enough troops to prosecute both conflicts. Bill Clinton pressed hard for a settlement for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict while caving in to the very Israeli demands that made a settlement impossible. And Barack Obama tried to reform healthcare for all Americans while settling for a bill that was little more than a giveaway to the health industries who would be hurt by true reform. In all of these cases, and in many more that I lack the time to discuss, our leaders avoided making the difficult political decisions that their policies required, resulting in massive deficits, simmering international conflict, an overtaxed military and a sham reform bill.
It is for this reason that I believe that our government would try and maintain its foreign empire while trying to fight a domestic counterinsurgency war against the militias. The decision to close down America’s bases and bring the troops home would be such a difficult, massive and revolutionary action that no American political leader would be willing to make it, and Washington DC and the people who run it are so detached from the reality of everyday American life, so wrapped up in their own selfish concerns, that they would be able to delude themselves into thinking that they could defeat a growing insurgency while still policing the world. They would try to maintain the American empire until the insurgency controlled so much of the country that they had no choice but to bring the troops home, at which point it could very well be too late.
To be absolutely clear, my analysis of this matter does not suggest that the elites would resist all attempts to bring federal troops home. If the situation started getting out of control they would probably consent to the removal of a limited number of troops, most likely those with specialized equipment or training. But they would oppose the removal of large combat units by couching it in language about how the remaining troops should be kept in place to “reassure our allies” and “provide deterrence” against China, Russia, Iran, North Korea, etc. They would fight tooth and nail against the removal of those large combat units unless the situation got really and completely out of hand, at which point they would concede that large numbers of troops needed to be withdrawn, but not all of them, and that sufficient forces should be kept in place to keep the bases open and secure. They would fight to the last to keep the overseas bases themselves from closing down because they would know that, if they were to vacate a place like Okinawa or Guantanamo Bay, they would never be allowed back in.
Conclusions
My purpose in writing this article is not to suggest that a militia victory would be inevitable in a second American Civil War. Despite some notable vulnerabilities the federal government of the United States of America already has all the economic, political, law enforcement and military tools it would need to defeat a militia insurgency. And yet I believe that the likelihood of a militia victory is far greater than anyone wants to acknowledge because I have severe doubts about the ability of the federal government to effectively use those powers. Overthrowing the federal government would take years, but the outcomes of counterinsurgency wars are rarely decided quickly.
The history of the United States government in the twenty-first century has been nothing if not a legacy of inevitable disaster and failure. From the government’s failure to prevent 9/11 to its inability to capture Osama bin Laden, from the preventable disaster of Hurricane Katrina to the even more preventable disaster of Wall Street in 2008, from the botched occupation of Iraq to the botched attempt at reforming healthcare this year, the federal government has done practically nothing right and many things disastrously wrong. Why should their conduct of a second American Civil War turn out to be any less disastrous?
Simply put, I have little faith in the ability of today’s federal government to get something like this right, even with the more competent Barack Obama now being president. I don’t trust the institutions that are supposed to protect me. I don’t trust the elites to bring the military home from overseas if events warranted, and I don’t trust the military to use its power responsibly and not drive more Americans into the arms of the militias by using indiscriminate firepower. I don’t trust federal law enforcement to respect the rights of Americans citizens and I don’t trust the Justice Department to respect the judicial rights of suspected militia fighters, or any suggestion that suspected insurgents in government custody would not eventually be tortured and mistreated. I don’t trust the mercenaries that the government would probably hire to protect its civilian operations, and I don’t trust the corporate contractors and profiteers who would help with any war effort. I don’t trust the financial elites to not use the war as an excuse to further loot the country, and I don’t trust Congress or the White House. In short, I don’t trust any of the prospects for “victory” over the militias, no matter how overwhelming the government’s power may be.
